Factors Responsible For Change In Family Life Cycle

Family life cycle is defined as what type of family the target market consumer is in. DINKS are double income no kids and SINKS are single income no kids . Marketers love to target the DINKS and SINKS because they have lots of discretionary income and no children to spend it on, so they spend their extra money on themselves, their house, their pets and vacations.

1.Factors Responsible For Change In Family Life Cycle And How It Is Useful To Marketers
Family Life Cycle Characteristics: The traditional FLC describes family patterns as consumers marry, have children, leave home, lose a spouse, and retire. But consumers don t necessarily have to pass through all these stages-thy can skip multiple stages. What is a family life cycle? The emotional and intellectual stages you pass through from childhood to your retirement years as a member of a family are called the family life cycle. In each stage, you face challenges in your family life that cause you to build or gain new skills. Gaining these skills helps you work through the changes that nearly every family goes through. Not everyone passes through these stages smoothly. Situations such as severe illness, financial problems, or the death of a loved one can have an effect on how well you pass through the stages. Fortunately, if you miss skills in one stage, you can learn them in later stages. The stages of the family life cycle are:
y y y y y

Independence. Coupling or marriage. Parenting: babies through adolescents. Launching adult children. Retirement or senior years. Why is it important to understand the family life cycle? Mastering the skills and milestones of each stage allows you to successfully move from one stage of development to the next. If you don't master the skills, you may still move on to the

next phase of the cycle, but you are more likely to have difficulty with relationships and future transitions. Family life cycle theory suggests that successful transitioning may also help to prevent disease and emotional or stress-related disorders. Whether you are a parent or child, brother or sister, bonded by blood or love, your experiences through the family life cycle will affect who you are and who you become. The more you understand about the challenges of each stage of the cycle, the more likely you are to successfully move on. What can disrupt the normal cycle? The stress of daily living or coping with a chronic medical condition or other crisis disrupts the normal family cycle. A crisis or ongoing stress can delay the transition to the next phase of life. Or you may move on without the skills that you need to succeed. How can I improve my family life cycle? Be assured, you can learn missed skills and improve your and your family's quality of life at any stage. Self-examination, education, and perhaps counseling are ways to improve yourself and your family life. These are also actions that can help you manage other issues, too, such as going through a divorce or being a part of a nontraditional family structure. Independence Stage Independence is the most critical stage of the family life cycle. As you enter young adulthood, you begin to separate emotionally from your family. During this stage, you strive to become fully able to support yourself emotionally, physically, socially, and financially. You begin to develop unique qualities and characteristics that define your individual identity. Intimacy is a vital skill to develop during your independent, young adult years. Intimacy is the ability to develop and maintain close relationships that can endure hard times and other challenges. In an intimate relationship, you learn about:
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Commitment. Commonality or similarity. Compatibility. Attachment. Dependence on another person who is not in your family. Shared emotion in a relationship. You also learn who you are outside of your identity within your family. Your ability to develop an intimate relationship depends on how successful you were at developing your individual identity earlier in life. If you are a lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgendered person (LGBT), this stage may include making your sexual orientationknown, or "coming out" to your family and friends. Exploring interests and career goals is part of developing independence. To live successfully away from your family, you must develop financial and emotional independence.

You also begin to be responsible for your own health in this stage. You become responsible for your nutritional, physical, and medical needs. Developing healthy habits at this time such as good nutrition, regular exercise, and safe sex practices is important for lifelong good health and happiness. You learn new aspects of independence throughout your lifetime. Even when you have moved on to another stage of life, such as coupling, you continue to learn independence within the context of that stage. During the independence stage, you hope to:
y y y

