U.K. birthrate hits 20 year low

[SunshineHello]

“Since 2011, the number of babies born has been on an almost constant downward trend, falling each year from 2011 to 2020 before a small rise in 2021 as pandemic restrictions were eased. The latest figures show another “considerable” decline last year, from 624,828 births to 605,479.”

This take the TFR to the lowest rate on record for the U.K. - 1.5

I wonder how much the birth rate will drop before it levels out.

The cost of housing and childcare are a major factor among my peers.

I currently have one in nursery and if I had two it would be ~ £4,000 pcm. That’s a £75,000 salary. To make a decision to do that is… complex.

I’m not sure we’ll have the same high people requirement as AI kicks in

It’s started already but right at the beginning. It’ll pick up quickly

I think you can safely put that at the feet of the withdrawal of uc for the third child rather than MN posters though.

And yet many think people are having too many babies!

The old age-dependency ratio that we are heading towards requires some serious thinking and adaptations over the coming decades. Of course we'll just stick our head in the sand and see how it goes though

this does worry me, I think it was 1:5 in the 60s, now around 1:3 & forecasted to be 1:2. If you talk about it it's ageism though, I'm bloody worried about getting old!

For many it's the sheer expense which shows how out of whack things are

Exactly. There are far too many people on the planet already and it's now having real consequences. Adding more seems like madness.

I don't understand this. The population growth in the west is largely driven by people living longer & immigration

We are living longer

life expectancy isn't increasing & healthy life expectancy hasn't increased but people now need to work till 68 - which I expect will
increase.

Wage stagnation is a huge one.

40k in 2010 is akin to 60k today but no child benefit and a higher tax rate.

We selfishly had our children on 2015 and 2019(X2) despite the impending apocalypse.

I think amongst my Uni and work friends, 2 and under is normal (notwithstanding twins)but at the (WC) school gate (where it's rare for both parents to work cos childcare costs too much) at least 2 is more normal. I suspect that part is ever as it has always been.

I'd be interested to see if family size is getting smaller, or of more women are choosing to not have children iyswim

And yet every other thread on MN is Should I have a third baby?

But not every woman has one baby

Encouraging women to have unwanted children seems like a particularly brutal way to solve the problem.

except boobs has advocated for that

But you still had children in the aftermath of 9/11, the Iraq war and the world financial crash? It’s all very well saying you wouldn’t have children now when you already have them, I’m not sure I believe it when people say that tbh

This rings true for me. I always assumed we'd have two kids but I struggle to see us having a second. Putting aside any personal feelings on the subject and the wider issues of climate change and the state of the planet, for purely economic reasons it would be a real stretch to have a second with the cost of housing and childcare plus everything in between. It might just about become feasible once DC heads to school, but by that point I'll be getting to an age where it may not be an option medically. I know a fair few people in a similar boat.

The most ridiculous comments are people saying 'I've had my kids however many years ago, but I wouldn't have any now'.

100% guarantee, if you wanted kids then, you'd still go to have kids now 😂

I made a conscious decision not to have kids due to population concerns and the whole resource issue - there are just too many people on the planet and there are finite resources to support them all.

But people in the west have a far bigger impact on resources then people in poorer parts of the world. Do you believe in rebalancing resources or repatriations to other countries @whirlyhead?

Good, have you seen the current thread about awful maternity care? Plus the racism in the health system? Then there are costs, the environment, AI… Why should intelligent women choose to have children in such a situation?

I don't know what this means?**

The anti natalism on a website called "mums"net never fails to astonish me.

Population collapse is the real concern. If you're so concerned about this political issues, you should be fighting for a better country, future for children rather than just opting out and pretending its the moral choice.

When people say "but people need to have children in order to support you when you're older" I see the point, but at the same time I should be able to pay for my own care if/when I hit that stage.

There's nuance though from a financial aspect an economy made up of more older people will be more expensive than a reversed one. There's already a shortage of staff in the NHS/social care so everything is going to get a lot more expensive n

My 2 we’re born in 2005 and 2008, those days seem decades away from where we are now, life seemed so less stressful and brighter then. I feel there has been such a huge shift in peoples attitudes and life in general, it just doesn’t feel the same. Life is just very stressful for so many people right now for a whole host of reasons and it’s having such a huge impact on mental and physical health. I wouldn’t want to bring a child into this world and I hope my children don’t either.

Thank god it's dropping.

Population collapse 🤣

I'd be interested to see if family size is getting smaller, or of more women are choosing to not have children iyswim

yes & yes

The Office for National Statisticss_ found the proportion of women having just one child has been rising over the years.
It now stands at 18 per cent, the same as last year — up from 14 per cent for those women born in 1946.
Two-child families remain the most common size, at 37 per cent for women aged 45 in 2018.
Among this age group, 19 per cent were childless — similar to recent years but more than double the nine per cent for their mums’ generation.

Oh come off it! There was a global financial crisis in 2008 and terror attacks going on left right and centre at the time you had your children, it was hardly a golden utopia. Stop being so sanctimonious, you acted selfishly to have your children just like everybody else who fulfils their biological urge.

As parents are by large having kids around 30. It makes sense that high birth rate 30 years ago correlate with high birth rate years in the present. Not to mention Brexit, rising abortion rates & immigration from other countries is reducing.

I also suspect the data doesn’t include babies born outside the UK / have non-British mothers.