A population pyramid in general, it is a graphical illustration of the various age groups in a population showing the distribution of the population of various age groups. The population graph usually takes on the shape of a pyramid, therefore name population pyramid. The pyramid contains two back –to-back bar graphs with the population on the X-axis and the age on the Y-axis. Males are conventionally shown on the left and the females on the right.

In a population pyramid, the people under 14 years of age are considered as young dependents while people about the age of 80 are considered as old dependents. The middle section of the pyramid is made up of the working population, people who are able to work, generate income and sustain themselves and probably others. The formula to calculate the dependency ratio is as given as.

Some other terms that may come along are infant mortality rates, birth rate and death rate, each of them signifies different occurrence that can be seen from the population pyramid. There are however, two major cases and conditions that we would be able to observe from a population pyramid.

Aging Population



From a population pyramid, we can easily see the dependency ration of a country, in most cases, if not all, the population pyramid would be in a broad base pyramid shape when it is developing and a rocket shape when it becomes a developed country. The dependency ratio in a less developed country contains more young dependents whilst a more economically developed country may contain a higher number of old dependents. As a country develops, the economical costs for bringing up a baby increases and thus, people refuse to have babies. This would lead to a drastic drop in birth rate and with time, result in an aging population. The country would then not have enough children to replace the old and dead. This would lead to major consequences within the country.

Overpopulation



Overpopulation occurs during the developing stages of a country. The birth rate of the country would grow uncontrollably and soar to extremely high numbers. The young dependents at this point of time would be extremely high. And as this group of young dependents moves on to become a part of the working population, there may be a shortage of jobs in the country and may lead to many other problems. The amount of resource may also become scarce resulting in the decline of the countries’ economy.



Both cases of over and under population have dire consequences on the world’s resources. On one hand, high birth rates are occurring in countries which lack the necessary social services and economic infrastructure to provide adequately for its people. While on the other hand, low birth rates spell economic problems. Industries would soon experience shortages of young productive manpower. This could in turn lead to higher taxes for working individuals to support an ageing population.

Case Study – China



China’s population has been constantly changing throughout history due to many different reasons like war and political changes. In the near history, China’s population has been rising at an average of 25 million a year due to the Chairman Mao who was a fan for having a large population. He thus encouraged people to have more children. However, this soon led to complications within the country. China first of all had always been a closed door population, refusing to let people migrate in or out of China until 1979. The huge rise in population had greatly depleted the resources in mainland China in conjunction with the just concluded civil war.

The people in rural China often had more than 4 children in each family. With the great depletion of resource, China had almost become a wasteland. People were in poor living conditions in China but they could not leave China. The government thus, decided to have an attempt to reduce the increase in the population through the one child policy. The one child policy had been one of the most major population control strategies that had been put in place and of course, one of the most wide-scale and most successive one in the entire human history. The government spread enforced the policy to try and reduce the increase in the population. Each family was only encouraged to have one child, while that was not a law, it was a policy and if you had gone against it, there would be major consequences. For example, if you give birth to a second child then, you would either have to pay extravagant fees to keep the child or if you are unable to pay, you would have to give up your property to the government. Free sterilization, was also available at that time.

On the other hand, people who have followed the policy were given monetary incentives like a bonus every year. They were also given a certificate of honor each to show that they had followed the policy. This though managed to stop the drastic increase in population; it had resulted in the extreme imbalance in gender. Since the Chinese culture had always taught people that having a son was better than having a daughter since, first of all, t he son would be able to care for the parents when they get old and the son can also help work for the father at a young age. A girl however, would be married to another man there would not be anyone to support the parents at an old age. The family name would also not be continued since the woman follows his husband’s surname. The imbalance in gender had also led to many complications, leading from the lack of girls for each man. The unmarried percentage has thus also increased. Prostitution and bride selling has also become very common since there were not enough females.

