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What is Happening to our Birth Rate?

photorandy2023

I have written or posted several articles on healthcare issues. A series of links has been provided at the bottom of these articles for your convenience.

The birth rate is declining globally and in the U.S., hitting a record low in the United States in 2024, and is projected to continue falling. This is due to factors like people delaying childbearing, economic stress, and a lack of affordable childcare, with trends showing a decline for younger women while rates rise for women in their 40s. This demographic shift could lead to a shrinking working-age population and economic implications for entitlement programs, though it also correlates with rising lifespans. 

Key trends

Contributing factors

Age-specific changes

Potential consequences

The families into which children are born, and in which they spend the early part of childhood, have changed dramatically over the past several decades. Among the most notable changes is an increase in non-marital childbearing—that is, the percentage of all children born to unmarried parents. Recent estimates show that about 40 percent of births in the United States occur outside of marriage, up from 28 percent in 1990 (Child Trends, 2016). This increase is consistent with changes in non-marital childbearing seen worldwide.

New analyses by Child Trends indicate that the likelihood that a child will be born to unmarried parents varies substantially by the mother’s current education level and by her race and ethnicity.

In 2016, 28 percent of all births to non-Hispanic white women (i.e., white) occurred outside of marriage, a figure that is almost twice as high as the 15 percent of births among this demographic that were nonmarital in 1990. In 2016, 52 percent of all births to Hispanic women occurred outside of marriage, up from 34 percent in 1990 (a more than 50 percent increase). The percent of births that occurred outside of marriage also increased for non-Hispanic black women (black) between 1990 and 2016, from 63 to 69 percent (a nine percent increase), though a much lesser extent than for white and Hispanic women.

Between 1990 and 2016, the percentage of nonmarital births rose substantially across all levels of education—albeit somewhat less so for parents with the fewest years of education.

The greatest increase in non-marital births was to women who attended some college or earned an associate’s degree (but did not earn a bachelor’s degree); the percentage of non-marital births to these women more than doubled, from 17 percent in 1990 to 43 percent in 2016. The percentage of births to unmarried women who completed high school or earned a GED (but did not go to college), and to those with a bachelor’s degree or higher, doubled from 1990 to 2016. Although women who did not finish high school also saw increases in non-marital childbearing, those increases were not as dramatic (46 percent in 1990 and 62 percent in 2016).

Despite these changes, the difference in nonmarital childbearing between women with the lowest and highest levels of education remains substantial. In 2016, births to women who did not finish high school or obtain a GED were more than six times as likely to be nonmarital (62 percent) as births to women with a bachelor’s degree or more (10 percent).

The relationship between education and nonmarital childbearing varies by race and Hispanic ethnicity. Notably, the difference in nonmarital childbearing between women with the lowest levels of education and those with the most education is largest among white women. In 2016, 59 percent of births to white women who did not finish high school or obtain a GED occurred outside of marriage, which is almost nine times higher than the 7 percent of births to white women with at least a bachelor’s degree. The comparable gap is roughly 2.5 times for black women (82% compared to 33%) and roughly 3 times for Hispanic women (61% compared to 20%).

Even within the highest education category, there are still large racial/ethnic differences in nonmarital births. Although only 7 percent of births to white women with a bachelor’s degree or higher occur outside of marriage, one in three births to black women (33%) and one in five to Hispanic women (20%) with the same level of education were nonmarital in 2016.

Among women ages 20 to 29—who are more likely than older women to be new parents—levels of nonmarital childbearing are even higher than for all women ages 18 and older, across education and race/ethnicity. This is particularly true at the highest levels of education. For example, almost half (48 percent) of births to black women ages 20–29 with a bachelor’s degree or higher are nonmarital, compared to one-third (33%) of births to all black women ages 18 and older with a bachelor’s degree or higher (see Table 1). These patterns suggest that we are unlikely to see a reversal in nonmarital childbearing anytime soon.

Discussion

Many explanations have been offered for the increase in non-marital childbearing. Most immediately, the percentage of births that occur outside of marriage is determined by three factors: 1) the proportion of women who are married, 2) the fertility rate of married women, and 3) the fertility rate of unmarried women. A change in any of these three factors can lead to an overall change in the percent of births that are non-marital. Additionally, differences between groups of women, either by race/ethnicity or education (or both), across these factors can contribute to overall group differences in non-marital births.

One of the most notable changes in recent decades has been in the first factor: the proportion of women who are married. Women and men are marrying at increasingly older ages, on average. Women’s median age at marriage was 27.4 years in 2016, up from 23.9 in 1990. This means that relatively fewer women are married when they are most likely to have a child. Additionally, fewer adults are getting married. This is particularly true for blacks and Hispanics, who have seen the most dramatic declines in marriage rates. In 2012, 35 percent of black adults and 26 percent of Hispanic adults (ages 25 and older) had never been married, compared to 16 percent of white adults.

Declines in marriage have been linked to a range of social and economic factors. Increasingly, couples are waiting for economic security or stability before getting married. In this domain, nonwhites are especially disadvantaged. These economic disparities reflect, to some extent, the lasting effects of institutional and systemic racism that surface in inequitable policies, practices, and social norms. For example, given the strong tendency for people to marry same-race partners, the comparatively high levels of unemployment, underemployment, and incarceration among black men may limit the opportunity of black women to marry. Additionally, black women outnumber black men among the most highly educated populations, further limiting marriage opportunities and increasing the likelihood that births will occur outside of marriage. This may be one explanation for why one-third of births to highly educated black women (and almost half of births to highly educated black women in their twenties) are non-marital.

At the same time, however, cohabitation has increased. Notably, many non-marital births occur to couples who live together in a cohabiting union but are not formally married. Recent estimates suggest that 62 percent of births to never-married women are to women in a cohabiting union. However, white and Hispanic women are much more likely to have a birth in the context of a cohabiting union than black women.

Although many children born outside of marriage will thrive, research shows that they are more likely than those born to married parents to be poor, experience multiple changes in family living arrangements as they grow up, and face cognitive and behavioral challenges such as aggression and depression. While cohabiting parents are more likely to marry after the birth of their child than parents who don’t live together, cohabiting unions are generally less stable than marriages and put children at increased risk for adverse outcomes.

Recent federal efforts have encouraged marriage among low-income unmarried couples through relationship education and the provision of critical support services (Office of Planning, Research & Evaluation, n.d.). However, not all couples who have children outside of marriage will be able to marry or want to marry. Despite this, positive parental involvement with a child is linked to better child outcomes, even when the parent does not live with the child (Scott et al., 2016). To promote well-being among the many children born outside of marriage, policymakers and program providers should encourage and support healthy relationships between unmarried parents, regardless of whether they share a household. In addition, efforts should continue to help all couples avoid unplanned pregnancies.

Data

Child Trends used National Vital Statistics System (NVSS) birth data from 1990 and 2016 to conduct analyses for this brief. The NVSS data include all birth certificates from live births filed in all states and the District of Columbia. For analyses of education by race and Hispanic ethnicity, we limited our sample to women whose race/ethnicity is listed as non-Hispanic white, non-Hispanic black, or Hispanic. For all analyses by education level in this brief, births are excluded from our analytic sample if the mother’s educational status is “unknown/not on certificate” or “excluded.” The first figure includes all births, even if the mother’s race/ethnicity or education level information is missing. Our sample of births to all women ages 18 and older included n=3,671,456 births in 1990 and n=3,838,160 births in 2016.

How education is measured on birth certificates has changed over time. In 1990, completed education was measured in years (e.g., 1 year of college, 2 years of college). In 2016, completed education was measured categorically. In these analyses, we categorized 1990 education data to align with the 2016 education categories. Our final measure of educational attainment in both years has four categories:

  1. Less than high school degree or GED
    • 1990: No formal education, one to eight years of elementary school, or one to three years of high school
    • 2016: Eighth grade or less, or ninth through twelfth grade with no diploma
  2. High school degree or GED
    • 1990: Four years of high school
    • 2016: Graduated from high school or completed a GED
  3. Some college or associate’s degree
    • 1990: One to three years of college
    • 2016: Some college credit (but not a bachelor’s degree), or an associate’s degree
  4. Bachelor’s degree or higher
    • 1990: Four years or more of college
    • 2016: Bachelor’s degree, master’s degree, or a doctorate or professional degree

Don’t Call It a Crisis: The Natural Explanation Behind Collapsing Birth Rates

Americans are having far fewer children than in the past, as a recent report by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) shows. The media has declared this a “crisis” that demands government attention. In reality, the plummeting birth rate is a natural and inevitable result of overpopulation and overcrowding. Science has already proven this. Therefore, the only correct action U.S. policymakers should take is no action whatsoever.

Is overpopulation a problem that fixes itself? Let’s consider the evidence.

The total fertility rate for the United States has fallen to an all-time low, according to a May report released by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.1 The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has encouraged millions of women and couples to delay having children, pressing childbirths to 4% below last year’s figures.2 Of course, the birth rate has been falling lower for some time now – the pandemic merely exacerbated a pre-existing phenomenon. But the recent news brought out the usual panicked voices. Pundits and the press have declared this trend a “crisis” that demands urgent government action. It’s no such thing, and no government intervention is warranted.

