Latest news with #babybust
Daily Mail
5 days ago
- Science
- Daily Mail
Britain's biggest 'baby deserts': The truth about plunging birth rates amid growing threat of 'underpopulation' - find out how YOUR area fares
Plunging fertility rates mean nine in ten neighbourhoods face the terrifying threat of 'underpopulation', MailOnline can today reveal. Laying bare the reality of Britain's 'baby bust', staggering analysis shows only 5,000 out of 36,000 communities are having enough babies. Nationwide, fertility rates have sunk to their lowest levels since records began in the 1930s. Women in England and Wales, on average, now only have 1.44 children. Yet, in parts of the country, this is as low as 0.1 – the equivalent of one child for every ten women of childbearing age. Experts fear the freefalling trend will leave the country reliant on immigration to prop up the economy, with Britain otherwise left with too few younger people to work, pay tax and look after the elderly. MailOnline analysed fertility rates by lower layer super output areas (LSOAs) – home to around 2,000 people. Across England and Wales, there are 36,000 in total. Full results of our probe – employing methodology backed by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) – can be viewed below in our postcode search tool below. For a population to stay the same size without relying on immigration, nations must achieve a 'replacement' level fertility rate of 2.1. Yet scientists studying the demographic phenomenon – dubbed the 'greatest risk to the future of civilisation' by Elon Musk – claim the real target should be upped to 2.7 to avoid extinction. Only 679 LSOAs (1.9 per cent) recorded a total fertility rate above that threshold, our figures showed. The fertility rate – calculated by comparing populations of birthing-aged women with the amount of babies born for each area – was below one in 6,000 LSOAs. In seven neighbourhoods, no births were recorded at all in 2023 – the last year with available data. Excluding LSOAs where no children were born, the area with the lowest fertility rate was in the Western quadrant of leafy Guildford (0.07). Behind it in the league table came the south western corner of Darlington, inbetween Hummersknott and Skerne Park, (0.09) and the Paignton area of the Devon seaside town of Torbay (0.11). At the other end of the spectrum was the Stamford Hill area of Hackney, where 76 babies were born to 354 women. Four of the top five areas were located in that north London borough, with Shoreditch (5.54), Woodbury Wetlands (5.4) and the area next to South Tottenham (5.33) ranking third, fourth and fifth, respectively. The second top spot belonged to a pocket of King's Lynn and West Norfolk, next to the village of Hockold cum Wilton (5.78). Fertility replacement doesn't account for the impact of immigration, meaning overall population levels can still increase in a country despite a drop in fertility rates. Yet becoming reliant on immigration to offset low birth rates would only fuel the fire, on what is already a hugely controversial topic in British society. Immigration levels have spiralled to all-time highs over the past few years, with tens of thousands having arrived on small boats. Experts also say the fertility rates of immigrants' descendants tend to converge with those of the native population over time as second and third generation immigrants are influenced by social norms of their birth country. It means that to sustain population growth through immigration, a continuous influx of new migrants is required. World-leading demographer Dr Paul Morland told MailOnline: 'We have been below replacement fertility levels for over 50 years now. 'That's why we've had mass migration, why our economy is in such a bad way and it's just decades of problems'. 'It's also a major lag that we'll be dealing with for many years'. Oxford University-educated Dr Morland, the author of No One Left: Why the World Needs More Children, added: 'We are only now suffering the effects of our fertility rate in the 2000s.' Women prioritising their education and careers, and couples waiting to have children until later in life have fuelled the freefalling trend. Rising costs, especially the price of childcare and housing, is another factor thought to be putting people off starting families. There is no evidence that Covid vaccines are to blame, with scientists insisting there is no proof they harm fertility. Britain's fertility rate as a whole is forecasted to fall to 1.3 by 2100. The US is on track for a similar downward trajectory, researchers warned last year in the respected medical journal The Lancet. Sharing their shock findings, the University of Washington team warned 97 per cent of nations face the threat of underpopulation by 2100. By then, half of all babies may be born in sub-Saharan Africa. Dr Morland said that, as nations become more prosperous, fertility rates