Case Study – India



India is a country which is still in the process of developing itself, of improving itself into a developed country and in order to develop itself, the best way is to increase birth rates and have a larger work force. The competitiveness of the country would thus also increase. The birth rate of India is thus very high and thus, it is suffering from the conditions of overpopulation. Each family averages about 7 children, two of which are sons. This kind of situation has also led to the situation where not everyone in the country is able to have access to natural resources like clean water. As shown, 40% of the people in India do not have access to clean water. 60% of the population is unable to get a good education.

The culture in India also gives the condition that families favor boys over girls, thus after the government had placed down the rule for a 2 child family, wide scale abortion took place. This had greatly altered the gender ratio of India. In India, many husbands and mother in law forces the wife to keep bearing children for the family such that they would have more sons. If the wife is unable to bear sons for the husband, the husband in some cases may abuse them or even kill them. These most of the time are consequences of arranged marriage. The husband and wives are almost strangers to each other, however, are forced to marry. The women in these cases do not run away from their husbands because of a simple reason, they have no economic independence. The mothers also do not bear to run away, because most likely their children, a part of them would be left behind. Their motherly instincts would then tell them against leaving.

The Indian government, after noticing all these effects from overpopulation, has taken steps to try and curb the growth of this population. The laws for population control in India however, are not as well enforced as in China, the benefits that the population would reap as a result of this policy were not great, and thus they refused to follow the policy. The law was also enforced in the large towns while in the small towns and rural villages; the law was not as strongly enforced as in cases like China. The effects of the population control efforts were thus not visible.

Case Study – Singapore



Singapore is one of the fastest nations which have developed from a third world country into a first world country. This is also why Singapore is a country which has, in such a short time frame, experienced overpopulation and an ageing population. Therefore, we shall use Singapore as a case study and analyze the policies that have been put into place in order to solve overpopulation and ageing population. These two policies are known as the ‘stop and 2’ policy and the ‘have 3 or more if you can afford’ policy. These are the two main policies that have been put into place in order to curb population growth and drop.

The stop at two policies is rather similar to China’s one child policy and it is aimed at regulating the tremendous increase in the population. The ‘stop at two’ policy was not as strongly put into place as China’s one child policy, however, was so successful that the population started became an aging population. The ‘stop at two’ policy encourages couples in Singapore to only have 2 children at the maximum and marry at a later age. This campaign included monetary incentives and also posters that are pasted all around the place to influence the people and convey the idea of how two children is just the right number.

The ‘stop at two’ policy was so successful that the birth rates in Singapore fell so drastically that Singapore gradually became an aging population since the birth rate fell below the replacement rate and thus, the working population was also shrinking with each generation. Therefore, Singapore launched its next ‘have 3 or more if you can afford’ campaign which is aimed at increasing the replacement rate of the country so that it would not become an aging population.

Although the replacement rate of Singapore is low, it relies heavily on immigration to increase its population and this is something that Japan and pre-1979 China did not have. Japan had always been a closed door country and refused to have immigrants and China too wanted to keep the teachings of Confucius, thus they remained closed door until 1979, when it finally opened its door to other countries. Before 1979, nobody was allowed to migrate to Singapore and no Chinese was allowed to leave Singapore. Once China opened its doors to the world, millions of Chinese migrated to all parts of the world. Even now, 73 percent of the Singapore population is made up of Chinese.

Policies in Singapore



Singapore nowadays has been facing the case of an aging population. The government have put into place many different policies, each aiming to solve problems and reasons that are encouraging parents to have less children, including the high costs of living, the increased stress of parenthood.

The reasons why couples do not want to have too many children including the rising costs of raising a child. This is however, also due to the rising quality and quantity of what the parents wants for the child. For example, some married couples only want one child as they are keen on only and oversea education for their child, this would incur a high estimated cost of a million to bring up the child. This high cost discourages the parent from having more children since they may not be able to pay for a good education of the child in the future.

The increasing stressful life of being a parent further discourages the parents from having more than one child. In today’s society where there are huge amounts of information easily available online, there is also an increased risk of the child’s personality or behavior highly susceptible to change and effects of the media. The flurry of education and the uncertainty of war and terrorism also meant that the lives of the children would be unstable and unpredictable. The stress given to the parent in order to ensure that the children are taught the right things and pursue the right career in life discourages them from having more babies.