The reality is these statistics and others like them are signs that nature is now enforcing upon the U.S. a natural law that Negative Population Growth has long advocated for as a goal: slowing population growth, to be followed by an ultimate cessation to U.S. population expansion. It’s a rule of nature: nothing grows forever. It’s definitely not a crisis. Rather, in the face of the collapsing birth rates trend – and a possible future decline in U.S. population that may ensue because of it – the only proper response by the U.S. government is no response whatsoever. The same goes for the world as a whole – governments everywhere should avoid all attempts to manipulate birth rates, period.

Why? Because research published from 2002 to 2017 has uncovered incontrovertible evidence that falling human fertility in the U.S. and globally is a natural phenomenon with a natural explanation behind it: rising human population density. Average birth rates are falling nearly everywhere because they must fall, per a natural law governing nearly all animal species, and humans are no exception. The effect is known to ecologists as “density dependence”. Why this can be so confidently asserted is explained here, but density dependence is the explanation. Data unveiled by economists, ethologists, and one of the world’s leading demographers reveal how average birth rates correlate most strongly to average population densities. Moreover, this connection is stronger than any other factors mentioned as probable causes for why women and men are deciding to have fewer children. The Japanese have already noticed the link between population density and plummeting birth rates;3 we Americans have yet to catch on. Because it’s natural, inevitable, and inescapable, it cannot be fixed, so governments should avoid trying to fix it. But others are demanding that they do just that, even though they can’t.

As noted, in May the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics released an update on U.S. birth and fertility rates. When the pandemic first forced millions to lock themselves indoors early last year some foolish commentators cheekily predicted a COVID baby boom. More sensible thinkers knew better and foresaw the exact opposite – an impending baby bust. The CDC’s latest data vindicates those serious prognosticators: the pandemic seems to have encouraged Americans to give birth to the fewest number of babies since 1979. The total fertility rate (TFR) for the U.S. in 2020 was about 1.64 births per woman, “another record low for the nation” as CDC reported.4 The total fertility rate was “again below replacement – the level at which a given generation can exactly replace itself,” CDC added.5 The replacement TFR is put at about 2.1 births per woman (the replacement TFR value would fall lower with higher life expectancy, but there is no guarantee life expectancy will rise indefinitely).

Again, the trend is not new for America; the pandemic only exacerbated it. There may be a recovery in TFR later this year, but it won’t change the underlying fact that Americans are increasingly having fewer children. Economists fear dire consequences for the nation’s Social Security system given that its function is to take care of the elderly by taxing the young – with numbers of elderly rising and of youth falling, that math no longer works, right? Thus, the plunging birth rate is deemed a “crisis”,6 and not only in America. The New York Times calls it China’s “time bomb” and “looming demographic crisis”7 using the same loaded language whenever this topic pops up.

There is nothing abnormal about collapsing birth rates in the U.S., Europe, East Asia, and much of the developing world. Rather, this is an expected and predicted outcome of rising population density, especially in colony-forming species like ours. To understand how, let’s consider some fundamentals of population dynamics. 

5 Reasons America’s Birthrate Is Plummeting

The simple truth is, there are fewer people who want to bring kids into the world. Though the reasons are diverse, 44 percent of non-parents between 18 to 49 say it is not to or not at all likely they will procreate.

Elon Musk recently tweeted, “population collapse is the biggest threat to civilization.”

The tweet included a link to an interview Musk gave where he expanded on the subject. “Assuming there’s a benevolent future with AI, I think the biggest problem the world will face in 20 years is population collapse,” Musk wrote. “Collapse. I want to emphasize this….Not explosion, collapse.”

Musk has been known to raise this concern in the past too. Last year he told the Wall Street Journal, “I can’t emphasize this enough, there are not enough people.” He also said that low and rapidly declining birth rates are “one of the biggest risks to civilization.”

That the wealthiest and arguably one of the smartest men on earth spends his days fixating on this issue should be a signal to others that things might be more dire than they think.

According to the US Census, “The US population grew at a slower rate in 2021 than in any other year since the founding of the nation.” And we’re not alone. According to reporting by the BBC, “Researchers at the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation showed the global fertility rate nearly halved to 2.4 in 2017 – and their study, published in the Lancet, projects it will fall below 1.7 by 2100.”

Population replacement rates are important for a society to sustain itself. We need people to be born so that there are workers to fill the various needs of the whole. Old men cannot do the labor young men can do, young adults are needed to care for the dying and aging. Fewer people means less economic activity, smaller GDPs, less innovation, and less competition.

It also means we have less division of labor. As Adam Smith wrote in The Wealth of Nations, “The division of labor is limited by the extent of the market.“ That means people are less able to specialize and lean into their preferences or areas of expertise in their work.

As a whole, the machine slows and then stagnates when new firewood is not added to the furnace.

But while Elon Musk is absolutely correct about the problem and the potential threat it poses to society, he has not addressed (as far as I’ve seen) the underlying issues creating it or discussed how they might be solved.

So, in an effort to address these issues, here are five reasons people are increasingly choosing not to procreate, along with the free-market responses that could address them.

1. Higher Opportunity Costs for Women

The simple fact is, some people don’t want children. And there are legitimate reasons for that choice.

No matter what Sheryl Sandberg wants you to believe, women cannot have it all. “Leaning in” is a practice that has left most women who attempt it barrelled over in pain.

The reality is, while women tend to work outside the home in most partnerships now, the vast majority of childcare and household work continues to be laid at their feet. This is an ongoing issue that causes many women to choose not to have kids or not to have more kids.

In life, just as in economics, there are trade-offs. Most women realize they will likely not be able to be a successful career woman, a dedicated mother, and a jaw-dropping homemaker all at the same time. There are choices to be made here, and some women are simply deciding that motherhood is the role they can let go.

It’s important to point out that these are choices that used to be harder to make. In generations past, women were shamed for not having kids, ostracized in society, or simply did not have the access to birth control they needed to determine their own pathway. We’re moving away from that kind of culture, and the advancements in women’s healthcare have empowered women to set their own course.

2. More Americans (Men and Women) Don’t Want to Have Kids

As a woman who has never wanted children, I’ve thought deeply about this topic. And I believe there are many others who are looking at the same factors I am and reaching the same conclusion.

Motherhood is hard, physically, emotionally, and mentally. I personally never wanted to go through the pain of childbirth, nor do I want to give myself the mental and emotional anxiety that comes with taking on this role. But as pointed out above, this wasn’t always a calculation afforded to women.

Furthermore, I love working—always have. And I’ve built a meaningful and impactful career I’d never be willing to give up. While some women choose to work and have kids, that’s not a situation I’d choose for myself. I’d never put my kids in government schools nor would I want them to spend their time with others in daycare. So when faced with the choice of pursuing my work or raising kids, I simply choose the former. It’s where I want to spend my time. I’ve met many others who feel the same way as me.

There are other factors as well. While the world has actually been improving (though you wouldn’t know it based on the media), there are many people (myself included) who look around and still don’t find the world to be one they’d want to bring kids into.

Thanks to birth control and the gains made under feminism, these are choices women now get to make that other generations simply were not afforded. As a whole, this is a choice that should be accepted and even celebrated by society.

Are there free market solutions to these factors? Sure. School choice would make it easier for women to homeschool or find other alternatives. Remote work would allow more people to balance child-rearing with their careers. And improvements in our social climate would likely make people more optimistic about procreating.

Still, the simple truth is, there are fewer people who want to bring kids into the world. Though the reasons are diverse, 44 percent of non-parents between 18 to 49 say it is not to or not at all likely they will procreate. And that’s ok. But for those who do want kids, we should strive to create a world where that option is as feasible as possible.

3. New Gender Norms Are … Complicated

While some women and men are simply choosing not to have kids, others wish to and cannot find adequate partners.

It’s important to remember that we are still merely a few decades into a new normal: the sexes having equal rights and a fair playing field.

While this is long-overdue progress that should obviously be celebrated, it also means the social fabric of our society is still fraught with landmines. For all of human history, women and men have not been in a situation where they were equal under the law.

That means culturally and biologically women are programmed to look for partners who are stronger and wealthier than they are, because those elements were essential for survival for most of our existence. But in recent decades, women are largely surpassing men economically. They are more likely to obtain degrees, are catching up to men in their earnings, and in 37 percent of US households, women pay the bills.

To this, many will say women should just lower their standards or not be so picky. But it’s not that simple. Again, to do that requires overcoming significant evolutionary impulses on the part of women. And even when they do overcome these factors, it still isn’t working out. In fact, marriages with female breadwinners are 50 percent more likely to end in divorce. This illustrates that the power dynamic shift created between higher earning women and lower earning men is one our society has not yet learned to live with.

Furthermore, while men say they are fine with dating women who are smarter than them, psychological studies have revealed otherwise. Men are also biologically inclined to be providers and to be competitive. But for the first time in history, they’re having to compete with women, and outcome wise, they’re often ending up in second place. It turns out they don’t find this so appealing in practice.