typically fall. He said: 'The only western country with a birthrate above two is Israel and there is a countervailing religious ideology to that - if you don't have that then Western countries fall behind.' Last week, Keir Starmer refused to align with his Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson's line that she harboured 'worrying repercussions for society in the future' if the UK's birth rate didn't improve. A No10 spokesperson said that the Prime Minister would not 'tell people how to live their lives'. The move comes as comparable Western countries with similar birth issues such as France and Italy have taken steps in recent years to right the ship. Last year, French President Emmanuel Macron brought in free fertility checks for those aged 18 to 25. And Giorgia Meloni, Italy's Prime Minister, set a target of 500,000 births annually. Asked why Sir Keir would not weigh in on the debate in the way Mr Macron and Ms Meloni have in France and Italy respectively, the No10 spokesman said: 'It's for the members of the French and Italian government to speak for their policies.' Last year, the Office for Budget Responsibility warned that Britain's falling birth rate could see the national debt soar over the next 50 years. It said the country would have to become reliant on migration to boost the population as deaths will outnumber births in Britain from the middle of the next decade. A waning population could mean there are not enough workers to care for the ageing members of society and to pay taxes to keep funding public services. Immigration remains a hot button voter issue in Keir Starmer's premiership. In May, the PM announced plans to 'significantly' reduce net migration over the next four years, with the Home Office suggesting his eight core policy areas could lead to a 100,000 per year drop by 2029. In his recent meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron, Keir Starmer said that a 'one in, one out' policy was scheduled to come into force within weeks. Our search tool also lays bare the rising average age of mothers across the nation. Nationally, the average age of mums now stands at 30.9 years old. This is an all-time high. During the 1970s, it was closer to 26. The oldest mothers in the country, on average, live in the City of London (38.2) and Kensington and Chelsea (35). Westminster (34.8), Camden, and Islington (both 34.7) followed closely behind. At the other end of the spectrum was the Nottinghamshire town of Mansfield and the region of North East Lincolnshire, both with an average age of 28.2. Methodology MailOnline analysed fertility rates by lower layer super output areas (LSOAs) – home to around 2,000 people. Across England and Wales, there are 36,000 LSOAs in total. We used the 2022 female population estimates for each LSOA from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) – the most up-to-date figures available. These were broken down into age brackets of 15-24, 25-34 and 35-44. This is how the ONS separates women of childbearing age in its statistics. We then pulled the number of births that occurred in 2023 for each age group in every LSOA and calculated age-specific fertility rates. Finally, to calculate the total fertility rate figure for each area, we summed the age-specific rates and multiplied the result by ten – representing the age gap in each bracket. The final figure was then divided by 1,000 to give us a total fertility rate.
Washington Post
10-06-2025
- Health
- Washington Post
You can't save the birth rate, so at least save your brain
In today's edition: Ashes to ashes, bust to bust. Two essays today frame the breadth of human life, beginning with Eduardo Porter's on the big dip in fertility rates across the globe — the baby bust. A bunch of solutions have been proposed here in the United States, but Eduardo writes that no baby bonus or motherhood medal is going to offset the fact that the opportunity cost for having a child is now much higher for women than in decades past. Even in countries that have devoted lots of money to subsidized child care, such as France and the Scandinavian states, fertility is still ticking lower.
Daily Mail
04-06-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
EXCLUSIVE Do you live in one of Britain's fastest shrinking towns? Find out with our interactive tool that charts the underpopulation crisis
Deaths outnumber births in half of neighbourhoods, according to analysis laying bare the 'alarming' baby bust. Some of the worst-hit areas across England and Wales are shrinking naturally at a pace of 5 per cent a year, in trends which have spooked experts. Parts of Wales, Merseyside, Devon, Dorset and Sussex are threatened by 'underpopulation', data suggests. Your browser does not support iframes. Your browser does not support iframes. Your browser does not support iframes. Your browser does not support iframes. Your browser does not support iframes.
