UK fertility rate drops by 18.8% in 12 years

[MidnightPatrol]

The UK has the fastest falling fertility rate in the G7.

2022 saw the lowest number of births for 20 years.

The current TFR is 1.49 births per woman.

What do you think the reason for this is, and what could be done to reverse the trend?

news.sky.com/story/amp/britains-fertility-rate-falling-faster-than-any-other-g7-country-with-austerity-thought-to-be-a-principal-factor-13232314

And 'your' opinion is that in discussions about Motherhood, 'lifestyle choice' is not used prejoratively, in fact it's neo-liberal terminology crafting at its finest! Just because you don't believe this to be true it doesn't make your 'opinion' the 'truth'.

Lastly, Dartmouth college is 161 in The Times Higher Education World University rankings- just saying!

Er... what? Dartmouth is a very respectable Ivy League institution. Durham University isn't far behind on that list and it's a UK top 10 university.

(Not to mention that the ranking of the college attended by an author isn't a particularly good rebuttal against the contents of an article written by said author.)

If working people are a resource like war or oil - if follows wars to capture workers could start to be a thing.

Should have been water not war there.

'Not to mention that the ranking of the college attended by an author isn't a particularly good rebuttal against the contents of an article written by said author'

That's why it wasn't my only comment on the article, an article from 2019, that the PP couldn't be bothered to paraphrase.

😂

I wonder where the poster went to uni. Oxford Harvard Institute for Top Geniuses maybe.

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 oh yes it's changed days from 2019

It certainly doesn’t feel like that! Midwifery services are overrun and all I see are young families in my area. I did give birth in September (2021) and September is the busiest birthing month, and it definitely felt busy and bursting at the seams. All the pre-schools are full, I struggled to get my son into one, and all the schools are having to expand as they are heavily oversubscribed.

That's almost 6 years ago, pre much of the international conflict being conducted today. That said, there are many papers that put the counter argument to yours, that evidence how older leaders are more likely to engage in military conflict than younger ones.

It doesn't take a 'Top Genius' to understand the point of an article and disagree. However, IMO it is a bit lazy to link articles, not paraphrase them and pass them off as your own opinion.

I'm a Mother so my intellectual feats only include pushing shapes into a shape sorter and stacking wooden blocks!

It's not uniform. World wide it's linked to urbanisation trends. England and Wales certainly ins't uniform.

From here
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-13118755/Fertility-rate-plunges-time-low.html.

Scale not copied - but it goes from 0.68 -1.22 light green 1.22 -1.44 green, 1.58-1.73 light blue, 1.73 - 1.98 being top dark blue area.

Not sure if map is copying

I’m one of three siblings. One of us is child free by choice, me and other sibling have one child each. In my case, we could have afforded more than one but I hated being pregnant, had a bloody awful birth and piss poor post natal care. Put me off ever having another. I have a feeling DS won’t have children, he’s already said as much but is only 23 so might change his mind I guess.

In terms of having someone to look after me when I get old, I’m perfectly happy to shuffle off this mortal coil when I can no longer do the things I enjoy. Absolutely no desire to be stuck in a chair for 18 hours a day with someone getting me up and putting me to bed. My man was 96 when she died and spent the last 16 years indoors with carers four times a day. Not for me thanks.

I'm in an area that has the lowest birthrate and schools are closing as a result so it is certainly not uniform as you point out. My Dad is in his late 70s and tells me that out of his friends mainly from the London area he is the only grandparent to 5 children (includes my siblings DC) and there is only 1 other friend out of 6 that has one grandchild.

THIS 100%
You'd be shocked at the amount of grown men that spend all their spare time playing video games and smoking pot.
Plus the sheer price of rent at the moment. Go have a look at the average price of a three bed family home 😬 madness I suppose if you wanted a bigger family you could just buy a two bed flat and hope they're all the same gender lol.

If the darker bits mean a higher birth rate then my area is one of those. I am not surprised. It is quite deprived.

Yep Dark bit mean higher birth rate.

I'm in the only dark bit for a huge region and house prices are rapidly rising with high employment areas nearby. It's a nice bit of a deprived area though city is frequently slated on here.

I think the population mix is slowly changing as young locals get slowly priced out and families like us move here and work in nearby cities we can't afford to buy in. At some point I can't help but feel all the cheap accessible areas will be gone.

I'm also in a dark blue area which explains a lot, as my (white British) colleagues all have at least 3 (two have 4 and 5 respectively) and my older friends who became mums all had 3, with one exception. I had a suspicion that my location is an exception and so it is.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-10-17/australia-birth-rate-hits-rock-bottom-economic-consequences/104480816?utm_medium=social&utm_content=sf275083821&utm_campaign=tw_abc_news&utm_source=t.co&sf275083821=1

Let's be honest why would anyone have kids now? I think it's positive woman are waking up to the motherhood myth. After doing 90% of parenting alone during covid there is no amount of money or incentive that will make me have another one.

Because it’s one of the most rewarding things you can do in life. Relationships are a source of great happiness for humans and the bond between mother and child is one of the strongest you can experience (not everyone obviously).

I don’t regret becoming a mother and it’s not been that difficult for me as a full time working mum. The only thing stopping me having more is money as I want my kids to have their own bedroom and I can’t afford to buy a bigger house.

I did not have a maternal urge until my kids were born … in fact it took a while to develop after the birth

V. interesting. Is there a Scottish map?

It's one of the most rewarding things YOU have done in life. For others it's their worst mistake or worst nightmare.

Can't find a detailed one like England and Wales

https://landgeist.com/2022/02/18/fertility-rate-in-europe/

Best I could find was this for whole of Europe with some variation in Scotland from 2022.

I was replying to the previous poster who said “Let's be honest why would anyone have kids now? I think it's positive woman are waking up to the motherhood myth.” I was explaining why women choose to become mothers as the poster was suggesting it was irrational.