Changing Population Age Research Articles

Norwegian sandwiches: On the prevalence and consequences of family and work role squeezes over the life course.

Population ageing changes profoundly the current balance between generations. Governments are responding with policies to promote later retirement and family care, but these ideals may come in conflict in mid-life when family obligations can be hard to reconcile with employment. Yet we know little about the prevalence of being "sandwiched", and even less about the consequences. This article maps out the prevalence of different forms of family and work sandwiching for the Norwegian population, and explores adaptive strategies and psycho-social outcomes. The analyses are based on data from the NorLAG and LOGG studies (n=15 109, age 18-84). Preliminary findings indicate that 75-80% of the population are located in-between younger and older family generations in mid-life, the great majority are at the same time in paid work, but comparatively few (8-9% aged 35-45) have both children and parents in need at the same time, and fewer still (3%) are then also caregivers to older parents. Although few in proportion of their age group, they add up to a considerable number of persons. Women are more likely to reduce work in response to family needs than men. Implications of family and work sandwiching for health and well-being are analysed.

If you build it, will they come? Biofuel plants and demographic trends in the Midwest

The rural United States has suffered long-term population decline over the past several decades, especially in farming communities. In recent years, biofuel production has been argued to hold potential for the revitalization of rural America and in response, many rural communities have eagerly attempted to attract ethanol plants as a local development effort. This study conceptualizes economic revitalization in terms of population dynamics and investigates whether the establishment of a biofuel plant has been associated with changes in population aging, natural increase, and/or migration trends in the West North Central United States, the location of the majority of the nation’s biofuel plants. Using path dependence as a conceptual framework and aggregate statistics from a variety of sources, results from spatial regression models indicate that despite initial expectations, ethanol plants have no association with the demographic trajectories of rural counties.

Generational Economics in a Changing World

Human hunter-gatherers evolved a life strategy that involved extensive sharing of food and support within and across generations, social behaviors that coevolved with the cognitive and emotional mental apparatus needed to sustain such sophisticated sociality. Adults at all ages produced surplus food which was transferred downwards to children, to support their prolonged period of nutritional dependency, until around age 20. Over a long period of economic development, and a shorter period of demographic transition, generational relations interacted with the changing environment, including changing population age distributions, life cycle behavior, technologies, and institutional arrangements. Similar patterns may have held during land abundant subsistence agriculture, but in intensive agriculture, perhaps due to their property rights in land, the elderly became net consumers in a stage of partial retirement, when they were sustained in part by food transfers from their adult children. At the same time, assets in general became more important – land, buildings, property of all sorts. These assets provided an alternative means for the elderly to support themselves in retirement. These trends continued as agriculture gave way to industry, with retirement earlier and more complete. The growth of a public sector reinforced the pattern of downward transfers with public education and health care for children. However, as states industrialized and the welfare state grew, transfers to the elderly for pensions and health care became increasingly important, with a fiscal effect exacerbated by population aging. At the same time, the growth of capital and financial institutions provided new forms of asset accumulation along with private pensions. These two trends reduced the role of the family in providing for the elderly. Our evolved sociality and ethic of sharing and fairness is now expressed through welfare state redistributive programs, and continuing and intensifying public and private investment in children. But now population aging, interacting with the public programs for the elderly, has led to a reversal in the direction of resource flows across age, from downward (old to young) to upward (young to old). We are currently able both to invest in the young and care for the newly dependent elderly. However, the old age dependency ratio is projected to double or triple in coming decades in the rich industrial countries. The public costs of the elderly may increasingly compete with investments in children through the public sector budget constraint. It remains to be seen whether the elderly, in the context of new public policies, will opt to work until substantially older ages, and whether the rapid growth of health care expenditures will be restrained.

