GROWING OLDER.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 72, 24 March 1923, Page 13

GROWING OLDER.

DOMINION'S AGE STATISTICS. INTERESTING ASPECTS OF N.Z. LIFE. An interesting study on the age statistics of the Dominion is contained in an "Ages" section of the census report just issued by the Census and Statistics Office. The report points out that half a century ago New Zealand possessed a rather remarkable age constitution, contrasted with to-day. The high birth rate uf that period (nearly double that of the present day i and the heavy immigration, largely of youths and men up to middle age, were the principal causes operating to produce an abnormal position. For instance, in I*o7 the proportion to the whole population of children under five years of age was 17.1S per cent; in 1921 it was lO.<> per cent. Persons between 21 and 39 years numbered 42.t>4 per cent in 1807, compared with 29.82 per cent in 1921. But from 40 years onwards the balance swings heavily the other way. In lK(i" the proportion between 40 and 54 years of age was 9.92, against 17.50 in 1921 : of those between f>s and 04 the percentage was 2.18 in 1807. and 5.87 in 1921. and from f>s years upwards the percentage in IKIiT was .87, and in 1921 4.HK. RISING DEATH RATE. The report goes on to say: '"The falling birth rate, and the decrease in the relative importance of immigration, and also in the composition of immigrants as a whole, has gradually tended to efface abnormalities. The result of the gradually increasing age of the community is becoming apparent in many directions. For example, the remarkably low death rate of New Zealand, which has always been influenced advantageously by the favourable age constitution, is now slowly losing the assistance of this factor. WAR AND EPIDEMIC. "More recent movements in age-distri-bution have been influenced very largely by circumstances of abnormal character. In great part the effect is attributable to the circumstances arising out of the Great War. Directly the war was responsible for the loss to the Dominion of 17,000 men of from youth to middle age. Indirectly the war re-acted upon the age-constitution of the country in many ways, two of which may be indicated. The first was a considerable decrease in the birth-rate, and the second was the temporary cessation and later revival of immigration. Another factor which has recently exercised sufficient effect upon the age constitution to be worthy of special mention is the influenza epidemic of 1918-19. This disease within a few months accounted for over 6000 lives. Strangely the classes most severely attacked were those ordinarily comparatively immune, the frroups comprising the youth and middle age of the community. Another peculiarity was the fact that males suffered twice as severely as females." THE SUPERFLUOUS WOMAN. In 1021, the adult male population of New Zealand was 364,044. or 58.41 per cent of the total males. The adult female population was 344,936, or 57.91 of the total females. Forty years ago there were 47,361 more adult males in New Zealand than adult females but now the excess of men over women has been reduced to 19,108, and the Statistician sees no reason why the "superfluous woman" should not make her exit from the Dominion within a few years. In respect to the women of the country it is a feature that while the number of reproductive females (ages IS to 44) has increased in the last 20 years from 183,387 to 288,477, they are 'less in proportion to the whole population by nearly two per cent. On the male side, with an eye to military age, the senior cadete have increased by 1.5 per cent in the last ten yeare. the territorials have decreased by 1.74 per cent, the reserve (25 to 29 years) have decreased by 3.19 per cent, and the "over thirty' , class has increased three per cent. THE RUSH TO THE CITY. The Statistician proceeds to deal with the relative ages of male and female, and other such interesting aspects of the figures. Among other things he discovered that the age-constitution of the South Island as a whole is older than that of the North Island, and that the 1 more prosperous districts have a higher birthrate. The "mean age" of the population is 28.53 years, which is a computation useful for comparison with other countries, but not of much local meaning. The rural districts show five per cent more young people up to the ages of 19 than there are in the towns, but after that age the balance is always lin favour of the towns. 'The excess "in ratio of males in urban districts over males in rural districts from the age of 25 years onwards," says the statistician, "affords food for reflection when it is considered that the Dominion is after all. a primary-producing country, and that the great part of its wealth comes from the pastoral industries." At the date of the census the native-born population numbered 906,283, or 74.3-5 of the total and the foreign-born 312,630 or 25.65 per cent. But it is a marked feature of an analysis of the census that the excess of native-born New Zealanders are all under the age of 25 years, and that between the ages of 25 and 34 the colonial-born and the foreiguborn are of about equal numbers, while above the age of 35 years those who immigrated to the country outnumber the others increasingly. The centenarians of 1921 numbered eight, as compared with twelve people in 1910, who had survived for a hundred years.