In Britain, there is some evidence that a new and more effective form of contraception has been developed. It is called a mortgage, writes Breda O'Brien.
Sociologist Catherine Hakim of the London School of Economics examines the phenomenon in a forthcoming book, Models of the Family in Modern Societies (Ashgate, August 2003). She suggests that the substantial debt required to finance home purchase means that some women delay child-rearing, while others, who would prefer to be home with their children, are forced into full-time work.
Prior to this, Ms Hakim's major contribution to the debate on women's lives was her development of preference theory. She found that women were not a homogenous group, and that their aims in life were very different. Contrary to old-fashioned feminist doctrine, the majority of mothers prioritised family, not career, and wanted it that way.
Ms Hakim found that there are a small number of women, somewhere between 10 per cent and 20 per cent, who are completely work-centred. They tend to be childless and, if married, are more likely to divorce. The majority of women fall into the category which she calls "adaptive". They want to work, but their families are their priority. They much prefer part-time flexible work to full-time hours. They constitute somewhere between 40 per cent and 60 per cent of the population.
Then there are the home-centred women, who do not want to work outside the home at all, and who favour the traditional division of labour. They constitute some 10-20 per cent of the population. Ms Hakim says drily that the UK's Labour government conducted extensive research in 1998 and 1999 which confirms this division of women into three distinct categories. Labour then proceeded as if all women are work-centred, and are simply praying for more paid childcare so that they can rush off to their satisfying careers.
We have been acting in a similar fashion in this country, with a concerted push to get more women into the full-time workforce. Here, too, we have seen couples locked into the double-income trap in order to secure a home of their own. This not only adds immeasurably to stress, it is also very short-sighted.
Recently, the Mercer Consulting Report delivered to the Department of Social and Family Affairs said the cost of providing nursing homes and home help for elderly people would rise by nearly 60 per cent in the next decade. This is due to the fall in the birth rate and the increase in the number of women in the labour force. "The provision of informal care by family members can no longer be presumed upon," according to the report.
But this is only one warning signal. In an article entitled "The need for comprehensive reforms to deal with population ageing" in the April monthly bulletin of the European Central Bank, the position is set out in stark form. It echoes a previous report by the European Union in October 2001, with the equally catchy title Budgetary Policy Challenges Posed by an Ageing Population. We are living longer and having fewer children. Since pensions are paid on a "pay as you go" basis, which means that the current working generation funds the pensions of the previous generation, this has potentially catastrophic consequences.
In the year 2000 in the EU there was a ratio of one person over 64 to every four people between 15 and 64. In 2050, there will be one over 64 to every two between 15 and 64. The average costs of pensions alone in the EU are already 18 per cent of GDP - very high by international standards. This cost will rise by between 3 per cent and 6 per cent depending on the country.
The rising cost of healthcare for the elderly will add between 2 per cent and 4 per cent depending on the country, with far fewer taxpayers to share the burden. Those figures don't look too worrying, until you realise what it means in terms of the proportion of tax which we will be paying. Assuming optimistically that Ireland is on the lower end of the scale, then the costs of ageing will increase by approximately 5 per cent of GDP, but by 15 per cent as a proportion of the taxes we pay.
Official reports on the problem sometimes give the underlying reasons for the changes, but rarely comment on them. In Europe we are delaying marriage, or cohabiting, having fewer children, and couples break up more frequently. Let's put morality aside for a moment, and just do maths. A separated or divorced couple with one or two children is much less likely to be cared for by a family member in old age.
In our pursuit of personal fulfilment, we have merrily hacked away at the roots of intergenerational solidarity, at the idea that one generation cares for the next and is cared for in turn. When we get to be grandmas and grandpas, we can count on living longer. What we cannot count on is having family members to care for us.
Nor do we have any cause for complacency in Ireland. The effects may not be seen for 30 years, because we have a younger population than the rest of Europe, but that just constitutes a stay of execution, not a pardon.
Generations of Irish people worked hard, had large families and suffered privations which laid the basis for the prosperity we have today. Since that time there has been a vast change in values. Not only that, those changed values are reinforced by successive governments, which have pushed more and more women into full-time work, and discriminated against single-income families through individualisation. Yet Ms Hakim says that home-centred women are the ones most likely to have larger families.
Forcing them into the workplace adds to the problem of the slowly ticking demographic time-bomb. As for our collective values as a society, it will be interesting to see what effect our pursuit of an ethic of independence rather than interdependence, will have in the long term. This generation reveres wealth and despises "losers". It has passed legislation on divorce, looks benignly on sexual freedom, and is more accepting of abortion. Will a younger generation, our grandchildren, have absorbed an ethic of self-sacrifice from us which will make them happy to have poorer services and a more modest lifestyle because there are so many older people around? Or will we have taught them well, to consider only themselves?