Learn to see yourself as a separate person in relation to your original family parents, siblings, and extended family members. Develop intimate peer relationships outside the family. Establish yourself in your work or career. Other important qualities you develop during this phase include:

y y y y y

Trust. Morals. Initiative. Work ethic. Identity, or who you are in the world. Coupling Stage After you achieve independence, the next stage in the family life cycle is coupling. You explore your ability to commit to a new family and a new way of life. Although being in a relationship with someone does involve a process of adaptation and relationship building, a marriage or committed union often requires unique skills. When you join families through a marriage or committed union, you form a new family system. Your family system includes your personal ideas, expectations, and values. These are shaped by the relationships and experiences with your original family. When you marry or form a union, you combine your family system with your spouse's or partner's. This requires reshaping your goals and your partner's goals. In the most functional relationships, partners have the ability to take two different points of view and create an option that neither person had considered. It differs from a compromise in that it is not giving up something. Rather, it is creating a third, better option. You may find that some of the ideas or expectations that you held in the past are not realistic at this stage. Some common areas of adjustment include:

y y y

Finances. Lifestyle. Recreational activities or hobbies.

y y y y

Relationships with in-laws. Sexuality or sexual compatibility. Friendships. Putting another person's needs before your own. The ultimate goal at this stage is to achieve interdependence, which occurs when you are able to fully enter into a relationship with another person. Interdependence also requires that you share goals and that you are able to sometimes place the needs of another above your own. But before you can achieve interdependence, you must have first acquired a high degree of independence. The relationship skills you learn in coupling serve as a foundation for other relationships, such as parent-child, teacher-student, or physician-patient. Within a couple, you learn:

y y y y y

Advanced interpersonal communication. Problem-solving skills. Common spiritual and emotional development goals. How to form boundaries in relationships. When to place the needs or importance of the other person above your own. Most research shows that early on, a happy marriage is full of passion and sexual intimacy, which can become less important in later successful marriage. A satisfying marriage at this stage includes a high amount of considerate or kind acts (such as doing something nice for the other person without being asked) and praise. The life skills you learn in this stage are important in developing true interdependence and the ability to have a cooperative and healthy relationship. Some of the challenges of this stage include:

y y y y

Transitioning into the new family system. Including your spouse or partner in your relationships with friends and family members. Being committed to making your marriage work. Putting the needs of another ahead of your own. You and your partner will have less stress if the transition into a new family system is smooth, and less stress often means better health. Your specific goals for this stage of the family life cycle are:

y y

Forming a new family with your partner. Realigning your relationships with your family of origin and your friends to now include your spouse.

Parenting: Babies Through Adolescents Making the decision to have a baby: At some point in your relationship, you and your partner will decide if you want to have a baby. Some couples know going into a relationship that they do not want children. Parenting is one of the most challenging phases of the family life cycle. The decision to have children is one that affects your individual development, the identity of your family, and your relationship. Children are so time-consuming that skills not learned in previous stages will be difficult to pick up at this stage. Your ability to communicate well, maintain your relationships, and solve problems are often tested during this stage. Introducing a child into your family results in a major change in roles for you and your partner. Each parent has three distinct and demanding roles: as an individual, a partner, and a parent. As new parents, your individual identities shift along with how you relate to each other and to others. If you have not learned compromise and commitment in the previous stage, you may not have the skills you need to transition well into this stage. Along with the joy that comes from having a child, you may feel a great deal of stress and fear about these changes. A woman might have concerns about being pregnant and going through childbirth. Fathers tend to keep their fears and stress to themselves, which can cause health problems. Talking about your emotional or physical concerns with your family physician, obstetrician, or counselor can help you deal with these and future challenges. Parenting young children Adapting children into other relationships is a key emotional process of this stage. You will take on the parenting role and transition from being a member of a couple to being a parent. While you are still evolving as individuals, you and your partner are also becoming decision-makers for your family. Continuing to express your individuality while working well together as a couple results in a strong marriage. Your child's healthy development depends on your ability to provide a safe, loving, and organized environment. Children benefit when their parents have a strong relationship. Caring for young children cuts into the amount of time you might otherwise spend alone or with your partner. If there were skills you didn't learn in previous phases, such as compromise for the good of the family, your relationship may suffer. Divorce and extramarital affairs often occur during the raising of small children when the parents have not learned proper life skills. But for those who have the proper tools, this can be a very rewarding, happy time, even with all of its challenges. Optimally, you develop as an individual, as a member of a couple, and as a member of a family. Specific goals when young children join your family are:

