three - Socio-economic change and social well-being trends

Summary

Social and family policy debates respond to: (1) ‘the new social risks and opportunities’ associated with demographic and socio-economic transformations (Taylor-Gooby, 2004); and (2) child, family and social well-being trends (MacInnes et al, 2009). In recent years, social policy debates have been dominated by the economic crisis in the global financial system and how to minimalise economic recession. Politicians and the media further often point to the social risks and fragmentation created by ‘family and social breakdown’ (Cameron, 2009) and ‘excessive individualism’ (Layard and Dunn, 2009). Chapter Two, however, indicated that empirical studies on child, adult, family and social well-being refute alarmist views about ‘social breakdown’. This chapter therefore reviews social trends and research debates.

Demographic change

Alongside the changes in partnering, family formations and living arrangements described in Chapter Two, the post-war era saw declining fertility rates, an ageing population and increasing ethnic diversity. In England and Wales, the Total Fertility Rate (TFR) rose in the immediate post-war era, peaking in 1963 when, on average, women gave birth to 3 children each (ONS, 2009). Following this postwar baby boom, the TFR dramatically declined. By 1975 women on average bore 1.6 children each (ONS, 2009). Since then the TFR has drifted between 1.6 and 1.9 children per woman (ONS, 2009). Moreover, the age at which women first bear children has increased, as have rates of childlessness among women. In England and Wales, the average age at which women had their first child in 1971 was 26.6 years (ONS, 2010a). By 2009, this had increased to 29.4 years (ONS, 2010a). In the UK, around 9% of women born in 1945 did not have children, compared to 20% of those born in 1965 (ONS, 2010). The fall in fertility rates in the 1960s and 1970s was associated with a ‘transformation in intimacy’ (the ‘decoupling’ of sexual relations from reproduction, family formation and childbearing) and more equal opportunities for women (Hantrais, 2004). However, there is concern that women now are unable to have as many children as they would prefer, as European social surveys suggest that most prefer to have at least two children (Esping-Andersen, 2009).