Subjective Satisfaction with Medical Care among Older People: Comprehensiveness, General Satisfaction and Accessibility

The changing population age structure and rapidly increasing medical costs make providing high-quality, effective medical care for the elderly a challenge. This study assessed the satisfaction with medical care in terms of comprehensiveness, general satisfaction, and accessibility among community-dwelling Korean elders. Data were obtained from a nationwide representative sample of the older adults(aged 65 years old or older) living in the community, who participated in a 2006 telephone survey conducted using random digit dialing (n=881). General satisfaction, comprehensiveness and accessibility were measured using a 10-item satisfaction survey questionnaire. Descriptive analysis was used to assess the distribution of each of three components of subjective satisfaction. Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was used to examine the association of each of the three components with socioeconomic variables. Comprehensiveness and general satisfaction were low among older people with a high socioeconomic status. Accessibility was evaluated as low among older people of low socioeconomic status, those living in rural areas and those who were medical aid beneficiaries. Urgent interventions should be considered in order to improve accessibility to medical care for elders of low socioeconomic status and those living in rural communities. Given the rapid aging of the population, we need to develop a monitoring system to improve the quality of geriatric care.

Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division, United Nations Expert Group Meeting on Social and Economic Implications of Changing Population Age Structures

Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division, United Nations Expert Group Meeting on Social and Economic Implications of Changing Population Age Structures

A Dynamical Approach To Evaluate Risk In Resource Management

With the depletion of many natural resources, we are growing aware of the need to understand the risks that stem from different management decisions. Here, we outline an approach to test the ability of different dynamical signatures to characterize time-series data: how likely is it that a natural population is declining, sustainable, or increasing, and at what rates are these temporal changes likely occurring? These dynamical signatures can serve as a robust foundation on which to formulate alternative scenarios in a decision analysis. They take account of much of the uncertainty in model parameters and have precise mathematical underpinnings with associated risks. We present methods to evaluate the likelihood of these scenarios, and ways that the analysis can be graphically represented. We discuss different ecological factors such as climate variability, life history, ecosystem interactions, and a changing population age structure, all of which impact the dynamics of natural populations. Considering the types of dynamical signatures that emerge from these factors can change our understanding of risk and the decisions that we make.

Age-structure, recruitment, and adult mortality in populations of the Atlantic surfclam, Spisula solidissima , from 1978 to 1997

The Atlantic surfclam, Spisula solidissima (Dillwyn, 1817), is a dominant member of the benthic community on the continental shelf from Georges Bank to North Carolina, USA. This bivalve has supported a major fishery, primarily off New Jersey and the Delmarva Peninsula, since the 1960s. Early papers documented that these populations were at historical lows in the mid-1970s owing to commercial harvesting and a hypoxic event off New Jersey. It was also shown that major recruitment took place off New Jersey in 1976 and off the Delmarva Peninsula in 1977. Because the size frequencies of surfclams from federal surveys do not show distinct year classes, there has been uncertainty about the number of year classes in these populations throughout the 1980s and 1990s. The present study describes changes in population age- and size-structure from 1978 to 1997 in federal waters (≥5.5 km from shore) of the USA. Given the 30 to 35 year life span of S. solidissima, these populations could be composed of many year classes. Yet, these populations were composed of only two to three year classes in 1978. Through annual recruitment, the number of year classes increased over time, and populations off New Jersey and the Delmarva Peninsula contained at least 19 year classes in 1997. This major change in population structure over time was not evident from examination of available size-frequency data, and could only be inferred from data on age-composition. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the surfclam fishery was supported by multiple year classes. The mean and variance of recruitment to the New Jersey region, as indicated by the abundance of 4-year-olds over time, was greater than that off Delmarva, particularly between 1980 and 1986. The instantaneous rate of adult mortality, which includes the effect of harvesting, was approximately 0.26 yr−1 in each region.

The impact of aging on health care expenditure in Sweden

This study measures the impact of aging on health care expenditure in Sweden in 1970–1985 and the projected impact for 1985–2005. In addition, the distribution of health care expenditure over different age groups is analysed. The study shows that changes in population aging account for barely 13% of the total increase in health care expenditure during the period 1970–1985, and that it is the combined effect of changes in population aging plus the faster increase in health care expenditure per capita in older age groups that governs the development of an increasing concentration of health care expenditure to older age groups. During the period 1976–1985 the per capita health care expenditure increased modestly for the ages 0–74, but 54% for persons older than 74 years.

