German birth rate continues to decline

As reported yesterday, there are now more cell phone connections than people in Germany and the outlook doesn't look so good. If Deutsche Welle has taught me anything in the past 24 hours its that Germans need to have more sex, buy more phones and allow more of us auslanders in the door.

Full story from Deutsche Welle: No Brakes on Germany's Population Freefall


Related TT topics:

• Working women in Germany - Arbeit vs. 3Ks: Kirche, Küche, Kinder
• and the ever classy: Govt report blames German women for birthrate: too much fun, not enough work

I still say its cause, having kids is still way to expensive. Just within the last few months the cost of Kindergarten has gone up over 200% (Headline topic in papers last month or so).. So until these Tax raising assholes in Berlin pull their heads outta their asses, this trend will continue. Not to mention the general health of the economy with prices on everything being raised higher and higher every year and the high unemployment figures.. Who even has the $ to raise kids these days..

We've talked about this before, but I blame the school system and the lack of Government controlled day care. Kids don't go to full day schools, so mom's either have to find other means of childcare or only work parttime. Making life to expensive.
Women in this country have to make a decision- children or career. Not like other countries where both are possible.

@DK, having kids IS way too expensive. But, a BMW will never give you love and cuddles and laughs like a kid will (I have the door open to his bedroom as I'm typing this and can hear him sleep talking... something about ice and meins and grosser).

Having worked with a couple of girls from the Chemnitz area, would could imagine that financial resources might have some bearing on the statistic. Defo not for lack of shaggin'.

Many people can't afford a car either.. so a kid is a deff. no... Carm comes closer to explaing the prob.
Besides, I'd never own a BMW.. Nothing but an over engineered expensive POS, thats always breaking in some way
that can only be fixed with a $$$ trip to the dealer. Same with most cars now adays...

These fat german cars are also bug ugly as well. Hideous things.

Its not a problem, population density here is high enough already, ideally we would be seeing negative population growth throughout most of the world. This is great, and I hope to see more of it. Theres more to life than the friggen german retirement system you know which seems to be the only point against population stability, and that can be reformed if it needs to be.

Maybe the companies here can start offering "Company Kids" as a perk for managers. Of course then they'd only be available in black, with black clothing...

There have been several stories over the last year about areas of Germany where there are mini population booms...high level of pregnancies... A certain area of Berlin where young professionals were living and now in Munich there is quite a few pregnant people.

Now that Germans are feeling proud about being German (after the World Cup) you may see a slight population growth... if they are flying German flags, they will be willing to make little Germans...

There have been studies to the effect that government financial incentives are not much help historically in trying to raise the birth rate. Easing the social impact of having kids seems to help: more kindergarten places, more childcare possibilities, a greater acceptance of kids in society in general (restaurants with changing tables and high chairs, playgrounds, etc.)

Finally someone speaks some sense.

Lets all encourage further taxation of our planets already over-stressed resources. It shocks me how narrowminded governments can be. Don't you realise we're all in this together?

Eunomad is right. A midwife who lives in my building said that along with an area in Berlin, the Glockenbachviertal in Munich has the highest birthrate in Germany.

How come Britain`s birthrate is so much higher than Germany`s? The UK population is said to be increasing, in contrast to Germany where its decreasing... Is it because Britain has a better economy... Or maybe because there are more Chavs there than in Germany - who are statistically more likely to have kids, and lots of èm...

I also agree with Kza and ER - low birth rates are are good thing and should be encouraged.

I wish people who wanted large families would consider adoption after having two.

CONTROLLED immigration can help take care of the need to stabilize the population for financial reasons.

From Reuters on the one child policy in China

Unfortunately a sinking birthrate in Germany isn't even a drop in the bucket when compared to the soaring birthrate in developing countries.

yup , have yet to go to a country where peeps dont complain about high cost of child-care yadda yadda... far more to do with individualism and people wanting to "delay" having kids as much as possible. Costs of childcare in Ireland Dwarf that of Germany - far more to do with general happiness and feelings of nationhood...
as to controlled immigration... nowhere in the Western world already has more immigration in last 30 years than right here

It might also have something to do with the higher standard of living and higher disposable incomes in Germany. By having children, your average young person in Germany perhaps stands to lose out more in terms of perceived 'quality of life' than their counterparts in the UK, or in India for that matter. In other words, there's a correlation between one's ability to afford modern 'distractions', and one's willingness (or not) to have babies.

I think its more to do with e.g. teenage pregnancies

@BR - QED. These same pregnant teenagers are usually from disadvantaged backgrounds and therefore, by having children, have less to lose (and more to gain) in terms of perceived 'quality of life'.

If Britain is reeling from a high rate of teen pregnancies, perhaps these young lads and ladies would benefit from good ol' American-style abstinence-only sex "education" classes. After all, the rate of births to American teens has been falling.

Or, er, maybe not:


But maybe we could get behind abstinence-only sex education classes for German teens, to combat the low birth rate.

having children has always been about sacrifices and has always meant some restriction on the financial side. this hasnt changed in centuries. what has changed is society's attitude to what is "sacrificable" in such a situation, and a lack of support from older family generations due to various factors such as rejuvenialsation relocation and general decay of traditional family structures.

presumably its also related to the drop or perceived drop in, for example, job security

@pike, yes, agreed, sorry I read your post too quickly

Well, in Germany, having a child actually gives you more job security.

