# Is There Any Practical Way to Increase the Birthrate? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 6, 2025, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655 "2025-01-06T20:41:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 65
**Author:** ![Charlie\_Tan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/charlie_tan/32/12582_2.png) [@Charlie\_Tan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Charlie_Tan)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 9:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1281 "2025-05-21T09:47:34Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > Part of the problem is that existing tax incentives for larger families tend to be very expensive because there is little bang for the buck. I say do more research. Apart from the “bang for the buck,” there’s a strong case to be made that it traps low education (especially immigrant) women in a cycle of having more and more kids It makes more sense economically for the family than working the lowest paying job they can hope to get. > [@DemonTree](#): > > cats are better than babies, Nah. But dogs are (I’m a dog person, but do like cats). In all seriousness, you’re coming close to introducing the crazy cat lady stereotype. I suppose that there really are people who refer to their pets as fur babies, and anthropomorphize them. But the idea that someone gets a cat or a dog as a substitute for having children doesn’t sit right with me. Getting a puppy is like having invited a toddler that will remain a toddler for 10+ years (give or take depending on breed). One has to have a very serious yearning for toddlers to think of substituting a pet for a kid. As you mentioned, children don’t remain in the diaper/toddler stage forever. He wrote as he’s getting giddy about the next puppy which will arrive mid July. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 10:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1282 "2025-05-21T10:10:21Z")
> [@Charlie\_Tan](#): > > I suppose that there really are people who refer to their pets as fur babies, and anthropomorphize them. In my experience it’s _other people_ referring to my pet(s) as “fur babies” or, in my case, “feather babies”. Most offensively, _to me_ (I don’t speak for anyone else) is on Mother’s Day. I absolutely _hate_ working Mother’s Day because, for 8 unrelenting hours I get greetings assuming I am a mother, or have a mother. My mother is dead. My mother-in-law is dead. Every other woman who has filled that role in my life is dead. I am _happy_ to help others celebrate the mothers in their lives but for me, it’s a reminder of loss and grief. In addition, I never had children. I am no one’s mother. I’m OK with that. What pisses me off is when people try to contort something in my life to make it fit. No, my pet does not make me a “mother”. At all. Stop doing that! I am not entitled to the title of “mother” in any way. Attempting to saddle me with that feels like stolen honor. _Stop doing that!_ Please! I usually try to arrange to have the day off and avoid people on Mother’s Day. I’m usually much, much happier that way. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1283 "2025-05-21T11:44:09Z")
> [@Charlie\_Tan](#): > > Nah. But dogs are (I’m a dog person, but do like cats). It was a friend’s puppy that nudged me to parenthood. Well, that’s not true. But i remember how much time they spent caring for and training the puppy, and i remarked to my husband, “if I’m going to have to put in that much work, i want to have a child, not just a dog. Children grow up.” But i wanted “family”, not “children”. > [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > I got my fertility numbers from wiki upthread and I have a reliability problem. Let’s look at South Korea. I said they have a fertility rate of 0.75. Their cite is “World Population Prospects” by the UN (2025). Scrolling down, there’s another 2024 list by the CIA World Factbook. That gives a fertility rate of 1.17. Big difference. I assume a demographer could explain why. The 2024 (??) CIA data I downloaded says 1.12. I’ll use that last source source below. I didn’t cite numbers in one of my posts, above (where i says South Korean fertility send to be increasing) because every site i looked at gave different numbers, although they all showed the same trend. I don’t know what’s up with that, as i thought the calculation was agreed upon and a well -documented nation like South Korea should have a grip on that number. > [@DemonTree](#): > > This is something that varies by time and place. Most of the other people posting in this thread are closer to my parents’ age than mine, and I get the impression it was a lot more common for marriage and parenthood to be seen as normative Yeah, that’s probably true. And yet, even though it was normal and expected for my generation, i found having children very isolating. Basically, my husband and i had no time for anything other than work and childcare for 10+ years. I think that isolation is a big reason people choose not to have kids. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1284 "2025-05-21T12:04:46Z")