Seasonal Demography and Movements of Cottontail Rabbits on Isolated Playa Basins

We examined spatial and temporal changes in population density, age structure, and individual movement distances of eastern cottontail rabbits (Sylvilagus floridanus) on 2 playa lake basins in the Texas Panhandle. We obtained 1,857 captures of 931 individual rabbits during 7,450 trap nights from February through November 1981. Population densities during prereproductive periods were 8.2 and 11.6 cottontails per ha on playa basins A and B, respectively. Subsequent changes in density were related to reproductive recruitment and to dispersal. Densities peaked at 28.4 and 26.9 cottontails per ha on playa basins A and B, respectively, during summer trapping periods. Adult :juvenile ratios declined coincident with the production of 7 litters. Distribution of captures within each playa basin and dispersal patterns were related to seasonal maturation and harvest of surrounding crops. A greater (P 2 times revealed that seasonal movement distances reflected the availability of habitats (i.e., crops) surrounding playa basins. J. WILDL. MANAGE. 54(3):403-409 Fragmentation and isolation of wildlife habitats by agricultural practices in the United States have dramatically reduced the abundance and diversity of native wildlife (Burger 1978). In fragmented habitat, native wildlife populations have been subdivided spatially and restricted to small areas of permanent cover such as fence rows and shelter belts (Swihart and Yahner 1982). These populations may be regulated as much by the availability, spatial arrangement, and interconnected nature of habitat as they are by fecundity and mortality rates (Fahrig and Merriam 1985). In regions of intensive agricultural activity, wildlife inhabiting small relic areas of native habitat may represent source populations (Pulliam 1988) where reproduction exceeds available cover, food resources, and breeding sites. Similarly, surrounding agricultural areas may constitute population sinks. Crops provide marginal habitat for a portion of the year, but are eliminated after harvest. Agricultural habitats might be expected to alter seasonal movements and dispersion of individuals, increase the potential productivity of source populations, and facilitate dispersal among isolated areas of permanent cover. The eastern cottontail rabbit inhabits earlymidsuccessional habitats over much of the continental United States, including all but the southwestern portion of Texas (Davis 1974). Previous studies of cottontail reproductive phenology (Chapman and Morgan 1973) and population dynamics (Bothma and Teer 1977) were done in southern and southeastern Texas and over much of the species' native range (see Chapman et al. 1982). However, relatively little work has been done on cottontails in finite and dispersed playa basin habitats that dominate most of the southern Great Plains. We present data on seasonal changes in cottontail demographic characteristics and movements for discrete populations inhabiting playa basins in the Texas Panhandle. Our objectives were to document seasonal variations in population densities, age structure, and breeding chronology. Further, analyses of cottontail movements and dispersion were examined relative to changing population age structure and the influences of adjacent agricultural activities. This work was funded by the Caesar Kleberg Foundation for Wildlife Conservation, The Noxious Brush and Weed Control Program at Texas Tech University, and through contract DEAC09-765R00819 between the U.S. Department of Energy and the University of Georgia's Institute of Ecology. This paper is Manuscript Number T-9-291, College of Agricultural Sciences, Texas Tech University. i'Present address: Department of Zoology, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602. 2 Present address: School of Forest Resources, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602.

The Meaning of Housing in America

Abstract Housing activity—households using dwellings—forms a central feature in the human use of the earth. A house is a structure; a home is an experience. Housing is an interactive process with meanings tied to status, social position, wealth, power, aspirations, and personal identity. Housing decisions reflect social drives for congregation and segregation within U.S. cities, thus making social and cultural categories of urban society visible, intelligible, and stable. U.S. urban housing landscapes are destabilized by changing population age structure, wealth transfers among neighborhoods, foreign immigration, and interregional wealth shifts. Despite vigorous initiatives to break down neighborhood lass barriers, zoning laws and court decisions staunchly protect single-family housing areas, perhaps as an expression of a basic conservative instinct to protect and nurture human life. Valiant efforts to modify zoning laws to improve the position of weaker classes without threatening the stronger may produc...