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Contemporary Global Fertility

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Book cover Decline and Prosper!

Abstract

Fertility has declined all over the world, but there is still enormous variation between countries and world regions. Moreover, within regions and countries, some subpopulations display very different fertility behavior than their peers. In this chapter, I describe contemporary fertility around the globe in relation to the “replacement level” and population growth. Prior to the demographic transition, higher fertility tended to be offset by higher mortality. Today, fertility variation translates more directly into variations in population size, composition, and growth as relatively few people die before reaching adulthood.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Fertility and Health, Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Oslo, Norway

    Vegard Skirbekk

  2. Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, New York City, USA

    Vegard Skirbekk

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Skirbekk, V. (2022). Contemporary Global Fertility. In: Decline and Prosper!. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-91611-4_6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-91611-4_6

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