Family Change

1
Family Change
2
Family Change

• Material Conditions
• Ideology
• Experiences

3
Key Shifts With Industrialization

• Material-
• Social Morphological Transition- shifts in
  populations (size, shape of distribution and
  region)
• Ideological-
• The role of families in society and the roles
  family fulfilled for individuals are changing.
• Experiential-
• How one experiences self in family life, the
  expectations foisted on one, what one can expect,
  are shifting.

4
The Family as a Sphere of Change

• Changes in Size
• Changes in Structure
• Changes in Role and Function
• Changes in what constitutes family life

5
The Size of Populations

• Industrialization saw rapid population growth, as
  death rates fell.
• This was followed by a decline in birth rates.
• Industrialized nations have little to no
  population growth.

6
Population Growth
7
Population Growth Reconsidered

• The rate of population increase is now
  approximately 1.7 percent per year. It is
  expected to decline to a little less than 1
  percent sometime during 2020-2025.
• What we see then is very low or negative growth
  in developed areas and rapid growth in others.
• Developing countries will account for 95 of the
  worlds population increase during 2000-2025.

8
Three Main Factors That Worked Together to Affect
Fertility Control Attitudes and Practices

• 1) The survival value of pronatalism was no
  longer relevant.
• 2) The role of children had shifted from
  producers to consumers of family resources.
• 3) Large Families were no longer providing
  support services for their members, such as
  health care, child care, shelter, emergency care,
  and support for the elderly.

9
Changes in Size

• In Western Europe and the U.S. the average family
  size in the 17th, 18th, and 19th century average
  household size was 4.75 compared to the U.S.
  today at 3.04.
• The number of live births for each woman dropped
  from 8 in 1900 to 3 in 1970 to 1.8 in 1994.
• Birth rates have declined, but so have infant
  mortality rates. In 1960, the rate in the U.S.
  was 26 per 1,000, in 1998 it was 7.2. During the
  20th Century, infant mortality rates declined by
  90.

10
The Changing Roles of Families

• In the Pre-Industrial Period, most functions were
  carried out within families including
  socialization, education, legal/moral authority,
  economic production, protection and so forth.
• In the industrial period, most of these functions
  begin to fall under the partial or total
  jurisdiction of the state.

11
Changes in the Role of the Family

• Family as primary economic unit of production-
  has been transferred to individual wage earners.
• Family as Protection-role that has been
  transferred to the state.
• Family as Status Conferral-has been transferred
  to individual achievements.

12
Changes in Infant Mortality and Number of Live
Births

• Family size has declined with number of live
  births dropping from 8 in 1900 to 3 in 1970 to
  1.8 in 1994.
• As children become an economic liability rather
  than an asset, limiting family size becomes a
  more rational economic choice.

13
Birth Rates and Infant Mortality- Los Angeles
14
Changes in Family/Household Size 1890-2002 U.S.
15
Changes in Family Structure

• Are Families Dissolving at a greater rate than in
  the past?
• Divorce Rate in 1867 - .3 per 1000
• Divorce Rate in 1950- 2.6
• Divorce Rate in 1981- 5.3
• Divorce Rate 2000- 4.8
• About 1 in 2 marriages end in divorce, however,
  statistics are inflated by repeat offenders.
• Colonial families average length of marriage was
  less than 12 years due to death. More than one
  half of children lost at least one parent by the
  time they reached 21.

16
Debate- Are Traditional Families Declining?

• Are Traditional Families Declining?
• Summarize views on both sides of the argument
  presented in Opposing Viewpoints.
• Are we asking the wrong question? What would
  Baca Zinn and Eitzen ask instead? Why?

17
Are Fathers Essential To Families

• Summarize the arguments on both sides presented
  in Opposing Viewpoints.
• What do you think?
• Why?

18
Changes in Families

• As the roles of families change, the nature and
  structure of families adapt to changing needs and
  circumstances.
• What are some of these changes?

19
Structural Transformations of the Economy and
Families

• How did the structural transformations that took
  us from private to industrial capitalism change
  family life?
• How are the current structural transformations
  that are taking us to the post-industrial economy
  affecting family life?

20
What are the forces transforming/restructuring
Life Today

• Technological breakthroughs in microelectronics
• The globalization of the economy
• Capital Flight
• The shift from an Economic based on the
  manufacture of goods to one based on information
  and services

21
New Microelectronic Technologies

• Information as the new global commodity.

22
Technology and Change

• The Communication Satellite-The first direct
  broadcast satellite (DBS) was launched May 1974
  by the U.S. National Aeronautic and Space
  Administration (NASA).
• The development of fiber optic cables make this
  innovation more useful.

23
An Effect?

• In 1980, the average American was exposed to 1600
  advertising messages per day. In 1990, it was
  3,000. So much was spent on advertising and
  other promotions, it amounted to 120 annually
  for every person on earth.

24
How Has the Development of Microprocessors
Changed Life in America?

• Break into pairs.
• Discuss how the technological changes of the
  computer age have changed other aspects of social
  life.
• Now join with another pair. Choose a few key
  changes.
• Report back to the class.

25
What is Globalization?

• World Interdependence
• Globalization, simply put, denotes the expanding
  scale, growing magnitude, speeding up and
  deepening impact of transcontinental flows and
  patterns of social interaction. Held McGrew,
  p. 1)

26
Characteristics of Globalization

• Time Space Compression
• Accelerating Interdependence
• A Shrinking World

27
Capital Flight

• Refers to investment choices that involve the
  movement of corporate monies from one investment
  to another.

28
Capital Flight Take Several Forms

• Investment overseas
• Plant relocation
• Mergers
• The Trend toward Mergers has three negative
  consequences
• Increases the centralization of capital (reducing
  competition and raising prices
• As corporations become more powerful entities.
• Reduce the total number of jobs.

