Low birth rates aren’t just a potential economic crisis. They can tell a deeply personal story about women failing to reach their goals for motherhood.
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Articles on Birth rates
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In general, an ageing population puts added pressure on the working-age population to be more productive – just to maintain total output – amid growing fiscal constraints.
Following a 30-year boy-to-girl birth rate imbalance, up to 800,000 ‘extra’ men born since the mid-1980s will be unable to find a South Korean woman to marry. That has big demographic consequences.
South Korea’s fertility rate fell below the level needed to sustain a population in the mid-1980s – and it never recovered. It is now below one child per woman during her reproductive years.
Childbearing goals have remained remarkably consistent over the decades. What has changed is when people start their families and how many kids they end up having.
While most women who try for a baby will succeed, some won’t, and some will have fewer children than they had planned to have.
Go back to 17th- and 18th-century England and France and you’ll see the same sort of handwringing over birthrates that we’re seeing today.
Economic opportunities, social norms and expanding education and employment options for many women help explain why U.S. fertility has slowed in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is reducing life expectancy, decreasing birth rates and slowing down immigration. These changes may produce concerning trends in populations globally.
Fertility is higher in Northern Europe than in Southern Europe. To understand, let’s take a look at family policies, equality between women and men and the economic context.
Research shows that unrest, even terrorism, can erupt in poor countries with a surplus of young people and not enough jobs. Can Niger, a once-peaceful sub-Saharan African nation, handle its baby boom?
Did you ever consider that human beings might have a breeding season? Birth seasonality exists – and has interesting implications for childhood disease outbreaks.
Tanzania was an early, ardent believer in family planning. Now it joins a growing number of developing nations that see potential advantage in having a huge and growing workforce.
Do Muslim couples in Australia have ‘on average 4.5 children’ while other couples have ‘1.5 children’? Could Australia have a ‘Muslim majority’ in ‘a couple’ of generations? Let’s check the evidence.
Women will now be better informed when it comes to deciding whether it’s worth undergoing another round of IVF.
Incentives to encourage childbearing haven’t worked elsewhere in Asia – can they in China?
A world of warmer weather may be bad news for reproductive health and birth rates.
Are we overscheduling our children even from the moment of their birth? We live in an on-demand world. Movies are shown on request, food is delivered on call and drivers arrive when beckoned. As an economist…
Humanity is on course for a population greater than 11 billion by the end of this century, according to the latest analysis from the UN’s population division. In a simple sense, population is the root…
Observers may be quick to declare social trends “good” or “bad” for families, but such conclusions are rarely justified. What’s good for one family – or group of families – may be bad for another. And…
Top contributors
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Professor of Sociology, Texas A&M University
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Demographer, POLIS Centre for Social Policy Research, Australian National University
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Associate Professor in Earth System Science, University of Exeter
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Karin Hammarberg is a Friend of The Conversation.
Senior Research Fellow, Global and Women's Health, School of Public Health & Preventive Medicine, Monash University
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Professor of Sociology, University of Maryland
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Associate Professor of Markets, Public Policy and Law, Boston University
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Associate Professor of Social Science and Public Policy, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
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Associate Professor of Environmental Economics, University of California, Los Angeles
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Assistant Professor of Economics, University of Central Florida
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Associate Professor, University of California, Santa Barbara
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Anthropologue et démographe, professeur émérite au Muséum national d’histoire naturelle et conseiller de la direction de l'INED, Muséum national d’histoire naturelle (MNHN)
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Professor, Director of the National Perinatal Epidemiology and Statistics Unit, UNSW Sydney
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Professor of History, University of Maryland, Baltimore County
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PhD Candidate in History, Boston University
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Adjunct Professor, Georgetown University School of Nursing and Health Studies, Georgetown University
