COMPOSITION OF POPULATION

Among various characteristics of population, age and sex compositions are the most important ones. Percentage of the youths, aged less than 15 years (i.e., 0-14), and percentage of the old, aged 65 and more, are of common interest to population scientists. Increase in percentage of population aged 65 and more leads to aging of population and it results mainly from declining fertility. Ratio of population of old to population of young, multiplied by 100 is called dependency ratio. Pyramidal diagram showing age distribution for males (left) and females (right) has a special significance and is called the age pyramid of the population. It may be noted that dependency ratio is closely related to labor force participation rate which expresses number of workers (including those looking for work) as a ratio of the total population.

Dependency ratio = (Population aged 0-14 + Population aged 65 or more)*100/Population aged 15 to 64 years)

Labor force participation rate = (Number of workers/total population)*100

Ratio of population aged 80+ to population 60+ indicates aging among the aged. Labor force participation rate may be computed separately for males and females and for urban and rural areas.

Sex ratio is defined as the number of females per thousand males. Improvement in sex ratio is often seen as indicative of empowerment of women.

Sex ratio = (Number of females/number of males)*1,000

In India population scientists specifically calculate sex ratio for age group 0-6. This is called juvenile sex ratio. This sex ratio has special significance. Low sex ratio for the age group 0-6 suggests that either there is practice of female feticide or infanticide or there is neglect of female babies due to which they have higher mortality than male babies. In any case a low juvenile sex ratio shows the gender inequality in society.