Shrinking Kin Networks in Italy Due to Sustained Low Fertility

Among the closely watched demographic trends of thelate 20th Century is a pronounced drop in fertilityrates throughout much of the world. Italy presents aparticularly interesting case for study: in 1960,Italy's TFR was 2.41, whereas by 1995 it had fallen to1.17. According to United Nations projections, by 2050Italy will be the second oldest country in the world,with 3.4 persons aged 60 or older per person under 15years of age. Besides overall population ageing,another implication of sustained low fertility issmaller families and kin groups. We investigate theconsequences of projected changes in Italy's birth anddeath rates on the composition of kin groups usingmicrosimulation techniques. Using a startingpopulation taken from the 1994 ``Indagine Multiscoposulle Famiglie'' survey, and projected rates ofmortality and fertility by age and parity produced bythe Italian Institute of Statistics, we simulate thepath of kin-group patterns in Italy during the period1994–2050. While we reproduce the aggregate populationpatterns found in official projections, we conduct ourestimates at the ``micro'' level, keeping track of therelationships between individuals that underlie kingroup patterns. We show the effects of the demographictrends on the existence of daughters and sons forolder mothers, on the number of sisters and brotherswith whom an adult woman could share theresponsibilities of caring an elderly mother, and theeffect of the joint action of the increase inlongevity and the mean age at fertility on theproportion of adult women with a living mother.