Good point about the isolation. Paradoxically, when there are more children around there is often more adult/child social segregation, as the children roam around in packs with older kids supervising younger ones. Fewer kids means that small children are with their parents almost all the time. So if parents don’t want to be isolated from other adults, then either the adults have to be okay with a lot of small-child behavior including screaming and breaking stuff, or small children have to be adult-socialized at a young age, which is hard and not always beneficial. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1285 "2025-05-21T13:00:50Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > It’s selfishly been kind of amazing to learn and relearn stuff alongside him. I forgot how awesome space was. It’s clear he’s going to be a hard science kind of guy. Awww. Your son reminds me of myself as a child; not that I was some kind of genius, but interests wise. My daughter doesn’t seem more than casually interested in any of those things; right now she likes animals, mermaids, and superhero cartoons, pretty normal kid stuff. I think my nephew might be the only mathsy one in the family. > [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > When he first became interested in his “children” I thought, wow, he’s really nurturing. He takes care of his Beep the way you would a baby doll, feeding it, brushing its teeth every night, showering it with praise, etc. Then I realized he was telling his Baby Beep all the things I told him. Oh, yes. Kids model themselves on their parents. Sometimes it’s funny, sometimes it’s sweet, sometimes it’s mortifying (“do I really sound that _that_?”). It all makes me want to be a better person. And having her makes me care more about the state of the world, and about the future. Yes, that can lead to increased worries, but I can’t believe that it’s a bad thing. > [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > Part of the issue is we are so siloed on the Internet. There are forums for people who want kids but can’t have them, forums for fence sitters, forums for one and done, for people who don’t want kids, for people who are pregnant, for autistic and ADHD kids, for preschoolers, for teens, for every identity imaginable, and people get really enmeshed in that single identity and nobody ever has to talk to anyone else. Meanwhile community life IRL is dying. So there are indeed people talking about how much they love being parents - but they are talking only to other people who love being parents. We have to figure out some way to have a cross dialogue in a way that nobody feels like they aren’t being heard. Yes, that’s true. There probably were and are people talking about how much they love being parents on Reddit, but they would be on a parenting subreddit where I never saw them. General forums like this one, where you can just run across something you wouldn’t have thought to seek out are a dying breed. Revitalising real life community would be a boon for this, as for so many other problems of modern life. > [@Broomstick](#): > > One good thing about living in the present is that in many (though not all) instance we can do something about infertility. However, there are some significant obstacles, including cost. I’d like to see those barriers eliminated, or failing that, greatly reduced so people who want to become parents will be able to. Yes, I agree. Governments could be making fertility treatments available for free right now, and aren’t. Finding a way to create new eggs, eliminating the negative effects of aging on them, would be especially beneficial. > [@Broomstick](#): > > We also need to make it clear to young women that biology isn’t fair and they can’t wait as long as men to become parents. I think we also need to remind young men that these limits impact them too. They can’t just attract a younger woman at will if they wait until later in life to settle down, and if they are already married or in a relationship, waiting longer reduces their chances of having children with their partner. > [@Broomstick](#): > > Well, it is annoying but I accept that is part of living in society. People had to put up with my screaming when I was an infant and toddler, I put up with that of new humans when they’re going through that stage. Babies, toddlers, and kids are part of the world, they shouldn’t be segregated and hidden. Yeah. Babies and children are people too, and deserve to participate in society. And actually, after all the complaining and judgemental attitudes I’ve seen in the news and on social media, I was pleasantly surprised at how positive strangers have been towards my daughter. > [@puzzlegal](#): > > It was a friend’s puppy that nudged me to parenthood. Well, that’s not true. But i remember how much time they spent caring for and training the puppy, and i remarked to my husband, “if I’m going to have to put in that much work, i want to have a child, not just a dog. Children grow up.” A couple of years ago we went on holiday with some friends of my husbands, including a couple who are childfree. And they were talking about how they don’t want children because kids are so limiting. This couple own two greyhounds, and these dogs were literally more of a pain than our 3 yo daughter. They can’t walk far, and can’t get over stiles, so only one of the couple could come on hikes. They couldn’t come for a meal in a pub, because the dogs can’t be left alone that long in a holiday home. We went on a fun train ride, and the couple had to stay at home because the dogs wouldn’t handle it. Forget about taking them on a foreign holiday. Two years’ later, and we have ever more freedom as our daughter grows up and becomes more capable, while they are stuck with the same limitations. > [@puzzlegal](#): > > But i wanted “family”, not “children”. I think this is part of the issue. I feel like all the advice I saw was that you should not, and had no right to, expect anything from