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?

Freedom of choice,
Availability of contraception,
Access to education,
Less focus/reliance on religion.

All of the above enable women to be more independent and to have goals beyond motherhood. Combine the above with current fears regarding the future and the lack of family and societal support, make it more logical and acceptable not to procreate.

Contraception has only been available for 1 generation, families have been getting smaller for the past two generations. It's a global epidemic, with first world countries more susceptible to the falling birth rate, than 2nd and 3rd world countries.

There was extreme poverty in the past and people still procreate, women had no choice.

It’s an international trend. In South Korea the birth rate is c.1.2. Even in African countries where births per mother are still above replacement level, the birth rate is falling dramatically. In the long run it will likely even out, but when you have a bulge of elderly people the care burden is significant.

@sparklyfox anyone is able to make the choice they don’t want to have kids for environmental or climate reasons.

You don’t need to be from a privileged background.

This. And with so many mothers having to go back to full time work, and do the lion's share of childcare and housework, you can only have a couple of kids before you break.

I remember reading something about the whole biological clock thing being mostly societal. Many women don’t feel this and probably never have but felt obliged to say so. Any time women have education and freedom the birth rate drops.

So many young people have to stretch themselves to the max, across two decent incomes, to be able to afford to own or buy even a flat or a 2-bed house. Then losing one of those salaries (either by being a SAHP or to nursery fees) is incredibly tough. And if you were to then throw in having to buy or rent a larger home to reasonably accommodate three kids or so...
That's why people aren't having kids, or are having fewer. Plus, I've had so many more opportunities than my mother and about a billion more than my grandmother. Not every woman (or indeed every man) gets fulfilment from children or from having multiple children and thankfully the vast majority of us can now choose a path that suits us rather than following what society expects.

I’m not sure that it is having that much of an impact to be honest.
There is definitely a divide between those who work and those who live on benefits as stated by a previous poster. Where I live there are lots and lots of women in their 20s having more than one child. The women who are having less children and waiting until they are older tend to work.
Perhaps when you work you cannot afford to have children. I come across many, many women who keep having children and they either:
Don’t work
work very part time hours
don’t live with a partner
live with their partner but he doesn't work either.
The women who are married and both they and their husband work are the ones holding off.
My own adult children have said they have no idea how they could afford to have children.

I was chatting to my mum about this the other day. In her day, it wasn’t common to have foreign holidays, trips to theme parks and other days out, meals out happened on a special occasion only, furniture was second hand. Cars were bangers, people didn’t have the ‘latest’ technology when it came out because they can’t afford it (or they prioritised other things). Kids would have 1 or 2 days out in the summer, not multiple days out every week. Most of the summer was spent playing in the garden.
People live expensive lives nowadays, so it’s no wonder people struggle to be able to afford a second or third child

It’s a popular narrative but I don’t think it’s true. Holidays abroad became popular because the introduction of low cost carriers make holidays much cheaper, I used to fly all over for £25. You can’t really drive a banger now due to car seat regulations and policies like ULEZ. Mobile phones didn’t exist when I was a dc so of course no one had one but tech is much cheaper now. When I was growing up everyone had a landline now people have mobiles. My parents socialised a lot in the pub but pubs are dying.
younger people have less disposable income then previous generations due to housing costs so they actually have more to spend.

Women now have a choice. There isn’t this expectation she should marry the first man who pays her attention, then churn out children whilst staying at home, doing all the chores whilst the man makes all the money (and then possibly leaves, which seems common on here, leaving her in a terrible position).

Yes, you can still have lots of children if you want to and those I know go have multiple children aren’t actually the highest earning. But, you can also earn your own money, date for a while, choose not to marry, travel the world.

The world won’t collapse, we will learn to be a true global economy with increased immigration to sustain the population.

Piss poor maternity ‘care’ certainly put me off having anymore, and I have met other mothers who have said the same.

Agree about money and housing being issues too.

Also lots of young women who have seen the their mothers struggling to manage career, motherhood and running the home, and don’t fancy putting themselves through it, can’t blame them!

Plus the message has been for years “don’t have dc unless you can afford them” and I guess people have absorbed it.