y y y

Adjusting your marital system to make space for children. Taking on parenting roles. Realigning your relationships with your extended family to include parenting and grandparenting roles. Parenting adolescents: Parenting teenagers can be a rough time for your family and can test your relationship skills. It's also a time for positive growth and creative exploration for your entire family. Families that function best during this period have strong, flexible relationships developed through good communication, problem solving, mutual caring, support, and trust. Most teens experiment with different thoughts, beliefs, and styles, which can cause family conflict. Your strengths as an individual and as part of a couple are critical as you deal with the increasing challenges of raising a teenager. Strive for a balanced atmosphere in which your teenager has a sense of support and emotional safety as well as opportunities to try new behaviors. An important skill at this stage is flexibility as you encourage your child to become independent and creative. Establish boundaries for your teenager, but encourage exploration at the same time. Teens may question themselves in many areas, including their sexual orientation and gender identities. If you properly developed your individual identity in earlier stages of your life, you will be much more secure about the changes your child is going through. But if you did not gain the needed skills at earlier stages of life, you may feel very threatened by your child's new developments. Flexibility in the roles each person plays in the family system is a valuable skill to develop at this stage. Responsibilities such as the demands of a job or caring for someone who is ill may require each person in the family to take on various, and sometimes changing, roles. This is a time when one or more family members may feel some level of depression or other distress. It may also lead to physical complaints that have no physical cause (somatization disorders such as stomach upsets and some headaches) along with other stressrelated disorders. Nurturing your relationship and your individual growth can sometimes be ignored at this stage. Toward the end of this phase, a parent's focus shifts from the maturing teen to career and relationship. Neglecting your personal development and your relationship can make this shift difficult. You also may begin thinking about your role in caring for aging parents. Making your own health a priority in this phase is helpful as you enter the next stage of the family life cycle. Specific goals during the stage of parenting adolescents include:

y y y

Shifting parent-child relationships to allow the child to move in and out of the family system. Shifting focus back to your midlife relationship and career issues. Beginning a shift toward concern for older generations in your extended family.

Empty Nest: Launching Adult Children The stage of launching adult children begins when your first child leaves home and ends with the "empty nest." When older children leave home, there are both positive and negative consequences. If your family has developed significant skills through the family life cycle, your children will be ready to leave home, ready to handle life's challenges. Free from the everyday demands of parenting, you may choose to rekindle your own relationship and possibly your career goals. Developing adult relationships with your children is a key skill in this stage. You may be challenged to accept new members into your family through your children's relationships. You may focus on reprioritizing your life, forgiving those who have wronged you (maybe long ago), and assessing your beliefs about life. If you have not moved through the phases with the appropriate tools and attitudes, you may not have taught your children the skills they need to live well on their own. If you and your partner have not transitioned together, you may no longer feel compatible with each other. But remember that you can still gain the skills you may have missed. Self-examination, education, and counseling can enhance your life and help ensure a healthy transition to the next phase. This is a time when your health and energy levels may decline. Some people are diagnosed with chronic illnesses. Symptoms of these diseases can limit normal activities and even longenjoyed pastimes. Health issues related to midlife may begin to occur and can include:
y y y y y y y y

High blood pressure (hypertension). Weight problems. Arthritis. Menopause. Osteoporosis. Heart disease (coronary artery disease). Depression. Stress-related illnesses. You may also be caring for aging parents in this phase, which can be stressful and affect your own health. Specific goals to reach at this stage include:

y y y

Refocusing on your relationship without children. Developing adult relationships with your grown children. Realigning relationships to include in-laws and grandchildren when your children begin their own families.

