First birth trends in developed countries: a cohort analysis

-cohort analysis, first birth

Fertility in Austria: Past, Present and the Near Future

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First birth trends in developed countries

Levels and trends of various facets concerning first births are continuously changing. The evidence confirms that the postponement of first births is an ongoing and persisting process which started in western countries among cohorts of the 1940s, but only in the 1960s cohorts in Central and Eastern Europe. The mean age of women having first births is universally rising. Fertility of older women was increasing. The decline in childbearing of young women is robust among the cohorts of the late 1960s and the 1970s; in Southern Europe as well as in central and Eastern Europe the rates of decline have accelerated. Childbearing behavior in the formerly socialist countries is in transition to a different regime.changing age patterns, childlessness, cohort analysis, developed countries, first birth, postponement, transition to different age patterns in Central and Eastern Europe

Fertility Austria: Past, present and the near future

In the European context Austria's population has a tradition of low fertility. Between the world wars of the 20th century Austria had the lowest fertility in Europe. It recovered most notably during the 1950s and early 1960s, but has been declining ever since. Contemporary childbearing trends and patterns are characterised by a continuing delay in childbearing which started with women born in the late 1940s. Women born during the 1970s had lower fertility than any previous cohorts. Whether they were postponing their births and/or many of them deciding not to have any children remains to be seen. In the cohorts of the mid- to late 1960s only about three-quarters of all women had a first birth and around one-quarter of Austrian women remained childless. This is one of the highest known proportions of childless women in Europe. At the turn of the century ideal and actual expected family size were among the lowest in Europe, 1.7 and 1.5 children per couple, respectively. Childbearing behaviour of its young inhabitants suggests that Austria will reassume the tradition of having one of the lowest fertility levels in Europe during the initial years, possibly decades, of the 21st century. If these low fertility levels were to persist, a considerable decline in population size as well as rapid population ageing are inevitable implying the need for societal and policy adjustments

Organic-Acid Mediated Bulk Polymerization of e-Caprolactam and Its Copolymerization with e-Caprolactone

Polyamides (PA) constitute one of the most important classes of polymeric materials and have gained strong position in different areas, such as textiles, fibers, and construction materials. Whereas most PA are synthesized by stepgrowth polycondensation, PA 6 is synthesized by ring opening polymerization (ROP) of e-caprolactam (e-CLa). The most popular ROP methods involve the use of alkaline metal catalyst difficult to handle at large scale. In this article, we propose the use of organic acids for the ROP of e-CLa in bulk at 180 8C (below the polymer’s melting point). Among evaluated organic acids, sulfonic acids were found to be the most effective for the polymerization of e-CLa , being the Brønsted acid ionic liquid: 1-(4- sulfobutyl)23-methylimidazolium hydrogen sulfate the most suitable due to its higher thermal stability. End-group analysis by 1H nuclear magnetic resonance and model reactions provided mechanistic insights and suggested that the catalytic activity of sulfonic acids was a function of not only the acid strength, but of the nucleophilic character of conjugate base as well. Finally, the ability of sulfonic acid to promote the copolymerization of e-CLa and e-caprolactone is demonstrated. As a result, poly(e-caprolactam-co-e-caprolactone) copolymers with considerably randomness are obtained. This benign route allows the synthesis of poly(ester amide)s with different thermal and mechanical properties.The authors acknowledge the financial support of Euskampus Fundazioa, the Spanish Ministery of Economy and Competition through project CTQ2014‐53458‐1 and the European Commission through project SUSPOL‐EJD 642671 and FP7‐PEOPLE‐212‐ITN 316832‐OLIMPIA (D. Mantione). Haritz Sardon gratefully acknowledges financial support from MINECO through project FDI 16507. A. Sanchez‐Sanchez thanks “Convocatoria de Contratación para la especialización de personal investigador doctor en la UPV/EHU” for financial support. The SGIKER UPV/EHU for the NMR facilities of Gipuzkoa campus are acknowledged