Daily Mail
28-05-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
Elon Musk's greatest fear realized as young adults find a replacement for 'burdensome' babies
People in the West – where fertility rates are collapsing – are replacing kids with dogs, a new review suggests. Researchers have found in European countries, declining rates of births have correlated with rising rates of dog ownership. They analyzed around a half-dozen studies on young people's views about pets and children, finding they see dog parenting as less burdensome than bearing a child. The researchers identified financial stress and lifestyle freedom as key reasons for the shift. The team from Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest wrote: 'Many wealthy and developed countries are now experiencing sub-replacement fertility, meaning people are having fewer children than needed to maintain the population over time,' the team shared. 'In contrast, dog ownership has gained popularity over the last decades.' In the US, more households now have dogs than children. More than 63 million households owning at least one pet compared to 32.7 million households with at least one child under the age of 18. The so-called 'baby bust' in the West has sparked concern from economists and public figures, including Elon Musk, who has warned that falling birth rates pose 'the biggest threat to civilization.' The billionaire, who has 14 children with four different women, has said that low birth rates mean few workers, increased debt, strained healthcare and pension systems and total social unrest. It comes as the US fertility rate has fallen to 1.6 births per woman, far below the 2.1 replacement rate needed to sustain a population. The new review suggests that this shift reflects a deeper transformation in society. Professor Enikő Kubinyi, senior author and head of the Department of Ethology, said: 'We argue that many people consider dogs to be family members and, more specifically, as child-like figures.' Approximately 19 percent of childless individuals and 10 percent of parents valued their dog at least partially more than any human in a recent Hungarian survey, researchers noted in the study. Up to half of the 197 million European households have at least one dog, compared to the 46 million that have at least one child under the age of 18. 'For some people, dogs may represent a fulfilling compromise, satisfying a genetically embedded drive to nurture and form social bonds without investing the substantial resources necessary to raise biological offspring,' the authors wrote. Dogs may be particularly suited for these evolving roles because of their cognitive and emotional abilities, according to the researchers. A recent survey showed that 43 percent of Millennials and Gen Z would prefer raising a dog over having a child 'Dogs exhibit a wide range of social behaviors, often comparable to those of pre-verbal children,' the study reads. Their dependency on humans mimics the relationship between children and parents: dogs rely on caregivers for food, routines, and social interaction. Still, the researchers caution that treating dogs like children isn't the same as parenting. 'Despite the high dependency and attachment of dogs to their caregivers, in the eyes of many, commitments coming with dog ownership remain less burdensome than child parenting,' said Laura Gillet, Ph.D. student and co-author of the review. Dogs generally have shorter lifespans, lower financial costs, and fewer social demands. No college tuition, no childcare, and typically no career sacrifices. 'We would like to point out that, contrary to popular belief, only a small minority of dog owners actually treat their pets like human children,' Kubinyi added. 'In most cases, dog parents choose dogs precisely because they are not like children, and they acknowledge their species-specific needs.' Nonetheless, the implications are significant. In some homes, dogs serve as 'pre-children' for couples preparing to become parents. In others, dogs can be a permanent substitutes for those who cannot have children or choose not to have them, and some are even considered siblings or companions for older adults. 'The roles that companion animals play in human lives are redefining the concept of family,' the study states.
Washington Post
12-05-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
Having more babies isn't the only answer
The United States is at risk of a 'baby bust,' and the government is scrambling to reverse it. President Donald Trump recently proposed a suite of initiatives to encourage women to have more children, from a $5,000 'baby bonus' to a 'motherhood medal of honor.' But if other developed nations with declining birth rates are any example, simply throwing money at young couples — or even fortifying social welfare — isn't incentive enough. On the latest episode of 'Impromptu,' Post Opinions writers Drew Goins, Molly Roberts and Bina Venkataraman discuss the pronatalism debate and alternative strategies for boosting birth rates. The excerpt below has been edited for length and clarity.