Stress and work demand of working mothers further influences the parents to not have a child since it is very hard for the mothers to be successful in work and yet be a good homemaker. If the mother cannot get domestic helpers, they would have to choose from work and family. The family bonding when the child is taken care of by domestic helpers would also be affected greatly resulting in the relationship between parents and child to loosen.

The work stress on singles now are also very high, greatly reducing the chances of the singles to socialize with their partner and the chances of the finding their suitable partner are also much more slimmer. They would also have to work overtime to cover up the work for their married colleagues who are taking maternity or child care leave. The singles also have their elderly parents to take care of since their married siblings need to tend to their own children.

The policies that Singapore has put into place to solve the population issues in an attempt to salvage the situation where Singapore is on its way to becoming an aging population, are centered on the problems listed above – to solve them.

The baby bonus scheme has been put into place in order to reduce the financial burden that has been placed upon parents when they have a baby, the baby bonus also at times, acts as monetary incentives for parents to have more children. The baby bonus scheme was put into place in April 2001 and enhanced in August 2003. The baby bonus scheme allow parents get cash gifts of 3000 dollars for the first and second and 6000 for the third and fourth child.

The government childcare subsidy has also been put into place in order to reduce the financial burden on parents when they cannot take care of the child and wants to send him into child care. This subsidy aims to help working parents to be able to work in peace and send their children to be taken care of by the child care centers which are set up. This is also to help parents who do not have time to take a leave from work and take care of the child. Childcare leave has also been incorporated in companies so that employees can take a few hours off in order to take care of their children without facing the pressing demand of work.

The special tax rebate aims to encourage couples to have children at a younger age. Monetary incentives which include tax rebates is given to mothers who have more than 2 babies before the age of 31. The special tax rebate can be offset against either or both parents’ income tax liabilities. The further tax rebate was then introduced in 1987 which is only applicable to income of the mother. This policy is in place to not only act as monetary incentive, but also to reduce the financial burden faced by parents when they bring up a baby.

The flexi-work arrangement policy also plays an important role in improving the work-life balance of parents. The flexi-work arrangement policy includes allowing parent to work at home and also for parents to be able to take child care leave in order to take better care of their child without sending them to child care. This policy is also to remove the need for a domestic helper and to close the gap between people’s work-family ideals and their actual decisions. With this policy in place, parents would be able to work and yet, take care of their children without the fear of losing competitiveness in the field of their job, thereby encouraging them to have babies.

Maternity and paternity leaves are also implemented to encouraged parents to have children without facing work stress and the fear of being fired due to loss of human capital development since mothers would not be able to do much when they are pregnant. They mothers would even fear retrenchment due to their inability when their pregnant. This policy would allow them to work yet not face the fear of retrenchment greatly reducing the work stress faced by the mothers during the period of time when the mother is pregnant and during the time when the child needs to be taken care of by the mother.

With all these policies put into place, I believe that the most effective policy that has been put into place is the flexi-work arrangement. We must understand that in today’s society, money is not the root of problem; money is not the main reason that discourages the parents from having more children. Money is important, but only to a certain extent. It is not able to acquire a lot of things including the sacrifices that a parent makes after making a decision of having a child. The time, the effort, the sacrifice of human capital development, all these cannot be compensated simply by the government giving that small amount of money to the parents. Money is not the root of all cause. Therefore, I believe that the baby bonuses that have been put into place to act as monetary incentives are not very important and are not very effective too. The tax rebate that the government gives to encourage parents to have more babies would also only play a small role in encouraging parents to have babies by reducing the financial burden of the parents during the time when the child is brought up. The flexi-work arrangement, however, appears to be the most important and most effective policy that the government has put into place in an attempt to encourage parents to have more babies. The flexi-work arrangement allows the parents to spend more time together with the child, thereby promoting family bonding and gorge stronger relationships between the child and the parent. This is something that would definitely not be possible to achieve if a child is sent to a childcare center. The baby bonus that is given by the government would also not be possible to achieves, therefore, I believe that the flexi-work policy is the most important and most effective policy put into place.