The fact that LDS and evangelical families are still having more children backs all of this up. Since gender norms are changing more slowly in these communities, it would seem their relationships are not suffering the same growing pains and therefore the number of children they are having is falling more slowly.

These are societal problems, not ones suited for public policy. And the harsh reality is that it will probably take decades for us to sort out this new landscape for romantic relationships and for people to evolve past the male provider/female nurturer gender stereotypes. But they are challenges worth examining and overcoming, and at an individual level, we can all look for ways to foster romantic relationships that take these factors into consideration.

4. Raising Children Is Getting Super Expensive

Even for people who do want to have kids and manage to find the right partner, there are still a multitude of landmines they must overcome before they can comfortably procreate, and they all trace back to affordability.

A flourishing society would naturally incentivize people to procreate. But that requires a steady currency, good job market, relatively safe communities, the promise of a good education, and economic factors that make it affordable to have and raise a child.

According to Merrill Lynch, it currently costs $230,000 to raise a kid to age 18. That’s a jaw-dropping amount, especially when one considers record-breaking inflation, wage stagnation, and economic uncertainty created by the reckless printing and spending policies of the US government.

The reasons for these high costs also trace back to the government. Childcare costs have been soaring for decades thanks to extreme government regulations and restrictions on these services. In one survey, 85 percent of parents reported spending 10 percent or more of their household income on child care.

Education is another major financial calculation in these decisions. There’s no way to sugarcoat it, government schools are atrocious and private schooling or alternative options can be expensive or unfeasible. Many parents are also hesitant to place their kids in government schools because of gun-free zones that make them sitting ducks.

And then there’s college. The price of higher education is astronomical, and that is solely due to government subsidies and loans. But while evidence increasingly shows college is not a good investment for most, many parents still desire to give their kids every opportunity they can and thus factor this in.

Additionally, healthcare costs continue to rise in the country thanks to the government increasingly taking over our system. Insurance prices shot up after Obamacare and there is no end in sight for many.

Finally, there are the costs of infertility. A growing number of Americans are having trouble getting pregnant when they want to. Some blame this on problems with our nutrition. Others say it’s because people are having kids later in life. Likely there are multiple reasons. But whatever the cause, fertility assistance is extremely expensive and a cost many cannot afford.

Relatedly, many economists point to the quantity-quality tradeoff theory which implies that a reduction in fertility would lead to more human capital investment per child. Meaning, people would rather invest their love, finances, and attention into a smaller number of children versus spreading it across a large family.

There are many public policy reforms that would bring these costs down. But for the time-being it is understandable why for some the math is simply not adding up. People want to know they can give their kids a brighter and better future than they themselves had, and for now, that simply isn’t true for a lot of people.

5. Demographic Transition Theory

Finally, many economists point to something called the demographic transition theory to explain the decrease in childbirth. In short, because child mortality rates have dropped so precipitously under capitalism people don’t have to have as many kids.

In generations past, as terrible as it was, parents would have a lot of kids with the assumption that several would die. That is no longer the case. People can plan how many children they want to have with a high level of certainty that those kids will live into adulthood.

Furthermore, as societies have become less male-centric, parents don’t have to keep having kids until they have a boy. For inheritance, property, and societal reasons, this used to be a goal for many people, but it is one that is quickly diminishing.

Many of these are issues we as a society can address through free-market solutions. It’s time we have that conversation.

Conclusion

Let’s face it, when our country was primarily agrarian, it made sense to have large families. Children were a source of cheap labor. Doctors went to the house to deliver babies. Therefore, the parents were spared the expense of a hospital stay. There was no need for expensive college educations, mainly because farming was the primary source of income. Children stayed on the farms, so they did not see all the advances and enticing opportunities in the big cities. Thanks to the advancement of media, televisions, and now smartphones, children and families want all the goodies that modern societies have to offer. Children are no longer a benefit but a burden. The more children you have, the more bills, the bigger the house, and so on. Now both parents must work. Women began to think of careers outside the home. Their priorities changed from raising a family to advancing in the workplace. Besides, there are already too many people in the world, right?

Fertility Rate

How many children people have, and how this changes over time, are important drivers of population growth and the age structure of populations. People’s decisions about when and how many children to have, in turn, reflect broader trends in societies and economies.

Globally, the total fertility rate was 2.3 children per woman in 2023. This is much lower than in the past; in the 1950s, it was more than twice as high: 4.9.

The total fertility rate is the most commonly used metric to assess birth patterns: it captures the average number of births per woman, assuming she experiences the same age-specific fertility rates over her lifetime as the age-specific fertility rates in one particular year. It’s important to note that this does not predict how many children women will eventually have.

On this page, we present a wide range of different measures related to fertility. We cover parental ages at birth, teenage birth rates, twin birth rates, the use of reproductive technologies, and more.

By looking at these additional metrics, we can better understand when, why, and how parents have children — and what this means for individuals and societies. The following section highlights the key insights on this topic. Below are links to our in-depth articles, which explore several topics in more detail.

Key Insights on Fertility

The fertility rate has declined over historyThe fertility rate varies greatly around the worldTwo is the typical number of children among women in many high-income countriesIn many countries, the average age of mothers at childbirth declined before rising againTeenage motherhood is still common in many parts of the world

The fertility rate has declined over history

Fertility rates have fallen around the world.

For example, total fertility rates in India have fallen from 5 to 2 births per woman since the 1970s.

South Korea has seen a particularly rapid decline: from a total fertility rate of around 6 births per woman in the 1950s to less than 1 in 2023.

As you can see, this decline in fertility rates is not linear in many countries. The United States is an example of a visible rise between the 1940s and 1960s, referred to as the “baby boom”.

In this article, we cover this in more detail:

The global decline of the fertility rate

The total fertility rate has halved in sixty years — what are the causes of the decline?

What you should know about this data

Population Paradox: Are Declining Birth Rates Good or Bad for the World?

[Lizzy Shackelford: INTRO: This is Deep Dish on Global Affairs, going beyond the headlines on critical global issues. I’m your host, Lizzy Shackelford, with the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

In recent years, the world has witnessed a surprising and unprecedented phenomenon, a decline in global population growth. As birth rates fall and life expectancy increases some regions are now experiencing an aging population and decrease in numbers overall. This shift is expected to pose challenges for the global economy, but possible benefits to the natural environment, leaving experts and policy makers grappling with its potential consequences. So, is population decline good or bad? What are the implications for our world? And what steps can society take to harness its benefits while mitigating its challenges?

Here with me to explore, we have Stephanie Feldstein, the Population and Sustainability Director at the Center for Biological Diversity, where she heads a national program that addresses the connection between human population growth, overconsumption, and the wildlife extinction crisis.

And we have John Ibbitson. John is a writer at large for The Globe and Mail. He is also co-author of the book “Empty Planet, The Shock of Global Population Decline”, which we discussed on this podcast after its release back in 2019.

So John, let’s start with the big picture here. Where are we seeing a decline in birth rates? Why are we seeing it? And why are so many economists sounding the alarm about this trend?]

John Ibbitson: We’re seeing a decline in birth rates everywhere around the world. There are no exceptions or very very few exceptions. Even in those regions that have the highest fertility rates Sub-Saharan Africa Those rates are coming down and in the rest of the world Fertility rates are either flatlining at their placement rate, which is 2.1 children per woman, or they have fallen below a placement rate and those populations are aging and starting to actually decline, the decline is enormous. 36 countries are losing population right now, every year. About 30 countries are going to lose half their population over the course of this century. And some of those are the biggest countries on earth. China is set to lose about half of its population over the course of this century. and an empty planet- we said China would start losing population later this decade. China is losing population now. We said that India would reach replacement rates 2. 1 later in this decade, India is at 2.1 now. So, the population growth that we are experiencing in this century is going to plateau earlier and lower than most experts expected. And then the global population is going to start to decline. And once it starts to decline, that decline will never stop. and we’re going to talk, you know, about the implications for the environment, the implications economically are dire, there’s no other word to describe it. We said in our book that population decline isn’t a good thing or a bad thing, but it’s a big thing. We’ve changed our mind economically. It’s a very bad thing. It’s a thing that involves aging societies, declining populations, fewer and fewer young people available to pay the taxes and consume the goods needed to sustain a society and to sustain pensions and healthcare and other necessities. There are all sorts of other implications that we can get into, but that’s the long and short of it.

Lizzy Shackelford: So have we always had a growth based economy? Forgive me if I’m wrong here, but the idea that we have to keep growing in order to keep paying for the folks we already have sounds a wee bit like a pyramid scheme…

John Ibbitson: Well, it’s a pyramid scheme that’s about as old as the Renaissance, you know, the Enlightenment period, the period of global exploration, the Industrial Revolution of the 19th century, the Second Industrial Revolution of the 20th century, the postindustrial revolutions of the 21st century all have been predicated on growth. They resulted in growth, and then growth became the assumption that every year, we will expand, we will grow, there will be more of us, we will be consuming more goods, our standards of living will be rising, things will be getting better, and society will go on. Liberal, democratic, capitalist society is founded on those assumptions. now those assumptions may be false, but those assumptions are deeply, deeply entrenched. And so, anyone who’s going to question that assumption, and many have tried, over the course of the last couple of centuries, have to contend with the robustness of the model.

