Families in Serbia as a factor of regional economic development

This paper broadly analyzes the nature of the impact of family types on the (regional) economic development. Results of the research of these issue at the level of regions in Europe have pointed to the relevance of the, family perspective" for the study of differential economic development, which opens the way for consideration of this issue at the level of regions in Serbia. In order to test the impact of family types on regional economic development in Serbia we have collected and analyzed data on average household size, family composition of households, types of families, the average number of household members, educational attainment measured by the proportion of the population with basic and higher education, the overall share of employees in the workforce, data on employment of women, as well as data on gross domestic product. The above demographic and socio-economic data are collected based on data from the 2011. census, and are represented at the level of four regions of Serbia (Belgrade region, the region of Vojvodina, Sumadija and Western Serbia, the region of Eastern and Southern Serbia). The research was largely done based on theoretical and methodological foundation used to investigate the impact of family types on regional socio-economic development of Europe, with extensive use of Emmanuel Todd descriptions of family types. The results suggest that although many factors exogenous to family structure seem likely to cause major economic changes, family structure itself may be a key determinant in adapting such changes.