The contraceptive pill
Reliable contraception under a woman's own control separates sex from reproduction.
- When
- Era
- Contemporary, Holocene
Approved in the United States in 1960, the pill spreads rapidly through the industrialised world despite legal restrictions that persisted for years — in the US it was not available to unmarried women in every state until 1972. Its effects on women's education, workforce participation, age at marriage and family size are among the most thoroughly documented in social science, and it is central to the demographic transition.