your kids after they were grown up, so you should only have them if you really enjoy spending (all your) time with young children for its own sake. Sometimes there’s the addition that if you aren’t 100% sure you could handle loving and caring for a profoundly disable child for the rest of your life, you shouldn’t have kids. > [@puzzlegal](#): > > Yeah, that’s probably true. And yet, even though it was normal and expected for my generation, i found having children very isolating. Basically, my husband and i had no time for anything other than work and childcare for 10+ years. I think that isolation is a big reason people choose not to have kids. What do you think could be changed to make it less isolating? > [@Kimstu](#): > > Good point about the isolation. Paradoxically, when there are more children around there is often more adult/child social segregation, as the children roam around in packs with older kids supervising younger ones. > > Fewer kids means that small children are with their parents almost all the time. So if parents don’t want to be isolated from other adults, then either the adults have to be okay with a lot of small-child behavior including screaming and breaking stuff, or small children have to be adult-socialized at a young age, which is hard and not always beneficial. Yes. My husband calls them ‘feral kids’, lol. But I think that’s the ‘natural’ way for children to be raised, and probably better for them. And it allows the adults to have adult conversations with their friends, rather than spending all their time supervising small children or trying to keep older ones entertained. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1286 "2025-05-21T13:31:20Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > What do you think could be changed to make it less isolating? Changes in the social rules that children must be supervised at all times. Of course, that attention really does decrease child mortality and child morbidity. So that’s a big trade off. When unavoidable child mortality was high enough that it was fairly common to lose a kid, the small increase in risk to let them run free, or to leave the baby in the care of the 5 year old, was more palatable than it is when we all expect that all our children will outlive us. And I’m surprised about your friend with the greyhounds. It’s much easier to kennel dogs when you go on vacation, or leave you dog with a friend who has dogs, than it is to get away from your small children for a week. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1287 "2025-05-21T13:36:50Z")
One change, that doesn’t have so many negative trade offs, that might increase the birth rate is to normalize large families. Some adults really enjoy rearing children, and tend to be good at it. Others really don’t, and often aren’t. I think the world would be a better place if ~half of adults didn’t have children, and the other half had, on average, larger families. More kids would have good, engaged parents, more children would have siblings, which i think is really valuable, both when you are a kid and also as you age, and more adults would be spared the expectation of child care. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1288 "2025-05-21T13:42:48Z")
To a very real degree this is what’s already happening in the US. There’ve been statistics cited up-thread about that. The number of childless has grown, but among those with non-zero numbers of kids, the average is larger than it was say 30 or 40 years ago. Still not as large as the late 19th or early 20th century when the US was much more a country of rural / small farm living. A societal challenge arising from this is that the preference for large family sizes is very highly correlated with strongly traditional religious views. Which suggests that 30-40 years later, the only people of childbearing age will be the highly traditionally religious. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1289 "2025-05-21T14:01:09Z")
You can’t have a fifth baby before you’ve had the first. When that first happens at 16, five happens more often than when the first is at 33 or later. Women (and yes the key person in this is the woman) have family planning ability now, and when they do a large number are choosing to not start until late and then have fewer on average even if they would have wanted more had they started earlier. Yes that ability is under attack. And greatly reducing that ability would increase fertility and the number of much larger families. I don’t think many here however would be in support of that approach. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1290 "2025-05-21T15:19:09Z")
Well said. Here’s a bit of an analogy that’s unrelated to birthrates strictly speaking … We lament a bit the rise of the insular family over the older model of 3 generations under one roof and 10 aunts and uncles plus 50 cousins all living within a few blocks of our home. Conversely I (and my late wife) lived most of my / our adult lives in a different time zone from 100% of her and my extended family. A very different cultural thing. Yet what I/we did is 100% the product of choice. In the main, it’s only people who have little or no choice who remain clustered like that traditional family. It’s pretty much a one-way function by logical necessity: If choice exists, some percentage of the family will leave for whatever reasons make sense to them. There’s no countervailing mechanism for strangers to move into your family cluster and become replacement family members. So _by definition_, choice ensures the shrinkage of these clusters. The only way to preserve clusters is to remove choice. Or, in a softer version, persuade people to not take the choices on offer. Which IMO is not much different from training your dog to stay in its crate even when you leave the door open. Social (or especially familial) pressure is (or can be) just as much a restraint on action as can be e.g. economic necessity. It doesn’t greatly matter if you (any you) don’t have a choice, or don’t _think_ you have a choice. In those circumstances you’ll _act_ as if you don’t. And acts are all that matters. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1291 "2025-05-21T15:22:00Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > You can’t have a fifth baby before you’ve had the first. When that first happens at 16, five happens more often than when the first is at 33 or later. That’s true. If it were easier to start at 25, women who want kids would have more babies. But people do feel that they need to be settled enough to support the kids, and to step back some from work & education, before they can start. I didn’t really feel settled enough at 30, and only started that young because of a family history of fertility problems. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1292 "2025-05-21T15:44:49Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > There’s no countervailing mechanism for strangers to move into your family cluster and become replacement family members. It may not be widespread, but there are mechanism for building family-like support networks. We had our kids thousands of miles from any family. But we quickly built a support network. We have friends who will, do, and did help us with our children (and pets and house). Friends from the neighborhood, friends from work, friends from church, friends from the kids’ schools, etc. Of course there’s varying levels of trust and responsibility. Because people who have kids, but no family, have that in common and have the resources to help each other. If I’m already picking up my kid from school, it’s easy enough to pick up another kid from school. And then get repaid in kind. And there’s a lot of us now. And the unspoken rule: never comment on another’s parenting. It’s kind of the opposite of family who give advice but no support. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1293 "2025-05-21T16:17:00Z")
True, and nonparents are also part of those networks. Like, my preschooler-parent friend has a doctor appointment and just drops her kid with me, or someone else in our friend group, for an hour or so. I think continuing to normalize parenthood and nonparenthood as equally socially acceptable, with no shaming or putdowns on either side, will do a lot to reintegrate nonparents into the child support network. For a while there, the self-described “childfree” community was very aggressively anti-kid, largely in pushback against aggressive anti-childlessness in society as a whole. And of course there will always be SOME nonparents who openly just “hate kids” and want nothing to do with them. But most of us very much don’t feel that way. And when our willing participation in the CSN is appreciated, rather than pitied or derided as some kind of parasitism by the emotionally stunted or starved, I think everyone is better off. Especially kids. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1294 "2025-05-21T16:53:04Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > You can’t have a fifth baby before you’ve had the first. When that first happens at 16, five happens more often than when the first is at 33 or later. I think you’re on to something here. My husband and I married at 23. That was when we had our first conversation about having kids. Due to his PhD program, the need to establish our careers, and a long wait for a planned adoption that didn’t happen, we didn’t have kids until we were 37. I hated being pregnant and I hated the early months of parenting. When my son was born, the first words out of my mouth, I’m embarrassed to admit, were, “I’m not doing that again.” It would take fully six months before I began to start to enjoy parenting. We had those early talks about how we didn’t think we could handle more kids. But we were basing that decision on what my son was like as a toddler. I can’t remember exactly when it happened but my husband said to me, “We just hit our deductible. If I’m going to get a vasectomy, now’s the time to do it before the next insurance year.” And I assumed that meant he didn’t want more kids. So he got the snip. But as our son got older and we talked about it, we kind of rushed into that decision. Maybe if we’d talked about it more, we would have had the same outcome. We have very compelling reasons to not have more kids. But in a sense it felt like we didn’t get a chance to see if we liked having kids before we decided whether we wanted more. We made the decision at one of our parenting low points. That said, I had a miscarriage at 33 and I’m glad I didn’t become a parent then, because I wasn’t ready. Waiting until I was 37 made a big difference in my overall maturity and mental stability. It gave my husband time to establish his career. Overall I think it was a better outcome for the kid we have. It sounds crazy that four years can make a difference but in my case, it really did. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1295 "2025-05-21T18:24:43Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > I hated being pregnant and I hated the early months of parenting. When my son was born, the first words out of my mouth, I’m embarrassed to admit, were, “I’m not doing that again.” It would take fully six months before I began to start to enjoy parenting. I didn’t hate months 4-18, but i can’t say i enjoyed anything about having kids until they hit the terrific twos. (Which happens around 18 months.) I hated being pregnant, and also had quite severe hormone-related depression through most of my second pregnancy. (Which no one will treat, because of the risk to the fetus, and because it _is_ expected to clear up on its own in a few months. But i was really miserable, and made my husband miserable, and it probably wasn’t great for the first child, either.) And i hated the first three months, when i had to be constantly available for a lump that didn’t do anything. (They eat, they sleep, they poop.) And i found the next ~15 months tedious and generally unpleasant. Fortunately for our kids, my husband loves infants, and loves to hold and cuddle infants. Because i sure don’t. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1296 "2025-05-21T18:39:45Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > What do you think could be changed to make it less isolating? Fewer working hours. If people didn’t need to spend so much time at work, they could raise children and still have time do things _other_ than work + children + sleep. And probably have more children in the first place; I don’t buy that it’s a _coincidence_ that the places with the worst birth rate dropoffs are the ones known for workaholism. ---
**Author:** ![filmore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7993a0/32.png) [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1297 "2025-05-21T18:42:19Z")
Under 8 or so, I think the main issue with kids is the unrelenting time commitment. It’s stressful because a huge portion of your time is spent meeting their needs. The problems with young kids are pretty straightforward to deal with, even if they take a lot of time and energy. But in the tween/teen years, there’s the potential for a lot of very complex problems to come up which are very hard to deal with. There may be issues with behavior, lying, drugs, alcohol, sex, respect, mental health, body image, eating disorders, lack of motivation, etc. These sorts of problems don’t have simple solutions and can be very stressful to deal with. A good parent will be able to not take things personally and not get overwhelmed if these problems don’t have easy solutions. When thinking about encouraging people to have kids, it’s important to recognize that being a parent is not all rainbows and stuffed animals. Being a parent can also mean dealing with your kid having crushing emotional problems that last for years and years and the effect it has on the family unit. If someone doesn’t have the personality to handle that kind of stuff, they may find being a parent too stressful and regret being a parent. ---
**Author:** ![filmore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7993a0/32.png) [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2025, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1298 "2025-05-22T16:31:57Z")
> [@Charlie\_Tan](#): > > I suppose that there really are people who refer to their pets as fur babies, and anthropomorphize them. But the idea that someone gets a cat or a dog as a substitute for having children doesn’t sit right with me. Here’s a study that just came out which looks at how dogs can satisfy some aspects of the nurturing drive similar to parenting. Although people don’t typically think of their pets truly as children, the act of taking care of a pet fulfills their nurturing need in a similar way to raising a child. > **[How modern dog ownership has redefined family and parenting](https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1084363)** > > Birth rates are declining worldwide, while dog parenting practices are gaining popularity. What does this growing “furry children” trend reveal about our societies? Researchers from Eötvös Loránd University suggest that, while dogs do not actually... ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2025, 11:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1299 "2025-06-12T11:11:59Z")
This boils down to “it’s the economy, stupid” - money and costs, including on-going costs that can’t be fixed by a one-time “baby bonus” - are significant factors in falling birth rates. Gift link, should work for all > **[The Real Fertility Crisis? Financial Security, a U.N. Report Says.](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/11/world/fertility-crisis-un-report.html?unlocked_article_code=1.OU8.Vqmw.KzzFtIY_J70K&smid=url-share)** > > Policymakers in many countries assume that birthrates have fallen because people want fewer children, but a global study says financial insecurity is driving those decisions. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2025, 11:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1300 "2025-06-12T11:33:51Z")
I suppose what’s relevant at the larger scale is that worldwide, the mass of people are starting to wake up to the idea that financial security _ought_ to be attainable … for them. And since they now want it but don’t have it, they’ve become kid-averse. A 1920s subsistence farmer in country X never thought financial security was attainable, so didn’t use that to condition their child plans. In fact for that person, more kids probably _was_ financial security. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655.md?page=64) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655.md?page=66)