MORTALITY AND POPULATION AGING

We are here trying to measure the impact of each element of the total fertility, mortality and migration history of the cohorts concerned on population structure change. Computations are done for both France and Italy on population ageing during the last 30 years as well as until the end of the official population projections around 2040. Though the ageing effect of fertility decrease is usually emphasized, we can see here that the consequences of mortality change are at least equally (and sometimes more) important. The case of the Italian projections is particularly fascinating. Even if the very low fertility level of 1.4 children per woman is maintained until the year 2040, more than half the increase in the proportion of the population aged 60 and over (from 21% to 43% for females) would be due to mortality change and slightly less to fertility change. © 1990 Elsevier Science Publishers B.V.