Retirement or Senior Stage of Life During the retirement phase of the family life cycle, many changes occur in your life. Welcoming new family members or seeing others leave your family is often a large part of this stage as your children marry or divorce or you become a grandparent. This stage can be a great adventure where you are free from the responsibilities of raising your children and can simply enjoy the fruits of your life's work. Challenges you may face include being a support to other family members, even as you are still exploring your own interests and activities or focusing on maintaining your relationship. Many people are caring for elderly parents at this time. You may feel challenged by their emotional, financial, and physical needs while trying to help them keep their independence. You may experience declining physical and mental abilities or changes in your financial or social status. Sometimes you must deal with the death of other family members, including your partner. The quality of your life at this stage depends on how well you adjusted to the changes in earlier stages. It often also depends on how well you have cared for your own health up to this point. Normal aging will affect your body, resulting in wrinkles, aches, pains, and loss of bone density. The chances of having a mental or chronic physical illness does increase with age. But aging does not mean you will automatically experience poor health. Retirement can be a fulfilling and happy time. Becoming a grandparent can bring you great joy without the responsibility of raising a child. Those who are without adequate support systems or not well off financially, though, may have a more difficult time in this phase of life. Specific goals to reach for at this final stage of your family life cycle include:
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Maintaining your own interests and physical functioning, along with those of your partner, as your body ages. Exploring new family and social roles. Providing emotional support for your adult children and extended family members. Making room in the family system for the wisdom and experience of older adults. Providing support for the older generation without doing too much for them. Dealing with the loss of a partner, siblings, and other peers, and preparing for your own death. Reviewing your life and reflecting on all you have learned and experienced during your life cycle.

Stages in Family Life Cycle Young Singles Young singles may live alone, with their nuclear families, or with friends, or they may co-habitat with partners in this stage. Although earnings tend to be relatively low, these consumers usually don t have many financial obligations and don t feel the need to save for their futures or retirement. Many of them find themselves spending as much as they make on cars, furnishings for first residences away from home, fashions, recreation, alcoholic beverages, foods away from home, vacations, and other products. Newly Married Couples: Newly married couples without children are usually better off financially than they were when they were single, since they often have two incomes available to spend on one household. These families tend to spend a substantial amount of their incomes on cars, clothing, vacations, and other leisure activities. They also have the highest purchase rate and highest average purchases of durable goods (particularly furniture and appliances) and appear to be more susceptible to advertising. Full Nest I: With the arrival of the first child, parents begin to change their roles in the family, and decide if one parent will stay to care for the child or if they will both work and buy daycare services. In this stage, families are likely to move into their first home; purchases furniture and furnishings for the child; and purchase new items such as baby food, toys, sleds, and skates. These requirements reduce families ability to save, and the husband and wife are often dissatisfied with their financial position. Full Nest II: In this stage, the youngest child has reached school age, the employed spouse s income has improved. Consequently, the family s financial position usually improves, but the family finds itself consuming more and in larger quantities Consumption patterns continue to be heavily influenced by the children, since the family tends to buy large-sized packages of food and cleaning suppliers, bicycles, music lessons, clothing, sports equipment, and a computer.

Full Nest III: As the family grows older and parents enter their min-40s, their financial position usually continues to improve because the primary wage earners income rises, the second wage earner is receiving a higher salary, and the children earn from occasional and part-time employment. The family typically replaces some worn pieces of furniture, buys some luxury appliances, and spends money on education. Families also spend more on computers in this stage, buying additional PCs for their older children. Depending on where children go to college and how many are seeking higher education, the financial position of the family may be tighter than other instances. Married, No Kids: Couples who marry and do not have children are likely to have more disposable income to spend on charities, travel, and entertainment than others in their age range. Not only do they have fewer expenses, these couples are more likely to be dual-wage earners, making it easier for them to retire earlier if they save appropriately. Older Singles: Single, age 40 or older, may be single again (ending married status because of divorce or death of a spouse), or never married (because they prefer to live independently or because they cohabitat with partners), either group of which may or may not have children living in the household. This group now has more available income to spend on travel and leisure but feels the pressure to save for the future, since there is no second income on which to rely as they get older. Empty Nest I: At this stage, the family is most satisfied with its financial position. The children have left home and are financially independent allowing the family to save more. In this stage discretionary income is spent on what the couple wants rather than on what the children need. Therefore,

