Labour market changes and their impact on family formation in Iran

Ladan Noroozi, Managment and Planning Organization, Iran
Zahra-Mila Elmi, University of Mazandaran

This paper shows that the higher the male marriage age , the higher gap between the marriage age of male and female . Therefore , female singleness rate increases . In the recent years,male marriage age increased due to the economical pressure and increasing unemployment rate.This issue has led to increase female singleness rate, polygamy , and the increasing divorce rate . The increasing unemployment rate led to immigration of male from rural area to urban regions .Therefore, the marriage opportunity of female in rural area decreased so rural female singleness incrased . In the recent years,women employment has increased due to the increasing their educational level. In this paper it is shown that there is a relation between the increasing of women employment and decreasing number of children,enhancing marriage age,increasing divorce rate , and increasing famale singleness that lead to enhancing single head households and female head of households .