Lizzy Shackelford: So, Stephanie, we’re talking about how it’s affecting our economy, but that growth-based model, which began as John said, back when we kind of thought we had unlimited resources to move into. What’s been the impact of that on the world we live in?

Stephanie Feldstein: Well, the reality is that any model that’s based on infinite growth in a finite planet is just untenable. I mean, it can’t go on forever. It has to end at some point. And, you know, what we’ve really seen is human population has grown faster than any other large animal population on the planet. And it’s grown larger and with more devastating consequences for life on Earth than we’ve seen from any other species. And of course, that’s not population growth alone, a lot of that is our consumption. But this is tied together, right? We’re talking about that concept of growth, both in people and in terms of our economy, which means what are people consuming. So, as a result, that’s really launched us into the environmental crises that we’re facing today. You know, I mean, so many of us are experiencing the consequences of the climate crisis now during the summer here, right? We’re seeing these unprecedented heat waves, we’re seeing drought that, threatens to really become, crippling in parts of the world, including parts of looking at, like, the Southwest United States and how that’s going to affect, the population centers that are there, we see it in floods and storms and wildfires. I mean, we’re seeing this play out in real time, just like we’re seeing some of these predictions about where populations are going to go happening now. We’re seeing the climate crisis happening now. And we’re also at the same time experiencing a wildlife extinction crisis, which doesn’t get nearly as much attention, but is going to be just as devastating because this means really unraveling these ecosystems that we rely on for our survival.

Lizzy Shackelford: So, John, the economic impact, as you’ve said, is even worse, than when you wrote your book just a few years ago. but you also comment on some of the Potential benefits to slowing population growth outside strictly the environmental benefits, as Stephanie’s mentioned. What are some of the other benefits that we could harness of a smaller population?

John Ibbitson: Let’s not understate the importance of slowing population growth and eventually of population decline to improving the environment to helping in the fight against global warming to preserving biodiversity after all population decline as a result of urbanization is the result of people leaving rural areas and going and living in cities. And when they do that, those rural areas revert to bush and all sorts of good things happen. There’s also something called the geriatric peace. This is the notion that as societies age, uh, governments are unable to wage war or find it very difficult to wage war because they have fewer and fewer young people available to throw into the meat grinder. And they need to devote more and more of their resources, to their aging and geriatric society. So, in theory, at least, over time, aging societies should be more peaceful societies. There’s a huge asterisk to that though- aging societies can also become unstable. As you have, more and more old people consuming more and more resources in healthcare and pensions, and fewer and fewer young people who are available to support them, you get intergenerational tensions. China, which is one of the most acute, countries in terms of aging and aging populations and societal tensions. You also have the problem of an alarming shortage of young women, caused by sex selective abortions. So, you have a lot of unhappy young men who are not married, not getting sex, and working, huge numbers of hours in order to support their parents and other old people that can lead to social tensions and governments that are experiencing deep social tensions, sometimes go looking for a quick and dirty war to distract people’s attentions from it. And if Taiwan is the source of Chinese saber rattling right now, that might be the cause.

Stephanie Feldstein: You know, just one other element that I wanted to add to this is we’re talking about population decline and some of the causes of it and how it fits in with society. I think it’s really critical that we point out that the major drivers behind population decline come from really positive societal developments. We’re talking about things like reproductive freedom and increased health care and education and gender equity for women and girls. And that is, you know of course, one of the things that makes it harder to turn back the trends for the countries that are trying to do so, because women don’t want to give up, this empowerment. And so, I think it’s just really important part of this conversation to emphasize that population decline, not only has these benefits for the environment and for society, but it comes from a very good place.

John Ibbitson: It certainly does. And this is something that Darrell and I emphasized in our book and have been writing about in the Globe and Mail mostly since. Urbanization leads to the empowerment of women who receive education in ways they don’t when they live in rural societies. The power of traditional religion declines, the ability of peers and family to force you to marry young and have kids declines. Instead, your peers are your co-workers and your co-workers couldn’t care less whether you get pregnant or not. All of these factors lead to the empowerment of women and lead to a declining fertility. And indeed, some societies that are trying to reverse, fertility, declines are doing it by trying to strip away the rights of women. Hungary is a particularly good example of this. They’re essentially, through tax breaks, trying to bribe women to quit their jobs, go home and have babies. The good news is it’s not working. The bad news is that the more positive versions of that, such as in Sweden, where there are very generous, parental leave policies, where there’s on-site daycare, where there are all sorts of supports that allow women to have children while continuing to maintain and advance their careers, they also don’t work. They don’t get you back up at least to 2.1 and they are tremendously expensive. So, yes, all good things, are the reasons for fertility decline, but bad things in some areas are the consequence.

Lizzy Shackelford: I want to shift and talk to policies in just a second, but I, feel like what we’re kind of honing in on is that the biggest risk of the population decline is primarily economic, that there are a lot of other positive social reactions, but the economic argument is really against it. But Stephanie, you’ve written a bit about the economic impact and that it’s not that simple a calculation. Can you talk about the economic impacts of reducing that influence on our environment too?

Stephanie Feldstein: Yeah, I think the problem that we run into here is when we talk about the economy sort of as if it exists in the bubble, right? But as I mentioned before, we’re facing these multiple crises. And when you look at, for example, population decline is expected to happen in, you know, about three decades or so, we have less than a decade to slash greenhouse gas emissions. Before we hit these irreversible tipping points in the climate crisis. And these things are deeply, deeply interrelated. And a lot of the solutions that we see for how we can start to change our consumption to address the climate crisis is also part of how we need to change our economy as well. So, you know, we had talked about how, of course, our growth economy is deeply, deeply entrenched, but we’ve also had to challenge many other things that are deeply entrenched, including some of the societal norms we were just talking about having to do with the patriarchy having to do with the subjugation of women. And of course, we’ve seen that changing. And I think, you know we have to look at the economy as something that has to change. And we need a radical change, because this endless growth can’t work and you know, the good news is that we already see some examples of how these different economic models can work in things like mutual aids and co-ops and these really community based and community driven ways of supporting each other and of approaching the economy in a way that is based more on well-being and partnership rather than just endless profits.

Lizzy Shackelford: What are some other policy or even technology solutions that can be pursued and John, you’ve spoken about some governments, how they’re trying to throw the brakes on this population decline. Are any governments so far trying to shift the economic model so that they can navigate the storm better?

John Ibbitson: Yeah, there are three essential models that a government that is worried about its aging society can pursue. The first is, the Hungarian model- use the tax system to encourage women to abandon, their careers, return home and have babies. If you have enough babies in Hungary, you can live a decent middle-class existence just from the government supports. The problem is, of course, it’s hugely expensive and it’s vile. The other alternative is the Swedish model, which is also hugely expensive, but which focuses more on keeping women. In their jobs, in the workforce, advancing their careers while also having children. It does a better job than the Hungarian model according to early results at any rate, but it still doesn’t get you up to 2.1 and it’s very expensive. The third model we call the Canadian model, which is a truly aggressive immigration policy. Canada, last year brought in 1 million people. This isn’t a society that only had 39 million people last year. We added another million. We’re on track to bring in 400,000 regular immigrants, next year, plus temporary foreign workers, plus foreign students. So, we’re able to smooth the curve. It doesn’t flatten the curve, but it smooths the curve, by bringing in young workers who can then contribute, to the society. They don’t contribute babies because they have the same fertility rate as the rest of us, but at least there are young workers, working in our society in order to pay for the cost of an aging society. The problem with all of this, though… Is that it does not address Stephanie’s problem, which is how do you transition to new economic models that will relieve the pressure on the environment? And the problem here is that we have just run out of runway, Stephanie may disagree with me, but I don’t think we have enough time left to make the changes that would need to be made in order to have a permanent sustainable impact on the environment. The United States population is deeply polarized and is fighting over the stupidest things and the very notion that you could get the American population to talk with any degree of intelligence about a new social model, is just not going to happen, not in the timeframe that we have. And it’s not going to happen in India, it’s not going to happen in China. So, if it’s not going to happen in those three societies, even if you did have progress in the European Union, for example, where there is greater openness to different economic models, and Canada sometimes has experimented with this as well, but we don’t matter, we don’t count. The big places, the places that could actually make a change, I see no possibility of that change being made in the timeframe that’s available.

Stephanie Feldstein: I think it’s very dismal to say that we’ve run out of runway. We don’t have enough time. And that may be true in some ways, but if we don’t change what we’re doing, it gives us a little bit more runway just to fall off a cliff. I mean, it’s not a solution in itself. And I think that there are some changes that can happen immediately. I mean, we know what needs to be done, right? If we look at the climate crisis, we know what needs to be done. And this again, dovetails into a lot of the solutions that we’re seeing when we talk about, well, either the solutions to fertility decline or the solutions to better adapting society to deal with an aging society are expensive, they cost a lot of money. Those things can be very closely interrelated. I mean, we’re giving billions of dollars away to the most polluting industries. It takes a reframing of government’s funding that’s already happening, but how do we shift it towards things that can actually protect the environment and therefore also protect our societies? And I think that that’s a really good place to start, is to look at what are the mechanisms we already have. And I agree that there is low political will for that in these places right now. But again, it’s something we have to keep pushing for because we don’t have a choice. You know, we can’t put the environmental damages that are happening on hold until we decide we all agree on what the next economic model is. We have to keep pushing towards these changes urgently. I mean, that’s where we’re really running out of time. Not to say that we, can’t do it. But that we know what the solutions are, and we have to create that political will to make it happen.

