To think it’s obvious why the birth rate is falling

[workidoos]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cnvj3j27nmro.amp

Life is prohibitively expensive in this country. We earn the UK average income each and can’t foresee being able to comfortably have a second child without the financial impact being too great. I understand sacrifices can be made but in addition to extortionate childcare and the essentials we want to be able to afford extracurriculars, birthday parties, Christmases, trips away for us and DD and some basic savings for her future. I’m not talking private school or extravagant holidays either. With another this would be harder, I’d have to definitely work full time and for longer to afford it and thus losing out on work life balance for what’s likely to be increased mental load and stress in some way or another.

On a local group someone was saying it’s over £100 for two adults and a child to enter a festive park nearby and see Santa. Mind boggling. As a family of 3 it then feels like the natural choice to stay that way, despite the fact we always saw ourselves with a bigger family.

Does this sound like anyone else’s situation? AIBU to think this news shouldn’t be a surprise?

You're wrong there. Yes, some countries have high birth rates but many African countries have birth rates similar to ours.

Women everywhere make similar decisions when they have basic education, access to contraception and a choice about whether to conceive.

It would be more accurate to say that in very poor countries women don't get education or healthcare, get married sooner to help their family finances. And in a system like that, where your kids aren't guaranteed to last into adulthood and you'll rely on them to help with farming/finances because there are no pensions - it's economically rational to have more.

Think it's more women focusing on work and being worried about climate change. You can have kids and not take them to theme parks etc

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fertility_rate

This is interesting to observe global trends.
Even comparing the tables from 2022 and 2024 you can see a decrease.
The world replacent rate is 2.3 children per woman (due to some countries having higher mortality rates), so everything in blue is below this.

Niger has the world's highest rate, but even that has been slowly decreasing from a peak in 1983 of 7.9 births per woman to 6.4 /6.6 (depending which data you look at ) in 2024.

Basically, the world over if women have a choice they generally don't want lots and lots of children.

There's no stories about young men desperately seeking a wife who is willing to give him a big family. Or articles about Dad's who dreamed of several children but the wife only wants one.
As far as my limited knowledge goes the Andrew Taits want money not kids. And subservient women.

And in a system like that, where your kids aren't guaranteed to last into adulthood and you'll rely on them to help with farming/finances because there are no pensions - it's economically rational to have more.
This is what I don't think people in the West understand about birthrate in sub saharan Africa. It's all very well talking about climate change and the environment but if the only way you have to get your family fed and to get people to care for you in your old age is to have children who can work/care for you, then all the contraceptive advice in the world won't help. The only way to reduce birth rate is to improve women's education and prosperity.

That wiki entry is interesting. It points out that the replacement rate in the West is 2.1 but in some countries ( presumably the poorest with the highest birthrates) it's 3.4 because of infant mortality. So even though in some countries the birthrate is high, and still well above replacement level, it's 2 x above not 3x above. The global birthrate has more or less stayed the same since the 1970s, even including African nations. So the global population increase is because people are living longer. Not more people being born. Once us over 50's pop off in 40 years or so, global population is predicted to plummet. If you take skin colour out of it, who really cares if most of that population is from Africa? The human race began there. Maybe we're meant to go full circle and end there, too.

Get your kid off YouTube ffs! This actually makes me sad! I have a big age gap and neither of my kids have watched this shit.

My decision not to have children was made in the early 1980’s. I wanted a career, to be able to do exactly as I wanted, when I wanted. I knew that I simply didn’t have a maternal, wants/needs a baby bone in my body. I wasn’t alone either, my DS doesn’t have children, two of my best friends at the time don’t have any children. We all came from loving, stable, solid, enough money for little luxuries, council house (later bought) backgrounds. We all did well at school and ended up having careers. None of us have any regrets at all. I wasn’t prepared to have time out for childbearing/raising and had a very time and money consuming hobby. I can understand the need and want though, but there are so many compromises and pitfalls that go with it.

