Can the rich world escape its baby crisis?
Across the region, policymakers had brought down teenage pregnancies dramatically. The drop in birth rates, which occurred over the span of a single generation, was a stunning success. That was until it carried on.
And on.A South Korean woman who is now becoming fertile will have on average just 0.7 children during her childbearing years if she follows the example of her older peers. Since 2006 the country’s government has spent around $270bn, or just over 1% of GDP a year, on baby-making incentives, such as tax breaks for parents, maternity care and even state-sponsored dating. When birth rates first began to fall, few could have imagined how much harder it would be to get women to have more children, rather than fewer.
Officials would love just some of the “missing" births back.What began in East Asia is increasingly true elsewhere, too. The world faces a shortage of babies. Among rich countries, only Israel is having enough children to stop its population from shrinking, and in most places birth rates are falling (see charts 1 and 2).
As a consequence, the great and the good are growing worried. “A nation’s strength", warns Emmanuel Macron, France’s president, “lies in its ability to generate a dynamic birth rate." Elon Musk, owner of Tesla and X, predicts the end of civilisation.Almost every rich country is thus considering increasing its pro-natal efforts, as are many middle-income ones. In January Mr Macron launched a campaign to “demographically rearm" France (his weapons of choice: fertility tests and maternity leave).
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