Lizzy Shackelford: I’m trending towards despair here, folks. As John said, the political obstacles are very real to having sensible policy solutions. What I’m hearing, and correct me if I’m wrong, is that there are policy solutions that could mitigate the damage or I guess flatten the curve, but that we don’t have political systems in place that can make that happen at this time.

John Ibbitson: Yeah, I mean, I’m a political reporter, columnist, I work in Ottawa on Parliament Hill, so I can only get my head around that which I consider to be politically possible. In my country, the way to lessen the impact of population decline and an aging society is through robust immigration. I think that is the American alternative as well, although again, there is a deeply polarized debate within the United States over immigration. However, let’s be honest, that’s a growth-based solution, right? We replaced the missing babies by bringing in young people from developing countries to take their place. It’s still growth based. If you went to the Canadian people or the American people and said, we need, in fact, to end growth. We need to retool our society in a shared co op model that acknowledges that there will not be the economic growth that we used to have that young people won’t ever own a home, that there will have to be compromises in terms of the quality of health care, everybody will receive the same quality of health care, but that quality of health care will steadily diminish over time, and all the other assumptions of a non-growth based society, well, you might get there. If you have the kind of summers that we’re having, you know, five and six or seven, 10 years in a row. If we get the kind of smog from smoke fires, in Canada that really destroys the summer for everyone year after year after year, you may get there, but we’re not there now. And I don’t foresee, honestly, the likelihood of our getting there anytime soon.

Lizzy Shackelford: So, Stephanie, how do we persuade governments to translate what we’ve been seeing, as John said, with our climate scenarios that is impacting everybody now. How do you politically persuade governments to take it seriously and take a non-growth approach?

Stephanie Feldstein: Well, I think the biggest challenge to that, you know, at least here in the United States, has to do with corporate power. Because there are a number of policies that could be put into place that the public would be very happy with. I mean, people are not against renewable energy, people are very favorable to renewable energy. But that is not where the government is investing the majority of their money. They’ll create a renewable energy policy in one hand, and then in the other hand, still give double that amount to fossil fuel companies, you know? And so, I think that there is a place there where we need to focus on how we break up this corporate control, this really this corporate stranglehold that they have over politicians, because that’s going to be a big piece of that. And there are, you know, so many other policies that I can point to having to do with looking at agriculture and why are we supporting industrial agriculture instead of agroecology. And again, that shift toward things like democratized renewable energy towards agroecology are all things that help support the values behind this alternative economic future that we can have. And so, there’s a lot of public support for it that exists. But we need to keep pushing hard on that corporate control. And how do we break that up? And really it’s hard because I think a lot of people share that despair that you were feeling. Because even while, you know, I say there’s still time and there’s so much that we can do. We have the solutions in our hands, we at the same time are seeing all these scientific reports that are like, the clock is ticking and it is. But I think that we need to push back against that despair, particularly among young people and stay engaged in politics, really change that paradigm that we’re seeing among governments.

Lizzy Shackelford: So, China is one of the countries that’s facing this in a very, very big way. And as John, you’ve said, it’s one of the countries that matters most because of its sheer size. And China is not subjected to the same political economy that the United States is and others. So, is China taking any steps to face down this challenge that others could learn from? Am I looking in the wrong place for optimism here?

John Ibbitson: It’s always a bad idea to look to China for sources of optimism. The quick answer is no, you know, they are working, on expanding the renewable side of their economy, but they’re also building cold fire plants at a tremendous lick. And because they’re an autocracy in theory, the ability to compel young people to do certain things, but again, it’s very hard to compel a woman to have a child, no matter how autocratic your society is. It is very hard to compel a woman to have a child as it should be. So, this decline that China is experiencing in population that is already underway is in fact going to accelerate. And there’s nothing that can be done to stop it. Again, we’re predicting that China will lose half its population over the course of the century, which will have pronounced environmental impact, but it’s down the road and the immediate impact in terms of social instability, global instability, the threat of invasion across the Taiwan Strait, all of those things, are clear and immediate and certainly not cause for optimism at all.

Lizzy Shackelford: Are they looking perhaps at any ways to shift from the growth-based model or is that just a pipedream?

John Ibbitson: If they’re looking, I’m not aware of it now again, I’m not a sign off a file. I don’t claim to have any expertise in the area of the Chinese economy and Chinese politics. But I’m not aware that they are looking to replace their current directed capitalism, if you want to call it that, autocratic capitalism, corrupt capitalism… that they’re looking to replace that economic model with something different. They may have to they’re already confronting the fact that their consumption-based society is not doing it for them. They spent decades building an export-based economy. Exports have sharply curtailed as a result of COVID and other things. they’re trying to transition to a consumption-based society, but you can’t have a growth-based consumption-based society when you have fewer people being born every year and more people dying. So no, I don’t see any options there.

Stephanie Feldstein: Regardless of the national level government, there is this global pressure that’s being driven by capitalism by these multinational corporations. So, whether you’re looking at the US or China, or so many other different models of government, they’re still feeling that same pressure of growth, which shows up on the international stage. I mean, if you look at every year, you know, COP, the big climate conference is sponsored by fossil fuel companies, and that’s the place where everybody’s supposed to actually be talking about solutions, regardless of what their individual model is. But one source for optimism to look for is really what’s happening at the community-based level. And I think that’s so critical, not just because, communities have to be really the backbone of these solutions. And there are a lot of really innovative, hopeful things happening in communities around the world, but also that creates this groundswell of pressure that helps aid these political problems we’ve been talking about, but it also has very real impacts on the lives of people who are experiencing things like this summer we’ve all been having right that creates that community resilience. That’s sort of, you know, brings us down from this high-level talk of economic models into how is this really impacting people? And ultimately, we do need these larger national level policies, but this community action and the community level policies that we’re seeing is really a source of hope because that is the thing that can not only help drive this change, but is actively helping people now as they are experiencing the impacts.

Lizzy Shackelford: I like that- positive. It’s good. So, John’s mentioned that there are various models that countries have been using to try and kind of kickstart that population growth again. But if we’re accepting that that’s not going to be a permanent solution, what are the best near-term choices, specific things that governments or international institutions could do to help navigate the challenge that population decline is doing? Are there any specific things that you could recommend?

John Ibbitson: I think first of all, and with great respect, we have to acknowledge here that Stephanie and I are working on very different models. for one thing, I’m focused on the economic challenges posed by declining fertility and declining population. Stephanie is focused on the environmental degradation caused by expanding populations. So, I’m trying to keep the populations up and Stephanie is trying to bring them down. We have to be honest at the end of the day, we are talking about two different things. You can respectfully disagree, but that is the origin of the disagreement. On my side of the argument, Darrell and I argue that we should be trying to at least maintain population and slow the process of societal aging so that we can continue to sustain our healthcare systems so that we can continue to sustain our pension systems. And so that, younger people can enjoy some quality of life other than just working relentlessly to pay taxes, to prop up old people. And again there are three models to repeat them. One is encouraging women to go home and have babies. That doesn’t work and it’s awful. The second is encouraging women to have babies while remaining at work. And that’s a great idea and governments should do more and more of that through, expanded, parental leave programs, through on-site daycare programs, through everything like children ride free if they’re with their mother, on the bus and the subway, stuff like that. And then finally, encourage robust levels of immigration, to replace the babies that aren’t being born. In fact, one of the things that Darrell and I, and others, are specifically recommending, is long term care insurance. Right now, most of the healthcare costs that you incur, you will incur in the final years of your life, the last five years when you become frail and elderly and you need support at home or you need support in an institution, that’s where all the tax money goes. There are a couple of countries, that have already embraced long term care insurance. It’s like, well, we have the Canada pension plan, you have social security, you contribute to it, through your wages, every year from the time you get your very first job, your employer also contributes to it as well. And there is an insurance policy available to you when and if, you end up needing it. And if you don’t need it, well, the money goes to someone who does. And that creates, a pool of investment that can be used to help people, in their final years. And that can mitigate the worst impacts economically of aging and declining populations.

Lizzy Shackelford: Could we agree that robust immigration, combined with reducing our climate impact could be a good way to marry those two approaches?

