Modelling demographic behaviours in the French microsimulation model Destinie: An analysis of future change in completed fertility

Future change in partnerships and fertility are not easy to forecast. However, the fertility of the youngest cohorts will depend on those behaviours. The way young people start a partnership has changed a lot during the past three decades. Many couples are now unmarried, union disruptions and step-families are more frequent, young people leave school later and the age of motherhood has increased. Microsimulation can provide a measure of the change in future completed fertility, which helps to analyse the influence of current behaviours on future change in family structures. If behaviours remain the same as the ones observed from 1995 to 1996, completed fertility may decrease to less than 2 children per woman born around 1970 and remain constant about 1.9 children per woman for women born after 1975. This decrease stems from a postponement in the age of motherhood and an increase in union disruptions. Fertility at older ages as well as the desire to have at least one common biological child in step-family do not offset the negative effects of delaying births and living longer without a partner before the age of 45. Timing in unions and disruptions seems to play an important role in fertility. Women who live only a short time without a partner after a disruption experience have practically the same number of children as those who are still living with their first coresident partner. These simulations remain of course prospective and rely on several assumptions which may not prove adequate in the future. In particular, they assume that future behaviours will remain identical to the ones currently observed. Although estimated behaviours provide results consistent with available empirical work, it does not mean that some household behaviours will not change in the long-run.microsimulation, demographic trends, fertility

Female labor supply and child care

We use household income tax data to estimate a structural model of female labor supply and utilization of paid child care outside the home. We find that child care costs have little impact on the participation decision of mothers of young children. However, they influence hours of work, as well as the decision to utilize paid child care. We use our results to simulate various policy reforms. Suppressing the APE (Parental Education Aid) would cause the participation rate in our sample to rise by 4 points and the proportion of mothers using outside paid care to rise by 2 points. Examining the effects on aggregate female labor supply of other policies that affect child care costs, we generally find that intensive effects caused by changes in working time are of the same order of magnitude as extensive effects due to changes in female participation.Child Care, female labor supply, fiscal policies

Socioeconomic inequalities in cause specific mortality among older people in France

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>European comparative studies documented a clear North-South divide in socioeconomic inequalities with cancer being the most important contributor to inequalities in total mortality among middle aged men in Latin Europe (France, Spain, Portugal, Italy). The aim of this paper is to investigate educational inequalities in mortality by gender, age and causes of death in France, with a special emphasis on people aged 75 years and more.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We used data from a longitudinal population sample that includes 1% of the French population. Risk of death (total and cause specific) in the period 1990-1999 according to education was analysed using Cox regression models by age group (45-59, 60-74, and 75+). Inequalities were quantified using both relative (ratio) and absolute (difference) measures.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Relative inequalities decreased with age but were still observed in the oldest age group. Absolute inequalities increased with age. This increase was particularly pronounced for cardiovascular diseases. The contribution of different causes of death to absolute inequalities in total mortality differed between age groups. In particular, the contribution of cancer deaths decreased substantially between the age groups 60-74 years and 75 years and more, both in men and in women.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>This study suggests that the large contribution of cancer deaths to the excess mortality among low educated people that was observed among middle aged men in Latin Europe is not observed among French people aged 75 years and more. This should be confirmed among other Latin Europe countries.</p