they spend on home improvements, luxury items, vacations, sports utility vehicles, food away from home, travel, and product for their grand children. Empty Nest II: But this time, the income earners have retired, usually resulting in a reduction in income and disposable income. Expenditures become health oriented, centering on such items as medical appliances and health, and medicines. But many of these families continue to be active and in good health, allowing them to spend time traveling, exercising, and volunteering. Many continue working part time to supplement their retirement and keep them socially involved. Solitary Survivor:

Solitary survivors be either employed or not employed. If the surviving spouse has worked outside the home in the past, he or she usually continues employment or goes back to work to live on earned income (rather than saving) and remain socially active. Expenditures for clothing and food usually decline in this stage, with income spent on health care, sickness care, travel entertainment, and services. Those who are not employed are often on fixed incomes and may move in with friends to share housing expenses and companionship, and some may choose to remarry. Retired Solitary Survivor: Retired solitary survivors follow the same general consumption patterns as solitary survivors; however, their income may not be as high. Depending on how much they have been able to save throughout their lifetimes, they can afford to buy a wide range of products. These individuals have special needs for attention, affection, and security based on their lifestyle choices.

2. Education and Career its impact on economy.

According to present situation on Economy the labor supply increases, more pressure is
placed on the wage rate. If the demand for labor by employers does not keep up with the supply of labor then the wage rate will be depressed. This is particularly harmful for employees working in industries that have low barriers to entry for new employees, i.e. they do not have high education or training requirements. Industries with higher requirements tend to pay workers higher wages, both because there is a smaller labor supply capable of operating in those industries and because the required education and training carries significant costs. Day by Day literacy rate is increasing in INDIA. According to that firms also increasing and job opportunities are also increasing.Every organization is looking for a Knowledgeable persons as a employees in their companies.According to situation our education system also developed and the competencies among students also increased.So that companies recruiting the talented people and developing their companies to compete with their competitors.If this continues with in few years INDIA became a number one country in the world and our economy also raises and industries and IT companies ,organizations will be increase their existence in the world market. So, our economy also develops and meets its standards. Globalization and international trade requires countries and their economies to compete with each other. Countries that are economically successful will hold competitive and comparative strengths compared to other economies, though a single country rarely specializes in a particular industry. This means that the country's economy will be made of various industries that will have different advantages and disadvantages in the global marketplace. The education and training of a country's workers is a major factor in determining just how well the country's economy will do.

The study of the economics of training and education involves an analysis of the economy as a whole, of employers and of workers. Two major concepts that influence the wage rate are training and education. In general, better trained and better educated workers earn more money than other workers with poorer training and education. This is because both training and education tend to improve the a worker's productivity.

Education For the Economy

Many countries have placed greater emphasis on developing an education system that can produce workers able to function in new industries, such as those in technology and science fields. This is partly because older industries in developed economies were becoming less competitive, and thus were less likely to be able to continue dominating the industrial landscape. In addition, a movement to improve the basic education of the population emerged, with some believing that people had a right to an education.

When economists speak of "education," the focus is not strictly on workers obtaining college degrees. Education is often broken into specific levels:
y y y

Primary referred to as elementary school in the United States Secondary includes middle schools, high schools and preparatory schools Post-secondary universities, community colleges and vocational schools

A country's economy becomes more productive as the proportion of educated workers increases, since educated workers are able to more efficiently carry out tasks that require literacy and critical thinking. Better-educated workers tend to be more productive than less educated ones; however, obtaining a higher level of education also carries a cost. A country doesn't have to provide an extensive network of colleges or universities in order to benefit from education; it can provide basic literacy programs and still see economic improvements.