Stephanie Feldstein: Yeah. I mean, I completely agree that immigration is a helpful solution here. And my experience from the environmental side, it’s also a necessary part of the picture as we are talking about things like how climate change will be changing the livability of certain regions of the world. But I think immigration is a great solution to addressing the immediate impacts that, countries will be feeling from population decline. I think John and I also in agreement that, you know, forcing women to have children is also a terrible idea. And I also do support, you know, support for parents, for people who do want to have children and still work and need the additional childcare. I think that all of that is very important. I think, and it sounds like John probably agrees that there are limitations to how effective that’s going to be, because that still doesn’t, address the issue that if people don’t want to have kids, they’re not gonna have kids. It helps the people who do want to have children, but for those who don’t, who, for whatever reason. That’s not going to necessarily change their mind. And I think, you know, the one piece that’s missing this is really facing that reality that our populations are aging and investing now, looking at what is that length of our runway and realizing we need to make some of these changes now, and even before you get to the larger, economic transformation that we’ve been talking about. Looking at where do we need to shift social supports for aging populations? What does it need to look like for us to instead of denying that the population is aging and figuring out quick, how do we, you know, pump up fertility rates, instead recognize that this fertility decline, this population decline is happening. So, what do we need to do as a society to really embrace that?

Lizzy Shackelford: Stephanie Feldstein of the Center for Biological Diversity and John Ibbitson of The Globe and Mail — I want to thank you both so much for coming on Deep Dish to explore this intriguing and terrifying trend of global population decline and how it’s affecting our world.

John Ibbitson: It’s been a pleasure.

Stephanie Feldstein: Thank you so much!

[Lizzy Shackelford: OUTRO: And thank you for tuning in to this episode of Deep Dish.  

Low Birth Rates May Not Be a Deciding Factor for Rural Populations

What rural America may be missing in births it could potentially make up for with current migration patterns.

Although the U.S. saw its lowest birth rate in 50 years in 2020, that may not necessarily mean a dramatic decline in rural populations.

According to a recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), more than 3.6 million babies were born last year in the U.S., Puerto Rico and the Northern Marianas, the study said, a decline of four percent over 2019. It’s the sixth year in a row that birth rates have declined.

That puts the U.S. total fertility rate, an estimate of how many babies a group of 1,000 women would have during their lifetime, at “below replacement” levels. 

“The rate has generally been below replacement since 1971 and has consistently been below replacement since 2007,” according to the National Center for Health Statistics, which is part of the CDC.

Janna E. Johnson, an assistant professor in the University of Minnesota Humphrey School of Public Affairs, said that while some rural areas may see falling birth rates, other factors, like migration, may change the face of the rural landscape.

Populations grow through births and decline through deaths, she said. But they also grow through migration.

“It may well be true in some states that births are outnumbering deaths, but still in the U.S., the biggest driver of state population change, I would say, would be migration,” Johnson said.

According to Realtor.com’s Market Hotness rankings for May 2020, only 87 urban ZIP codes saw improvement in their rankings, and only 404 suburban ZIP codes improved. But nearly 850 rural ZIP codes saw improvement.

“Particularly with the rise of remote work that was accelerated by the pandemic, what that means for some people, migrating out of urban areas and into rural areas, remains to be seen,” Johnson said.

The trend could be temporary, she said, or people could opt to return to urban and suburban areas.

“We don’t know yet if those moves are permanent,” she said. “We need to wait and see what happens once the pandemic is truly over. Will people need to return to the office? Or is remote work here to stay? That, I think, is yet-to-be-determined.”

Data on migration from urban areas to rural areas won’t be known for another year or more, she said.

One trend researchers have been seeing for a while is a reversal of the Great Migration. In the Great Migration, more than 6 million African Americans moved from the rural South into urban areas like Chicago, New York and Detroit between 1916 and 1970. Now, Johnson said, what researchers like her are seeing is a migration of African Americans from Northern cities back to the South.

While the majority of that migration seems to be headed to cities, it appears initially, she said, that the population is shifting to the South and Southwest. It will be some time, she said, whether or not researchers will see whether or not this new migration impacts rural populations.

“Trying to get a picture of what the rural communities are going to look like in 10 years, 15 years, or 20 years when the policies that are being enacted now start taking effect is an interesting question to ponder,” she said.

While the study did not look at rural versus urban birth rates, Johnson said, studies from 2017 suggest the birthrate in urban areas are falling faster than those in rural areas.

“Birth rates have been falling in all areas of the country – rural, urban and suburban, but they have been falling a little bit faster in urban areas,” she said. “The main driver of this has a lot to do with the age of women have their first child. That is, on average, a lot younger in rural areas than in urban areas.”

Johnson said the total fertility rate in urban areas is 1,600 births per 1,000 women, whereas the total fertility rate in rural areas is 1,900 births per 1,000 women – much closer to the population replacement rate of 2,100.

Another factor complicating the rise and fall of rural areas is their tendency to have more older people in them. As those rural residents die off, the rural population will decline, she said.

“Even though women in rural areas have more children per woman than urban areas, there are a lot fewer women of childbearing age to have those babies in rural areas relative to urban areas,” she said. “So even though women are having more babies in rural areas there are fewer of them and so they’re not necessarily making up for the deaths in the older population.”

The Global Fertility Crisis

In recent years, birth rates all over the globe have been falling precipitously. The drop in birth rates has been especially dramatic in developed nations, many of which fell far below replacement birth rates decades ago.

During this time, however, there is one developed nation that conspicuously resisted the trend. In the United States, fertility rates continued to hover near the replacement level throughout the 90s and early 2000s.

Sadly, in recent years this has changed…dramatically.

According to the latest data from the U.S. Center for Disease Control (CDC), in 2023 fertility rates in the U.S. fell to the all-time low of 1.6 children born per woman, which is well below the replacement rate of 2.1 needed to sustain a population. Countries with fertility rates below this gradually experience an overall older demographic and a decrease in population size over time.

And as reported in a new study, the traditionally held replacement-level birth rate of 2.1 may actually be too low. Because of variations in fertility, mortality, lifestyles, and that many adults choose not to welcome children, human populations may need a fertility rate of at least 2.7 children per woman to reliably avoid population decline, extinction.

Global Birth Rates Are Falling

As you can see on this graph, fertility rates peaked in the U.S. in the late 1950s, fell steeply throughout the 1960s and early 1970s (when contraception and abortion became widely available), before rising in the 1980s and 90s.

Beginning in 2008, however, the fertility rate began to fall once again.

Granted, in comparison with other nations such as South Korea and Japan, the U.S. fertility rate is comparatively healthy. In South Korea, the birth rate has fallen to the suicidally low .72 births per woman (Yes, you are reading that correctly. The average South Korean woman give birth to less than a single child.).

In such nations, it is becoming increasingly rare to see children playing on the streets. Schools are shuttering their doors. Entire towns and villages are being emptied out, as the elderly residents die, and the younger residents migrate into the metropolises—the only places that still have the promise of work.

It is no longer considered apocalyptic fear-mongering to speak about the coming disappearance of entire nations. Countries like South Korea and Japan (1.3 TFR) are already experiencing rapidly decreasing populations. However, the effects of shifts in birth rate have a significant lag, and compound over time. In coming decades, the rate of decline will rapidly increase.

Even a sudden, dramatic increase in the fertility rate in a country like South Korea won’t be enough to reverse the population trend. This is because the decades of low birth rates have already led to the significant aging of society.

There are currently far fewer women of child-bearing age in South Korea than there would have been three or four decades ago. Even if each South Korean woman should suddenly decide to have significantly more than the current 0.72 child on average, it would be too little too late. It would take multiple generations of a significantly increased birth rate to reverse the trend.

The Decline of U.S. Birth Rates

One question that demographers have asked, is why the U.S. has resisted the trend until recently? Why has the U.S. birth rate been so much higher than its European or Asian counterparts?

There is not likely to be any one single answer to such a complex question. One part of the answer is surely that is the U.S. has maintained its status as the most youthful, vibrant, and forward-looking of the developed nations.

The U.S. is the “land of promise.” While many other wealthy nations have become stagnant and set in their ways, the U.S. is still the land of innovation, in which optimism is in the air, and the future appears bright.

And then, of course, there is the fact that the U.S. is also easily the most religious of all the developed countries. And, as it turns out, religiosity is strongly correlated with fertility.

The question, then, is what changed?

The fact that fertility rates began dropping in 2008 suggests one obvious answer: that it is the market crash of 2008, with its associated increase in unemployment and general life stress, that is responsible.

This seems a plausible hypothesis, but for one fact: the economy completely recovered from the 2008 crash years ago. Stock markets are currently at their highest levels ever. Unemployment levels are at nearly the lowest they’ve ever been in recent history.

But fertility rates are continuing to drop!

From Baby Boom to Birth Drought

While the fast-paced modern economy does come with significant challenges for younger generations, especially in the form of information overload and stress, hard data shows that the generations that are currently of child-bearing age are significantly wealthier than the doom-mongering headlines in the papers suggest.

In fact, while Millennials and Gen Z often complain of being hard put upon, at least in comparison with their parents, the reality is that they are significantly wealthier than their parents’ generation.

This phenomenon of greater wealth, yet a much greater sense of poverty, has been labeled “money dysmorphia.” As Tali Sharot tells NPR in the interview linked here, if the younger generations feel poorer, it is likely only because they are continually comparing themselves to others, thanks to the ubiquity of social media, and the filtered lives that one encounters therein.

In other words, if younger generations are choosing not to welcome children because they believe they are poor, then they are operating under an illusion.

The Hidden Costs of Choosing Career Over Children

The reality is that many younger people aren’t choosing to welcome children because their priorities have shifted. Parents in far poorer societies routinely choose to welcome significantly more children than the average American adult.

