Demographics

Despite the declining birth rate in many developed countries, the population is still growing due to the increasing life expectancies. Life expectancy is the average number of years until death that a person has remaining at any given age. Largely due to improvements in modern medicine, the average life expectancy around the world has greatly increased in recent decades with only a few exceptions. However, cancer and heart disease continue to be some of the largest causes of death.

The frequency of marriages has declined in many countries as more and more adults find marriage to be an outdated concept. On the other hand, the rate of divorce is also low in these areas. However, this may be due to the low rates of marriages. The legalization of same-sex marriages helped to increase the number of weddings in those regions.

Either through necessity, or desire, people travel and move their homes and families to different countries every day. Europe sees thousands of displaced citizens from countries like Syria or Iraq cross its borders to escape war and persecution. At the same time, many want to move to another country simply to improve their living conditions and find better employment opportunities. Refugee resettlement agencies and immigration departments oversee much of migration movements.

Global institutions, like World Bank or the U.S. Census Bureau at the national level, calculate the poverty within a country based off the share of the population that possess “… low incomes and the inability to acquire the basic goods and services necessary for survival with dignity.” – World Bank. Extreme poverty is living on less than 1.25 U.S. dollars a day (Purchasing Power Parity) and moderate poverty is living on less than two U.S. dollars a day.