I think blaming it on "people leaving it too late" to start a family is missing the point. Proper adulthood/independence is often delayed these days because people can't afford to rent/buy, so end up living at home for a least a few years in their 20s. This is also often the only way to save for a deposit.

For many of my friends, childcare for 2 pre-school kids cost them the same as their mortgage. That's just not worth considering for some people.

Poor maternity and pregnancy care. To the point it's actually terrifying that we're in this situation in 2024.

The hit a woman's career takes, compared to a man's, when they start a family. Still.

Women increasingly want equality in a relationship (work, mental load etc) and refusing to settle. They're prepared to say no to marriage and kids if they don't think they can get that equality.

Of course, I've just never encountered normal people who state this as one of their reasons for not having children.

The world won’t collapse, we will learn to be a true global economy with increased immigration to sustain the population.

Well the question is how much immigration is the UK comfortable with because over the last few years it’s not been that popular.

In terms of mental load I think there is a lot more pressure on mothers and fathers these days. Parents are meant to be constantly around their dc, watching them etc which wasn’t the normal for previous generations.

I noticed it tends to be the well earners who say they can't afford a second. Often the less well off seem to manage it.

I agree with others that the ones having larger families are either very high earners (or have inherited from their parents) or not working. My salary only realistically covers me. If I had a partner on the same salary, then things would look a lot different.

Anecdotally, my colleagues and friends with highly paid spouses have 3 or 4, and the people I went to school with who don’t work or do online MLMs have 4 or 5.

Anyone else I know has 0 or 1.

@Carrotsandgrapes two nursery places local to me will cost you ~ £3,500 month (with hours, tax-free childcare) - to up to about £4,500 without.

So you need to earn min. £60,000 to pay for it - but it could be up to about £80,000.

I decided not to have children when i was 21 in 1994. I could see what was coming down the track............women expected to DO it all rather than have it all. Thirty years later i have no regrets about this decision

Immigration won't solve the problem because immigrants also age.

I would be interested to see statistics showing the number of women who have stopped at one child because they only then discover that their partner is unhelpful and won't take on half the burden.

Bit of a weird one, but I wonder if something is happening biologically.

Hasn't there been a big decline in men’s fertility?

I think this is true. Many people are prioritising, and are prioritising having a comfortable life, a decent career, a house and holidays over having children. The pressure and expectation isn't there so more people, if they have to choose between not having a holiday every year and having a child or children are choosing not. Life is long. Who wants to choose decades of poverty if they don't have a real desire for a child? Previously people would have just done it wiyhoit thinking about it. If society wants women to choose to have childrennthey shouldn't have treated parenting as as an inconvenient lifestyle choice for so long.

@Foxblue is on the money with this:

I think it's because it's become much more socially acceptable to leave a relationship where you aren't happy (not far enough in my opinion) especially for women, and the social change that's happened in terms of recognising abusive or shitty behaviours, and women having places to go online that are free of their immediate circle, who may themselves have ingrained ideas on what's acceptable to put up with, to talk about what's going on

I think finance may be a factor but as PPs have said plenty of very poor people have more children than wealthy ones so I don’t think it’s the whole story.

A big part of it is that it’s no longer the default for almost all women to have children and a lot of people who historically would have done it just because it’s what you did now feel liberated not to have to.

Until about 40 years ago not having children marked a woman out as odd or unusual. Nowadays people accept it. And that’s no bad thing.

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20230327-how-pollution-is-causing-a-male-fertility-crisis

i honestly think it is because most people are just happy with 2 children maximum. They just don’t feel the need to have more. Society is geared towards 2 adults and 2 children and in terms of time and expense it makes for an easier life. You are simply replacing yourself which is also best for the environment. There just isn’t the (usually religious) assumption anymore that you keep going for as long as you can and women stay at home to raise them.

some people will choose to have more but then some people can’t or don’t want to have children so the birth rate declines.

I actually am thrilled the population is declining. The country, particularly the cities, are just too crowded. The sky is disappearing amongst the skyscrapers. The roads are clogged. A managed reduction of the population over the next 50 years sounds like a good thing to me. The only benefit I ever hear for an ever growing population is ‘who is going to pay our pensions’? The economy should not be treated as a giant Ponzi scheme!