And no, contrary to the complaints of pro-abortion organizations, this isn’t simply because couples in developing nations don’t have access to contraception and abortion. Many of these nations are awash in contraception provided by the multi-national NGOs.

Instead, parents in many developing nations speak about the enormous meaning and joy that welcoming children brings into their life. Meaning, in other words, is almost certainly the key word. Not wealth. Not the economy.

The question is: What do people find meaningful? Is it raising a family? Or is it independence, travel and food?

Why Marriage and Family Are in Decline

“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,” Christ says in the Gospel of Matthew. Increasingly, the hearts of Americans are not invested in the next generation, but rather in themselves.

If we are to look for the one thing that has shifted most dramatically in the U.S. in recent years, one couldn’t do much better than to look at the levels of religiosity among the younger generations.

In the late 90s, the percentage of Americans who are Christian began to fall, while the percentage who call themselves “religiously unaffiliated” (the “nones”) significantly increased. As noted above, religiosity is one of the strongest predictors of fertility rates.

Why would this be? Because, in short, a religious person is likely to place meaning in significantly different things than an atheist, or agnostic.

Rebuilding a Culture of Life

Many people accuse Christianity, with its emphasis on sin, to be a “negative” religion. In reality, however, Christians tend to be far more optimistic than others. Certainly, if choosing to bring children into the world is a sign of optimism (as it is generally agreed it is), then Christians are far more optimistic than their non-religious peers.

Consider the quotation at the beginning of this article. In it, Pope Leo XIV speaks of the family as the “cradle of the future of humanity.”

In the same homily, Pope Leo praises the fact that in recent decades the Catholic Church has canonized multiple married couples. “By pointing to them as exemplary witnesses of married life,” he said, “the Church tells us that today’s world needs the marriage covenant in order to know and accept God’s love and to defeat, thanks to its unifying and reconciling power, the forces that break down relationships and societies.”

Saint Louis and Marie Zelie Guerin Martin

This is a very different understanding of marriage than one will find in secular society! To the extent that many people even bother getting married these days, it is often for motives that are far less lofty: perhaps because the couple “feels” like they are in love and enjoy one another’s company; or because the couple shares similar interests in travel, or some other hobby.

Why Children Bring Meaning To Life

Furthermore, many young couples are themselves the children of divorced couples and thus have a keen awareness of the fragility of marriage. Without strong ideals, strong role models, and thanks to the compounding trauma of generations of failed marriages, they often give up as soon as they face their first real difficulty.

However, the Christian view of marriage, as a sacrament bestowed by God, elevates the couple’s mind to things loftier than their transient feelings. As Pope Leo put it in that homily,

For this reason, with a heart filled with gratitude and hope, I would remind all married couples that marriage is not an ideal but the measure of true love between a man and a woman: a love that is total, faithful and fruitful (cf. Saint Paul VI, Humanae vitae, 9). This love makes you one flesh and enables you, in the image of God, to bestow the gift of life.

He continued,

In the family, faith is handed on together with life, generation after generation. It is shared like food at the family table and like the love in our hearts. In this way, families become privileged places in which to encounter Jesus, who loves us and desires our good, always.

This is how the world can reverse its course towards geriatric stagnation: by recovering a sense of the wonder of marriage, the beauty of family life, the dignity and holiness to which every human being is called!

No amount of economic stability or wealth can give a young couple hope. While it is true that we must take measures to make it easier for couples to afford to welcome children, this will not reverse the demographic slide. Various nations, including Canada and the Nordic countries, give very generous tax breaks and cash payouts to couples with children, and yet they continue to see low birth rates.

It is the spiritual renewal of the U.S., and the whole world, that will bring in a new springtime of hope and fill our streets and playgrounds with children once again.

Are we overpopulated? Are birth rates falling too fast? –Debunking alarmist population myths  

On November 15, 2022, the world population surpassed 8 billion people. Immediately, people began to sound the alarms about an “overpopulation crisis” and the strain that the growing population is having on our planet and its finite resources. 

Funny enough, this massive population milestone has also coincided with concerns about falling fertility rates among younger generations. As younger people forgo having children for reasons such as personal finances and the advancing climate crisis, population alarmists insist that we’re heading for a future where we will have “too few” people to sustain ourselves.  

So, what’s the truth: Do we have far too many people on Earth, or should we be worried about globally falling birth rates? 

In short — neither of these are legitimate concerns.  

This World Population Day, we’re going to break down myths about our global population and discuss how we’re working to create a world where every single person can reach their fullest potential. 

A crowded street in, Chhatarpur, India. © Nanna Heitmann/Magnum Photos for UNFPA 

Myth: There are too many people on Earth. 

The concern that there are “too many people” on Earth is not only an oversimplification of our global population, but also a deeply harmful piece of rhetoric. When politicians or media pundits assert that there are too many people, the implication is that some people are more worthy of living and having children than others. 

Let us be clear: Every single person alive today is worthy of living and living to the absolute fullest of their potential. There are not too many people, because every single person is valued. And, every single person has the right to grow their family as they choose.  

Instead of condemning the growth in population, we should be celebrating it as an achievement. A large factor in the population hitting 8 billion is that the average life expectancy has increased by nearly a decade since 1990. And it’s expected to continue to rise, hitting 77.2 years (+4.4 years) by 2050 

Umm has lived in this displacement camp in Yemen for 7 years. Yemen is one of the hardest hit nations from climate change and Umm has seen firsthand how difficult life has become. © UNFPA Yemen

Myth: Overpopulation is causing emissions to increase and climate change to worsen. 

Half of the emissions in the world come from the richest 10% of the world’s population. Many of the countries with the highest fertility rates are among the world’s least developed. Conflating population growth with a rise in emissions is not only incorrect, but it also takes the blame off the richest in the world to cut back on their consumption and do more for our planet. 

Even worse, the nations that are least responsible for climate change are the most affected. The three countries with the highest fertility rates – Niger, Somalia, and the Democratic Republic of Congo – have faced droughts, flooding, higher temperatures and more as a result of a warming planet. Instead of placing blame on nations like these with higher birth rates, we must stay focused on keeping the pressure on corporations and the rich to reduce emissions.  

A young woman receives an injectable contraceptive device through a family planning service from a UNFPA mobile health clinic. © UNFPA Mozambique/Mbuto Machili 

Myth: Falling birth rates will cause an underpopulation crisis. 

It’s a fact: Birth rates have fallen globally. In 1950, humanity averaged 5 births per woman. In 2021, the birth rate had fallen to 2.1 births per women. But this is a good thing.  

When we ask women how many children they want, the answer averages out to about 2. The global fertility rate matching this number is evidence that more women have the agency and resources to create the families they want. There are still too many women who are unable to make decisions for their bodies and families and ultimately have more children than they wish. Thanks to our supporters, we are working hard to provide family planning services to every woman and girl, so every pregnancy is on purpose.  

Falling birth rates can partially be attributed to young people no longer feeling stable enough to bring children into the world. We live in an increasingly volatile world, where violence is on the rise, climate change is worsening, and economic instability is upending lives. Many people from younger generations have made the decision that parenthood is no longer a feasible path – and we should not be placing any blame on those who are forced into this decision. We should instead work to address these issues, so every person feels secure enough to have the family they want.  

Children play outside at a site for displaced people in Armenia. © UNFPA Armenia/Aspram Manukyan 

Myth: Population is only increasing in developing nations.  

Despite falling birth rates, every single region of the world is actually facing a population increase, outside of Europe which is expected to see a decrease in growth of 7%. The population of every region is projected to keep growing and reach their peak sizes at some point before 2100. 

You may be wondering how this can be the case when birth rates have fallen – but the answer lies in migration. We have actually seen below-zero growth in birth rates in most of the world since the 1970s, and yet, we haven’t experienced population decline due to immigration. 

In the next few decades, migration is predicted to become the sole driver of population growth in high-income nations – meaning that our economies and cultures can continue to grow and thrive even though younger generations are having smaller families.  

Edith with her son in a temporary displacement camp in Malawi following Storm Freddy. © UNFPA/Eldson Chagara

The importance of counting everyone  

Despite our growing population and declining birth rates, we must not give into the panic of population alarmists. Instead, we must focus our efforts on ensuring that each and every person on Earth is getting the resources and care they need to reach their fullest potential – and we can’t do that without ensuring that we’re counting every single person accurately. 

Falling birth rates, why it is happening and how governments are trying to reverse the trend

Across the globe, birth rates are dropping rapidly. According to the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, the global average fertility rate was 2.2 in 2021, and over half of all countries and territories were below the necessary replacement rate of 2.1 children per woman. For countries like South Korea, Taiwan, and Serbia the situation is particularly dire with each having a fertility rate well below 1.1 (Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, 2024). Why is this the case and what effects will this have on an already strained global economy?

