The male to female ratio for the world’s population is approximately 101 males for every 100 females, although this gender imbalance is effected in the other direction in later life as females have a longer life expectancy. Nevertheless, this relative 50/50 split is not a true reflection that half the planet is males and females. This is down to the increasing numbers of people identifying as non-binary, that is, individuals whose gender falls into neither of the two main categories. The ratio between the number of males and females in a society is not stable, and experts from the TG personals site try to explain the main reasons and issues.
Gender Ratio across the world
While the global male to female gender ratio is 101 to 100, this varies considerably depending on which country these statistics are being ingathered. For instance, within Curacao, a Caribbean island, females comprise 54.6% of the population. The European country with the greatest female ratio is Latvia, at 54.2%. Nations where this imbalance is weighted towards males tend to be in North Africa, the Middle East, and Asia’s southern and eastern perimeters.
Factors affecting sex ratio in humans
– Social factors
One of the most dramatic examples of the social factors that have affected this ratio over the years was the ‘one-child policy’ introduced by China in 1979 (following ten years of a two-child only policy), designed to hold back the rising population. This existed until 2015 (although around half of all Chinese parents had been allowed to have a second child during this time).
– Natural factors
Many natural factors will impact the sex ratio, particularly warfare, the presence of pesticides or environmental contamination, self-selective terminations in cultures favoring male children (predominantly South, Central, and East Asia), and issues with birth registration in less-advanced societies.
Stress during pregnancy is an issue in countries with less ready access to medical facilities, with problems like malnutrition in mothers prompting a higher incidence of fetal deaths amongst males. It is also thought the presence of Hepatitis B will increase the male to female ratio, although environmental contaminants will tip the imbalance in favor of females.
– Economic factors
In India, the dowry system (cash and other payments to a groom during the marriage) has led to families favoring males. In Germany, a stark illustration of the correlation between economic factors and the sex ratio was revealed when comparisons were made between West and East Germany before unification. The East’s ratio, where the economy had collapsed at various times between 1946 and 1999, was generally lower.
Gender Ratio at birth and through the life course
The gender ratio at birth varies considerably across the globe. Although more males are born each year, this figure can become skewed (due to factors mentioned above, such as prenatal sex determination in North Africa and South and East Asia, leading to selective abortion.) This becomes increasingly imbalanced through life – in those populations discriminating in favor of male children, the third or fourth-born children are more likely to be male than the first or second.
How does the sex ratio at birth vary across the world?
Internationally, the sex ratio at birth is weighted slightly towards males (101 to every 100), but this decreases over life due to the increased mortality levels amongst males. In many nations, sex determination scanning and gender-selective abortion has been banned, but this has been too limited to impact the overall picture.
Biology or discrimination: which countries have skewed sex ratios at birth?
The countries with the greatest skewed male-bias include China, Pakistan, India, Vietnam, and Azerbaijan. The result of distortions in the natural sex ratio for all the listed reasons has been to produce a population of ‘missing females.’ In India and China alone, this amounts to a staggering 80 million.
Consequences of a high sex ratio
Reports into the long-term impact of high sex ratios have determined that these have given rise to an increased likelihood of female marriage but a detrimental effect on the female labor force.
Transgender Issues
The percentage of the population identifying as trans individuals has risen by 50% in the last decade, for various reasons, rising from 0.3% to 0.6% in the USA. There is an increasing acceptance of transgender issues falling under the protection of basic human rights. People can now customize sex and gender so many ways, from their social media to their dating site accounts. Gender and sex diversity is flourishing in the media, featuring as a storyline in prime-time dramas. Donald Trump banned trans individuals from serving in the US military – one of the incoming Joe Biden’s first congressional acts was canceling this discriminatory order.
