sustain:if:able kiwi

changing world: changing fathers

In honour of fathers, Statistics New Zealand offers the following facts ahead of (New Zealand) Father’s Day this Sunday (6 September).
* The average age of fathers of new babies is 33 years.
* One in 100 babies has a father aged 50 years or over.
* Today’s newborn babies have fathers who are, on average, four years older than their own fathers were when they were born.
* Fathers with children aged under a year old manage with 42 minutes less sleep than the average of 8.5 hours.
* Over a lifetime, fathers have seven fewer Father’s Days, on average, than mothers have Mother’s Days. This is because men generally start parenting later in life and women have a longer life span.
* More than a quarter (28 percent) of babies born in New Zealand last year were to fathers who were not themselves born in New Zealand. This compares with 24 percent a decade ago.

Other facts about Father’s Day
* The first Father’s Day is thought to have originated in Babylon over 4,000 years ago.