Birth rates are a complex issue caused by a multitude of factors which economists across the globe are working hard to understand. While the exact causes are difficult to pin down, changing social norms definitely seems to be one of the leading causes. According to a 2023 survey of U.S. adults conducted by the Pew Research Center, most adults rank “enjoying work” higher than having children or getting married, and 42% said having children is not important to them at all (Parker, Minkin, 2023). In today’s world, people value children and having a family at a much lower rate. This is a stark contrast to the American baby boom and emphasis of the nuclear family found in the 1940s and 1960s.

The primary effect of decreased birth rates is aging populations. In 2023, the median age of Japan was 49 years old, and this number is only going to increase if fertility rates stay well below the replacement rate (UN Data Portal). Typically, a society has a steady flow of young workers joining the workforce who consistently replace older retirees. However, low birth rates mean a steep decrease in the number of young people and Japan is experiencing a decline in the size of the workforce. This increases the Japanese senior population, with less young people and tax income to support senior care. Less taxpayer dollars means less resources which can be used to provide healthcare, pensions, and other elderly care services. This puts a major strain on young laborers, the government budget, and healthcare service providers. In countries which are below the replacement rate, income taxes and the retirement age are likely to increase in order to compensate for an overall smaller working population.

While countries like Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea are already experiencing noticeable population declines, the U.S. and many countries in western Europe are not despite having below-replacement fertility rates. This is due to a constant and steady flow of immigrants, particularly from countries with high fertility rates. While immigration is mitigating the effects of falling birth rates in a few countries, it is not a viable long-term solution for a few reasons. Firstly, the birth rates of immigrant populations tend to adjust to local levels within three generations. While many first-generation immigrants may have three or more children, their kids and grandkids will have fewer children as each subsequent generation tends to have a higher standard of living than the previous. In order to maintain population levels with immigration alone, a country would need a constant influx of immigrants in the long-run. The highest fertility rates in the world can be found in poor and developing nations in sub-saharan Africa. While these countries produce many immigrants, the overall welfare and standard of living quality in these nations are also improving. Eventually, they will reach the same point of urbanization and modernization as developed countries like Japan, Taiwan, and the United States, and they too will inevitably reach the same issue of population decline.

Wikimedia Commons

What solutions have governments tried?

Multiple countries that are facing population decline have adopted pro-family policies, often including paid parental leave, publicly supported child care, or a combination thereof. For example, in 2009 the Taiwanese government began offering six months of paid parental leave with a reimbursement rate of 60 percent of a new parent’s salary. The government has introduced tax breaks for parents of young children, invested in child care centers, and has even tried hosting several singles mixers in an effort to get young people to pair up (North, 2023). Furthemore, in 2013 Germany passed a law declaring that every child over the age of 1 has the legal right to daycare access. In 2017 they took this a step further by allowing parents to sue for lost wages if they can’t find a place for their child in a public daycare center (Collins, 2017). Other countries have even implemented direct-payment programs to encourage child-rearing. In 2007, Russia began offering a one-time sum of about $7,000 to families with more than two children (Walker, 2020). However, none of these policies have yet to make a significant impact anywhere. Experts argue the main reason for this is the importance of social values and norms in deciding to have children. Deciding to have kids is a deeply personal decision that is not easily swayed by government policies, or even monetary incentives.

Birth rates are plummeting worldwide – but it’s not because people don’t want kids anymore

“Lack of choice, not desire” is reason for global fertility crisis, say UN in a new report, after a massive new global survey. The Sky News data and forensics team breaks down the key details.

Two in five people over 50 say they have not had as many children as they wanted – with economic issues, health concerns and fears about the state of the world among the main barriers.

More than half said financial factors such as affordable housing, childcare options and job security were things that had limited, or would limit, their ability to grow their families.

One in four said health issues were holding them back, while a fifth of respondents mentioned fears about global issues including climate change, wars and pandemics.

The findings come from a new survey of over 14,000 people by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) – spanning 14 countries on five continents that are home to a third of the world’s population.

Birth rates have been declining across almost all regions of the world, while life expectancy continues to grow.

There are concerns, from politicians and commentators like Elon Musk, that future generations of working age people will find it more difficult to economically support people of pension age as the ratio of workers to pensioners shifts.

“Vast numbers of people are unable to create the families they want,” said Dr Natalia Kanem, executive director of the UNFPA.

“The issue is lack of choice, not desire, with major consequences for individuals and societies. That is the real fertility crisis, and the answer lies in responding to what people say they need: paid family leave, affordable fertility care, and supportive partners.”

Differences around the world

The survey was carried out in four European countries, four in Asia, three across Africa and three from the Americas.

The countries were picked to try and represent “a wide variety of countries with different cultural contexts, fertility rates and policy approaches”, according to the report’s editor Dr Rebecca Zerzan.

It includes, for example, the country with the lowest fertility rate in the world – South Korea. It also includes country with a birth rate among the highest in the world, which also happens to be the most populous country in its continent – Nigeria.

The others, in order of population size, are India, the US, Indonesia, Brazil, Mexico, Germany, Thailand, South Africa, Italy, Morocco, Sweden and Hungary.

In many cases there were significant differences in responses depending on which country people were reporting from.

For example in Nigeria, a third of men (although only 21% of women) reported that they wanted to have four or more children. The numbers were similar in South Africa. However in South Korea, Thailand, Italy, Germany and Hungary, no more than 5% agreed.

Fertility issues were twice as likely in the US (16% of respondents) as in neighbouring Mexico (8%).

In South Korea, three in five respondents reported financial limitations as an obstacle.

But in Sweden, where both men and women are entitled to 480 days of paid parental leave per child (which can also be transferred to grandparents), fewer than one in five said the same.

How paternity leave in the UK compares to other countries

Birth rates in Sweden are still among the lowest in the world, however. Dr Zerzan told Sky News that this shows that no one factor alone contributes to people feeling empowered to have children at the right time.

“A third of people in Sweden say they think raising a child will take up too much time and energy. And a higher number of people there, compared with other countries, are also concerned about climate change and bringing a child in to an uncertain world.”

Unintended pregnancies vs not as many children as wanted

A curious finding from the survey is that, while there has been much discussion around declining fertility rates, almost a third of people said they or their partner had experienced an unintended pregnancy.

Globally, as people who become pregnant unintentionally often do so more than once, half of all pregnancies are unintended.

In Morocco and South Africa, around half of people had experience of an unintended pregnancy. In the same two countries, more than half of people had experience of being unable to have a child at their preferred time.

Overall, one in eight people had experienced both an unintended pregnancy and barriers to a desired child.

“Everywhere we look, people are struggling to freely realise their reproductive aspirations,” explains the report.

People who had more children than they wanted, and people who had fewer, were present in countries with high and low fertility rates.

“That indicates that barriers to achieving one’s ideal family are ubiquitous.”

What can be done to help?

The report says that the crisis does require political interventions, but warns against policies that often amount to short-term fixes, or those designed to coerce people to either use or not use contraception.

“Whether the policies are coercive or not, there are real risks to treating fertility rates as a faucet to be turned on or off. Many of the countries that are today seeking to increase fertility have, within the last 40 years, sought to decrease birth rates.

“For example, China, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Thailand and Türkiye all reported in 1986 an intention to lower their national fertility rates through policy interventions, deeming their respective fertility rates at that time as ‘too high’. By 2015, however, all five countries had switched to policies designed to boost fertility.

“Today all five have total fertility rates below two children per woman.”

Its A Wrap

I was going to finish this lengthy article with a tirade about the globalist plot to reduce our population. Perhaps it’s just my paranoia getting the better of me, and it is not a significant plot. With vaccines, and a whole slew of other shit being involved, from organ harvesting and live abortions, because if it is all true, how sick are we really? So I will let it simmer a bit longer. Besides, the more facts I get, the better, right? Damn, what a conundrum!

Resources

-childtrends.org, “Dramatic increase in the proportion of births outside of marriage in the United States from 1990 to 2016.” By Elizabeth Wildsmith, Jennifer Manlove, and Elizabeth Cook;

-npg.org, “Don’t Call It a Crisis: The Natural Explanation Behind Collapsing Birth Rates.” By Nathanial Gronewold;

-www.fee.org, “5 Reasons America’s Birthrate Is Plummeting.” By Hannah Cox;

–https://ourworldindata.org/fertility-rate, ” Fertlity Rate.” By Saloni Dattani, Lucas Rodés-Guirao, and Max Roser;

-globalaffairs.org, “Population Paradox: Are Declining Birth Rates Good or Bad for the World?” By Stephanie Feldstein, John Ibbitson, and Elizabeth Shackelford;

-dailyyonder.com, “Low Birth Rates May Not Be a Deciding Factor for Rural Populations: What rural America may be missing in births it could potentially make up for with current migration patterns.” by Liz Carey;

-hli.org, “The Global Fertility Crisis.” By Fr. Shenan J. Boquet;

-usaforunfpa.org, “Are we overpopulated? Are birth rates falling too fast? –Debunking alarmist population myths .”;

–https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/mje/2025/01/22/falling-birth-rates-why-it-is-happening-and-how-governments-are-trying-to-reverse-the-trend/, “Falling birth rates, why it is happening and how governments are trying to reverse the trend.” By Ian Shin;

-news.sky.com, “Birth rates are plummeting worldwide – but it’s not because people don’t want kids anymore.” By Daniel Dunford;

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