PPs referencing those in poor countries having children to ensure there is support in their old age - indirectly, it's the same here, it's just we look at it from the point of view of money from taxes paid, rather than hands on support. We contribute to our communities as a whole financially rather than physically.

Not only do we have an ageing population, we also have generations coming through who will not be starting to make those financial contributions until later. The percentage of net contributors is not really being increased by the number of people now remaining in education.

All that is happening is that the number of mass contributors is reduced during the period in which the next generation is still in further education/part time employment.

Whilst the importance of net contributors can't be ignored, the fact is the majority are not and never were net contributors. But they will still BE contributing. We are now in a situation where the majority of our most able mass contributors aren't contributing at all until at least 6 years after the majority of previous generations would have started.

Whilst people are now expected to work longer at the other end there are fewer guarantees of health into our late 60s and beyond. We can't just keep shoving the pension age up. At some point we really need to bring the working/contributing age at the other end back down, unpalatable though that might be. And the problem there is that there are fewer and fewer employment options for unskilled teens. There isn't the industry there once was. I still believe the push to get young people into higher education has more to do with massaging unemployment figures than wanting our kids to have opportunities.

We need more young people in full time work from the age of 16, but we no longer have the work for them, certainly not work that will pay them enough to live on in the future.

I don't know what the answer is, but I don't think simply having more children is the solution to the Western problems caused by the drop in birth rate unless it is accompanied by much reduced public services and effectively turning the clock back to a time which wasn't dissimilar to those nations today having children to physically care for the older generations, etc.

And how many people will go for that?

In uneducated regions of Africa there is also the boast of great virility and possibly success if a man has several wives and thirteen kids.

I remember when Trump was President he stopped the sending of contraception to Africa at the behest of the Catholic Church but that may have been changed.

Well I hope you enjoyed getting to be holier than thou. And no I won't get my kids off youtube, you do you. You might be amazed how much you can learn on youtube if you give it a try.

On top of the affordability issue, more and more people just don't want to have kids, for a myriad of reasons, they don't want to bring kids into a world like this, they like their freedom and money, they just don't like kids. We fall into all 3 of those categories as do most of my friends and we each make over 100k so it's not financial. But yeah, it's not a big surprise.

Also in my experience having a child limits a woman so much more than a man. My ex had a great life picking and choosing when to see our dc whilst I did all the work. I'm limited in what hours I can work, when I can go out, when I can go on holiday etc. I expected that to some extent but when you see what some men get away with no wonder women won't entertain it.

Why is immigration intrinsically 'bad'? or 'wrong'?

Other than for reasons of racism and xenophobia.

All Western developed countries are seeing declining birth rates and declining fertility rates. Regardless of money invested in affordable childcare.

We need immigration and we'll continue to need immigration. So why is it bad?

It's not all bad but I think there has been too much.

Where I have grown up has totally changed and there are too many people in close proximity. The roads are heaving

It puts pressure on housing and we have to keep building on green spaces. The housing becomes more expensive.

I'm sure some immigrants are high earners but there are probably lots that need benefits and housing.

Do you make an argument for any controls on immigration?

The argument for controls on immigration are really focused on healthcare systems and housing. We have a housing crisis in the UK which is far worse than other countries with similar levels of migration because our housing market is completely dysfunctional. We have far and away the worst and most stupid planning laws in Europe and just haven't built enough homes over the past few decades.

So yes - we need some controls on immigration, particularly given the future prospect of a huge uptick in mass migration caused by climate catastrophe, looking ever more threatening when the US is on the cusp of having a climate change denialist POTUS.

You prob shouldn't refer to them as childless for one, implying they somehow have less bc they don't have children. All of my female friends are very well off financially and also happily child free.

Yep totally agree, none of my female friends have kids and it is entirely down to just not wanting them, I can't think of one who truly couldn't afford them if they wanted them. However, now it is much easier to just say nope, not for me and for women to have their own lives. It's very much a good thing.

eh?

You’ve taken my comment entirely out of context. I’ve never implied they have less. Merely it’s none of my business why they don’t have children. They refer to themselves as childless (and one petless).