29
From Manufacturing to Knowledge Based Corporations

• Economy based on ideas, information, and
  knowledge rather than physical capital.

30
The Re-Organization of Work

• Sarah Ryan discusses the ways in which the
  reorganization of work is problematic for the
  worker and his/her family. She lists seven major
  aspects of work re-engineering today
• 1) Lowering of worker compensation- decline of
  real wages.
• 2) Automation of Production, Information and
  Service Work-
• 3)Internationalization of production, with
  manufacturing exported to low wage areas-
• 4) Corporate mergers and reorganization, with
  workforce downsizing.-
• 5) Newly created jobs are part-time and temporary
  as companies shift to no-commitment hiring.
• 6) Increased use of overtime and rotating shifts,
  particularly in manufacturing
• 7) Team-Concept and total quality management
  systems

31
What Does the New Economy Mean for Families?

• Reduced Resources
• Changing Jobs- From Manufacturing to High Tech
  and Service Jobs
• Job Insecurity
• Income Inequality
• A Shrinking Middle Class
• Increasing Costs of Housing and Transportation
• Increased Cost of College Education

32
Reduced Resources

• Wages are not keeping pace with inflation.
• Families have fewer resources than those in the
  past.
• A worker under the age of 25 employed full time
  in 1994 earned 31 less than a comparable worker
  in 1973. (Coontz, 1997)

33
The Changing Nature of Jobs

• Sunset- on manufacturing industries
• Sunrise- of service and information/knowledge
  jobs.
• Increasingly middle class jobs are now being
  eliminated by new office technologies.

34
Job Insecurity

• Despite low unemployment, work is less stable.
• Race and Gender make one more susceptible to
  lay-offs.

35
Income Inequality

• The economic difference between the top and
  bottom strata of society is greater in
  underdeveloped and developing countries than in
  developed nations.
• Between 1968 and 1994, the share of total income
  going to the top 20 of American Households
  increased from 40.5 to 46.9.
• About 1/3 of the poor are working at jobs that
  still leave them below the poverty line.

36
The Shrinking Middle Class

• During the 1950s and 60s an increasing number of
  people received higher education and/or benefited
  from job opportunities in an expanding economy.
• As incomes lose ground relative to inflation,
  more people fall out of the middle class.
• Two incomes now provide what one used to.

37
Increasing Cost of Living- Housing and
Transportation

• While overall price increases averaged 170
  between 1972 and 1987, the average price of a new
  home rose by 294. (Coontz, 1997).
• Over the last 20 years, the cost of new cars has
  risen faster than the cost of inflation.

38
The Increased Cost of a College Education

• The cost of room and board at an elite university
  is 35,000 per year. The cost of the average
  private college is 23,651. The cost of the
  average public school is 10,909.
• So a worker who earns 10 per hour would have to
  work 1091 hours or 27 weeks full time simply to
  pay tuition at a State University.

39
What are the Results of Rising College Tuitions
and Fees?

• Break into groups and discuss the effects.
• How can these effects be mitigated?
• Share with the Class.

40
The Speed Up

• Hochschild refers to the Work-Family Speed Up
• Working parents.
• Specifically those in jobs that lack flexibilty
• Is Speed-Up a Problem?

41
Coping Strategies

• How are families coping with these changes?
• Dual incomes
• Longer Hours
• Home-based Work
• Debt

42
Dual Incomes

• 2/3 of adult women are in the labor force.
• The shift toward dual income families is
  important in at least four ways
• 1) Perceived necessity of two incomes
• 2) Womens work is underpaid (wage gap)
• 3) Additional costs are created by dual incomes
  (childcare, transit)
• 4) Dual income couples have less time for each
  other and with their children.

43
Increased Workload

• Americans work more hours per week than in any
  other country in the advanced industrial world.
• 8 million people held down more than one job in
  1997
• Between 1977 and 1997 the average work week
  increased from 43 to 47.
• To stay solvent, families of color average longer
  work weeks.

44
Home Based Work

• Working from home ie. Work processing, typing,
  editing, accounting, piece work (sewing etc),
  child care and so forth.

45
Increased Debt

• U.S. Total debt - 34 trillion, or 119,442 per
  man, woman and child.
• 61 (21 trillion) of this debt was created since
  1990.

46
The Consequences

• Emotional/Psychological- Lillian Rubins Worlds
  of Pain
• The Working Poor- one in four workers full time
  wages leave him/her below the poverty line.
• The New Poor- workers who have been downsized out
  of the economy.

47
Demographic Trends and Increasing Diversity Today

• More than one-fourth of the people in the United
  States are African-American, Latino, Asian, or
  Native American.
• Racial minorities are increasing faster than the
  majority population.
• Latinos are becoming the dominant minority.
• Immigration accounts for a large share of the
  nations population growth.
• New patterns of immigration are changing the
  racial composition of society.

48
Race in The United States People of Hispanic
Origin may be black, white, or Asian. The second
percentage for whites is whites not of Hispanic
Origin.
49
Race at Cal Poly Pomona
50
The Effects of Immigration on Immigrant Families

• Ethnic Identity- Assimilation?
• Immigration and social movements
• Transnational Motherhood and other forms of split
  families
• Fictive Kin

51
The Aging of Society

• In 1950 there were about 12.2 million Americans
  aged 65 and above. In 2000 there were
  approximately 35 million.
• A falling birth rate and advances and medicine
  mean that proportionally a larger proportion of
  the population is older.

52
The Consequences of an Aging Society

• Economic Resources- without social security, 54
  of Americas elderly would be living in poverty.
• Living Arrangements
• Increased healthcare costs
• More role transitions