Australia Yearbook - 2001

Chapter 5—Population 153
5.35 FIRST AND SECOND GENERATION AUSTRALIANS—1996
Second generation
Overseas born(a)
Australians
Country
’000
’000
’000
United Kingdom and Ireland 1 124.0 1 522.9 2 647.0
Italy 238.2 333.9 572.1
New Zealand 291.4 200.0 491.4
Former Yugoslav Republics 175.4 131.3 306.7
Greece 126.5 153.9 280.5
Germany 110.3 139.3 249.6
Netherlands 87.9 142.5 230.4
Viet Nam 151.1 46.8 197.8
China 111.0 40.2 151.2
Total population 3 901.9 3 595.3 7 497.2
(a) The population identified in this table is based on Census counts, and not the estimated resident population; it therefore has
slightly lower levels than the total overseas-born population in table 5.34.
Source: Unpublished data, 1996 Census of Population and Housing.
Total
Preliminary population estimates for 1999
identified 24% of the population as overseas
born. The 1996 Census showed that a further
27% of persons born in Australia had at least one
overseas born parent, that is, they were second
generation Australians. The variety and size of
second generation populations reflect past
migration and intermarriage patterns. In long
established migration groups, such as those from
the United Kingdom and Ireland, and from
northern and southern Europe, second
generation Australians form more than half the
total birthplace group. In more recently arrived
groups, such as those born in Viet Nam, second
generation Australians form a smaller part of the
birthplace group. This is illustrated in table 5.35.
Marriages and divorces
Marriages
The crude marriage rate in Australia (the annual
number of registered marriages per 1,000
population) has fluctuated since 1901. Broadly,
the crude marriage rate has followed the pattern
of prevailing economic and social conditions. It
has fallen in times of depression or recession
(e.g. in the 1930s), and increased in other times
such as the immediate post-war years of the early
1920s and late 1940s. Marriage rates have also
increased during times of war. The 1999 crude
marriage rate of 6.0 marriages per 1,000
population has increased slightly from 1997,
which at 5.8 per 1,000 population was the lowest
rate on record. The highest crude marriage rate
ever recorded was 12.0 per 1,000 in 1942.
The crude marriage rate has been declining since
1970. This decline in the marriage rate can be
mainly attributed to changes in attitudes to
marriage and living arrangements that have
occurred since then.
The fluctuations in the crude marriage rate
between 1901 and 1999 are shown in graph 5.36.
Recent trends show that Australians are marrying
later. The median ages of brides and bridegrooms
at first marriage have increased from 21.1 and
23.4 years respectively in 1971 to 26.4 and 28.2
years in 1999 (graph 5.37). Part of this increase
can be attributed to the increasing incidence of
de facto marriages. Another factor is that young
people are staying in education longer.
In 1999, 65% of marriages had a groom older than
the bride, and 23% of brides were older than
grooms. However, there was a strong tendency
for couples to be about the same age, with 44% of
couples being within two years of each other, and
only 8% being more than 10 years apart in age
(graph 5.38).
Table 5.39 brings together summary measures
of marriages for Census years between
1901 and 1986, and individual years between
1990 and 1999.