‘Have three or more if you can afford it’ – Policy



The replacement rate of Singapore has been constantly falling ever since the 1960s when the ‘Stop at 2 policy was implemented’ to the 1.11 replacement rate of Singapore today. Since the Singapore replacement rate has gone below 1.44 in the late 1980s. The ‘Stop at 2’ policy had been too successful leading to the drastic reduction in birth rates. The government then started reversing its policies when they saw that the birth rate was falling too quickly. The ‘Have 3 or more if you can afford it’ policy then came in place. This policy was an attempt to bring Singapore’s birth rate back up again since the birth rate of 1.11 is too low. It implies that for every couple, an average of 1 child is born and so our population halves every generation. This situation is scary and has to be avoided.

The ‘Have three or more if you can afford it’ policy was not successful as seen from how the birth rate continued to drop. The probable reasons why the ‘Stop at two’ policy was successful was because, it is easier for the government to tax people and fine people for having too many children, however, it is not possible for the government to force the population to have more children. This could also account for the failure of the ‘Have three or more if you can afford it’ policy. The government can only provide incentives and benefits to those who choose to follow what the government says and have more children. If the couples were forced to have more children, first of all it would lead to general unhappiness among the population, as a parent during that time period said, ‘are we being told to have more children for the sake of the country or for ourselves?’ If the parents are having more children just because the country needs more children, the happiness of the children would get compromised as the parents do not really want the children.

Ageing Population – Singapore



Reasons



For every developed country, they would face the eventual problem of an ageing population. There may be many different reasons that may account for the occurrence of an ageing population. One possible reason could be post-war baby boom. During the war, very few children were born as the men were also out fighting a battle, when they return home, a lot of children would be born. In the following generations however, less babies were born, thus the population pyramid would eventually become an inverted pyramid with the elderly population making up a bulk of the population. The country would also as a result have an ageing population.

An ageing population can also be as a result of the increase in technology and living conditions which would inversely mean an increase in the life expectancy of the elderly. With an increased life expectancy, more old folks would live to an older age, thus increasing the proportion of the population which is made up of elderly people.

An ageing population can also be due to a decrease in the number of babies born over time. This could be as a result of the increasing trend of women being more educated, thus feel that career is more important than family. The women would therefore focus on their studies and marry late, thus they would miss the fertile period or have less time to have children. Families would therefore be smaller, thus the population pyramid would therefore as the year pass become inverted and the country would have an ageing population. An ageing population can also be as a result of the increase in cost of living. With more expensive cost of living, parents would want to have fewer children. With the increase in availability of contraceptives and also the education level of the population, they would learn about birth control and thus think before they choose to have a child. The birth rate would therefore drop and over time, lead to an ageing population. Similarly, in today’s high-tech society, people do not need manual labor like in the past to work in a farm, thus fewer children are needed by each family and there would be an ageing population.

An ageing population may also be as a result of legalized abortion, as parents would want to abort girls and try again for boys. This might be as a result of the traditional thinking that boys are better than girls since boys can work and also be there to support the parents when they grow old while daughters would be married to another man and would not be able to support the parents when they grow old. Thus abortion would be more common and fewer children would be born.

Effects



With an ageing population, there are less economically active people to provide for the more dependents. Thus the government would receive less money from taxes in overall and to increase the amount of money received from taxes, the economically active people would be more burdened. With an ageing population, there would also be less working people to provide for more young and old.

Solutions



Solutions to this problem could include making full use of the elderly population for example to invite them to share their working experience with the young people and share their expertise, to be ‘the brains’ behind the workers. The government can also, in order to cope with the problems of an ageing population, rise the retirement age since some old folks above the age of 65 thus, we should make full use of them and allow then to work on as less economically active people.