Suchergebnisse

There is growing evidence that differences in children's intellectual, emotional and behavioural development by parents' socio-economic status emerge at early ages and that these differences cast a long shadow over subsequent achievements. This article demonstrates with the Millennium Cohort Study that differences by parents' income group in cognitive and behavioural development emerge by the child's third birthday. It shows that an important part of these differences can be accounted for by 'what parents do' in terms of educational activities and parenting style.

Résumé Ermisch (John). - Économie, politique et changement familial L'évolution de la nuptialité, du divorce et de la fécondité, en Europe et dans les autres pays industriels depuis vingt ans, a profondément modifié les structures familiales. Dans le même temps, la proportion de femmes actives, en particulier les mères, a fortement augmenté. Le lien avec la baisse de la fécondité est établi trop souvent de façon simpliste. En fait, les changements ne sont que les éléments d'un ensemble complexe. A cause de leurs interactions mutuelles, on les comprend mieux en les prenant tous en même temps. Les changements du marché du travail et de la législation qui ont affecté l'emploi féminin se sont répercutés sur le divorce et la fécondité, de même que les modifications du divorce ont eu un écho sur la fécondité et l'activité féminine. Il en est résulté une évolution des structures familiales, qui a accru les risques de pauvreté, en particulier parce que s'est trouvée élargie la place des familles monoparentales. Le démêlage de cet écheveau de relations est un défi passionnant pour la recherche.

This article examines the conditions under which social policy would be constrained by European economic integration and assesses whether a Social Charter is needed. It provides a framework for interpreting the 'principle of subsidiarity', examines the potential for a direct effect of social benefits on the movement of people within the EC, investigates the impact of the taxes used to finance social policy on the location of businesses and people and the incidence of these taxes. As the degree of labour mobility in response to differences in real wages between EC countries is demonstrated to be crucial in deciding whether a Social Charter is necessary, a substantial part of the paper examines the evidence on the responsiveness of labour mobility, and it suggests little need for a Social Charter.

The idea that economic developments can affect births is an old one, going back to Malthus'Essay on Populationin the early 19th century. In more recent times, the economic analysis of fertility was resurrected by Becker (1960) and developed by Easterlin (1980), Willis (1973), Becker (1981) and others. This article reports on an application of this economic approach to the analysis of fluctuations in births in Britain during the post-war period, building on previous work by De Cooman, Ermisch and Joshi (1987).