Countries with a greater portion of their population attending and graduating from schools see faster economic growth than countries with less-educated workers. Because of this, many countries provide funding for primary and secondary education in order to improve economic performance. In this sense, education is an investment in human capital, similar to investment in better equipment. According to UNESCO and the United Nations Human Development Programme, the ratio of the number of children of official secondary school age enrolled in school to the number of children of official secondary school age in the population (referred to

as the enrollment ratio) is higher in developed nations than it is in developing ones. This differs from education spending as a percentage of GDP, which does not always correlate strongly with how educated a country's population is. Thus, a country spending a high proportion of its GDP on education does not necessarily make the country's population more educated.

For Employers For businesses, the employee's intellectual ability can be treated as an asset. This asset can be used to create products and services which can then be sold. The more highly-educated workers available, the more a firm can theoretically produce. An economy in which employers treat education as an asset in this manner is often referred to as a knowledge-based economy.

For Workers Like any decision, investing in education involves an opportunity cost for the worker. Hours spent in the classroom cannot also be spent working for a wage. Employers, however, pay more wages when the tasks required to complete a job require a higher level of education. Thus, while wage earning might be lowered in the short-term as an opportunity cost to becoming educated, wages will likely be higher in the future once the training is complete.

3.Working women and impact on Economy

Traditionally women have been restricted in homes and their role in economic development has been minimal. However, lately there have been a lot of research and policy level discussions on increasing the overall participation of women in economic activities. Many, including the World Bank, beleieve that liberating women from traditional boundaries will lead to highereconomic growth. Even though the market is an important resource for women to fulfil their
social obligations and to provide fmily income, the economic realm is not an integral part of female identity in the household. Still, women s and men s position in the household is subject to household negotiation. In order to balance their productive and reproductive roles, it is imperative for women and

men to renegotiate their gender relations. Household negotiation and pronounced differences in family life have important implications for women s autonomy in the household reflecting both their

material and non-material dimensions of agency. In accordance with the previous theoretical chapters, we will present the impact of women s economic participation on their autonomy in the household in three ways: gender roles, decision-making and their opportunities gained from productive work

The process of liberating women in rich countries was painfully slow (and is not yet complete, according to some). Developing countries still have many institutional barriers that hinder growth, and economic access for women. Disparity in the schooling of boys and girls is still great in many countries, for example. This not only stunts the prospects for women, but also reduces economic growth by essentially hobblCurrently, the World Bank says that women earn an average of 22% less than men, and have much less access to credit; in Africa, for example, they receive just 1% of the credit going to the agricultural sector. Changing this could have an enormous impact on deprivation around the world. This is why Grameen Bank, among other poverty-fighting institutions, has chosen to focus its efforts on women. Almost all of its borrowers are women, and the micro-lender tries to ensure that its loans raise the economic status of women within their families by ensuring, for example, that ownership of houses built with Grameen loans stays with the women. There is also evidence that giving women more financial power fosters economic development. Where men control most of the finances, it is more likely that households will distribute what they have unequally between male and female children, leaving the female family members with insufficient resources to meet basic needs. This, in turn, can hinder development of both mind and body. Giving women economic power can significantly alter decision-making in ways that improve general welfare. Households where women contribute a significant portion of the revenue spend more money on food and childcare and less on alcohol and tobacco. But the World Bank may have cause and effect reversed. Does liberating women promote economic growth or does economic growth spur women's liberation? In an economy where adding economic value involves muscle power, women are bound to be paid less, and valued less, than men even before the effects of childbirth and childcare are taken into account. And in most societies, lower economic value translates into reduced social and political status.

The experience of developed countries certainly seems to indicate that economic growth is profoundly liberating for women. As the value of brute force falls opportunities in the labour market for women grow. Modern contraceptives, and labour-saving appliances, make it easier for them to take paid work. And with that comes economic and political power. There is a strong argument that women's liberation movement owes less to the feminine mystique than to the dishwashers and washing machines that reduced household drudgery. If so the bank would do better to concentrate on spurring economic growth rather than fretting about gender.