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Differential Fertility in Canada, 19311

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 November 2014

Enid Charles
Enid Charles*
Affiliation:
Ottawa
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Extract

Establishment of a uniform Dominion-wide vital statistical system in 1926 showed Canada to have gross and net reproduction rates above most of Northern and Western Europe and the Anglo-American world. What knowledge we have of trends indicates that fertility has been declining rapidly in Canada. In 1939 the Canadian net reproduction rate was well above unity and the war-time rise in marriages and births will have maintained it at that level. Probably, however, the rising birth-rate of the war years does not indicate any rise in the size of completed families. While the situation in Canada affords no grounds for complacency about that country's capacity to maintain its numbers in the future, there is no suggestion that declining fertility is an inevitable process. By analysing the trends now plainly visible, demographic research may provide a basis for policies aimed at their reversal. The prospect of a declining population may not cause much alarm in some countries. It can hardly be welcomed in Canada, with its empty spaces and undeveloped resources.

Type
Articles
Information
Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science/Revue canadienne de economiques et science politique , Volume 9 , Issue 2 , May 1943 , pp. 175 - 218
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association 1943

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Footnotes

1

This study forms part of a research programme financed by the Carnegie Corporation and sponsored by the Canadian Social Science Research Council. It was completed before the author's employment in the Dominion Bureau of Statistics and is not an official publication of that body. Acknowledgements are due to Dr. R. H. Coats, former Dominion Statistician, and to Professor S. A. Cudmore, Dominion Statistician, for research facilities provided at the Bureau of Statistics; to Mr. J. T. Marshall, to Mr. A. L. Neal, and to Mr. LeNeveu; and to my collaborator, Mrs. Sylvia Anthony.

References

2 Canada, Dominion Bureau of Statistics, Annual Report on Vital Statistics, 1931 (Ottawa, 1933).Google Scholar

3 Canada, Dominion Bureau of Statistics, Census of Canada, 1931 (Ottawa, 1936).Google Scholar

4 Tracey, W. R., Fertility of the Population of Canada (Ottawa, 1941, Census Monograph no. 3).Google Scholar

5 Myers, R. J., “Validity and Significance of Male Gross Reproduction Rate” (Journal of the American Statistical Association, vol. XXXVI, 06, 1941, pp. 275–82).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6 Tietze, C., “Differential Reproduction in England” (Millbank Memorial Fund Quarterly, XVII, 07, 1939, pp. 288–93).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

7 Canada, Dominion Bureau of Statistics, Vital Statistics Branch, Special Report on Occupation Mortality in Canada, 1931-2 (Ottawa, 1937).Google Scholar

8 Grouping by annual births was for convenience of tabulation. The standard error calculated was that of the sum of annual specific fertility rates.

9 See Canada, Dominion Bureau of Statistics, Census of Canada, vol. VII, Table 40.Google Scholar

10 Hurd, W. B., Origin, Birthplace, Nationality, and Language of the Canadian People (Ottawa, 1929)Google Scholar, and Racial Origins and Nativity of the Canadian People (Ottawa, 1937, Census Monograph no. 4).Google Scholar

11 Taylor, Griffith, Environment, Race, and Migration (Toronto, 1937), p. 48.Google Scholar

12 Marsh, Leonard C., Canadians in and out of Work (Toronto, 1940).Google Scholar

13 If x is the French Gross Reproduction Rate, y the British, l, m, the percentage of French and British, and G the total Gross Reproduction Rate, each occupation yields an equation of the form lx + my = G. x and y are determined from the set of equations by the method of least squares.

14 Maclean, M. G., LeNeveu, A. H., Tedford, W. C., and Keyfitz, N., Unemployment (Ottawa, 1938, Census Monograph no. 11).Google Scholar

15 Cf. Karpinos, B. D. and Kisef, C. V., “Differential Fertility and Potential Rates of Growth of Various Income and Educational Classes” (Millbank Memorial Fund Quarterly, vol. XVII, 10, 1939, pp. 367–91).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 The statements made refer to differences between groups. Association patterns between individuals within socially homogeneous groups may be quite different. Even so, group differences have considerable social significance, since transfer of population from high-fertility to low-fertility occupation groups is proceeding apace and such movements are likely to continue. Further research is projected to elucidate the relations between group and within-group variability.

17 Charles, Enid, “The Nuptiality Problem with Special Reference to Canadian Marriage Statistics” (Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science, vol. VII, 08, 1941, pp. 447–77).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

18 Vancouver Board of Trade, Industrial Survey of Vancouver and Its Adjacent Territory (Vancouver, 1929).Google Scholar

19 Canada, Dept. of Labour, Prices in Canada and Other Countries (supplement to the Labour Gazette, Ottawa, 01, 1928).Google Scholar

20 Canada, Dominion Bureau of Statistics, Census of Canada, vol. V.Google Scholar

21 Vancouver, Sun, British Columbia Today (Vancouver, 1931).Google Scholar

22 Canada Year Book, 1934-5. Professor Cudmore points out that these figures are of dubious significance. They are adduced only as part of the general picture.

23 Smith, Sydney B., “National Income of Canada, 1919-38” (Ottawa, Dominion Bureau of Statistics, General Statistics Branch, 1941).Google Scholar

24 Cudmore, S. A. and Caldwell, H. G., Rural and Urban Composition of the Canadian Population (Ottawa, 1938, Census Monograph no. 6).Google Scholar

25 Charles, Enid, “Differential Fertility in England and Wales” (in Political Arithmetic, edited by Hogben, L., London, 1938), pp. 106–160.Google Scholar

26 Excluding Salmon Arm, dairying.

27 Tracey, “Fertility of the Population of Canada.”