If you have kids, you're supposed to be able to keep your job while the single, childless sod toiling beside you would lose his first in a round of layoffs. Theoretically. Certainly if they want to make you redundant, they have to pay you more if you have kids.

i dont personaly think so, i've never heard that as a large factor, usualy its the i dont want to lose my carear flexibility (both male and female sides) and then shup di wup your past your use by date.

bit of an oversimplification, to be honest. In previous centuries having children, whilst costly at the time (extra mouth to feed etc) was your security in old age. There was a serious incentive to have enough children who lived to adulthood so you would be looked after once you become too old to work. The welfare state is as responsible as any other factor for the decline in "family values" since everyone assumed they wold be looked after by the state thus the importance of or incentive for having children declines, whilst the costs remained or increased. Financial incentives by the state have not compensated for this shift in thinking yet.

no i meant rejuvenile syndrom. its ever present and growing, the welfare state has been in existance for 60 years, the real decline in population growth has only kicked in siince the introduction of the pill and freely available contraceptive measures which indicates a choice mechanism takng place irrelevant of "future thoughts". in fact the future for some is going to be pretty lonley. the whole demographic inverting of the pyramid is an experiment and a half with concequences we are not aware of. pensioners are the new political power, which is messed up as they are no longer productive in the generation of wealth. agree the financial asspects of the future childless society havent been worked out, and probably wont be. no state pensions for childless is pretty insensitive.

Yeah. Bring back the good old days, when child sacrifice was considered to be a good thing.

I have read somewhere along the line, that the education level of women is in inversely correlated to the number of children one has and the level of poverty.

So really we must go back to a matriarchial model of society.

Gideon, no, it think you are underestimating the role the welfare state has had on procreation. It wasn't a case of oh we know have a welfare state lets stop having babies. No overnight switch bit a gradual change in people's attitudes, a slow realisation that babies are not needed for later security. Yes, there was a baby-boom post war (caused by the war) which delayed this but as the effefts of the welfare state began to kick in so did the decline of the birthrate. I am not saying it is the ONLY factor but an important one. The availability of the pill is not the cause of the declining birthrate. There were ways before to avoid pregnancy if you tried hard enough, it just made it easier to have sex and avoid pregnancy.

we cant go back thats the point. and everybody is flapping. not sure about your theory of educated women dont have children though, i personal know a couple of well educated doctor professor females who've children. the big problem isnt so much the lack of kiddies, its the baundance of pensioners who are sucking the system dry with their health and care costs. there's going to be a loud bump soon.

Incidentally along with declining the birth rate in Germany is the shift to the right in the average age of the population. By 2050 Germany is expected to have over 1/3 of the population over 60, and half over 48! This among other things means per capita beer consumption will continue the downward trend. This may seem a minor point, but its in the industry I work in hence my interest in it. German brewers are worried and expect more breweries to close

disagree totaly. as ardenauer said when creating the welfare state here in germany "people will always have children" and they did. puting back the age of marriage and missing your biological window are direct results of available contraception giving couples the choice. i feel your over estimating the affect of the welfare state as a factor in social change as towards family planning. my mum had 4 kids at an age before i had one. i do not have enough biological time left in my wife to match that statisic, plus i couldnt handel another screamer to be honest as i want to be able to live a little bit more. quality not quantity. but its a discussion worth as to which was the greatest influence.

While I agree that security later in life was probably a motivating factor, I think the drive to procreate is more intrinsic than that. The number one reason people have children is still the internal drive to procreate and pass on the genes. The difference between now and then as you mentioned before is now, the chances of most of our offspring kicking it at young ages is a lot slimmer so we don't have to have as many children to ensure some of our genes make it to the next generation.

interesting point obviously you need a grey beer? smaller bottles and quantities, less gas and good taste when served at room temperatures. also the ability to open and drink within the next hree days without serious taste change may help.

good point, which is looking at the welfare telescope at the other end, and has probably had more impact than the age-care issues. also dieing at childbirth is no longer an issue, meaning women can delay birth to a less physicaly optimum time.

old people have no taste buds. fact. you can serve them anything and it'll taste ok. You just have to make them want it.

The point gemini mentions is also valid to an extent in that as women we still to some extent have to choose family or career. If you want a family, you just don't have as much time for your career as the woman who doesn't. Admittedly more and more we are able to balance both but a completely equal balance just isn't possible in today's society. Therefore those women who put in the extra effort of educating themselves are less likely to sacrifice career for family than those who don't.

ah Gideon...the matriarch thing was sarcasm

I didn't say professional women don't have kids, I said IN GENERAL (your friends clearly excluded), they have less then non-professional women.

OG I think that contraception had a bigger impact than you give it credit for. Though I agree that the funded retirements have also had a significant contribution.

Probably the point is there are many complex factors contributing to the decline in birth rate.

Everybody happy?

i'm not sure how the buds react to age. i do know though that grey-product development is a massive industry in the states. arthritic fingures and squinting eyes dont make an avid mobile phone user. making oldies want anything is difficult, brand allegence is pretty set after 50 for alot of fmcgs and produce. if the buds have gone, it may explain the increase in stronger tasting wine consumption, i do know that heavy gassed beers (i bet theres a technical term i'll let lupo correct me there) affect alot of older people by causing stomach discomfort, as do the cold temperatures served. diabetic considerations, which is a major problem in men when they're older, can also mean a change in consumption patterns.

@ Gemini, i don't doubt it had an impact but just dipute it as being causal. I think the pill was used with other motivations in mind or in the subconscious.

I'm told that the continued propensity of men, particularly in former East Germany, towards the "vokuhila and olibar" look (see illustration), might also explain falling birth rates.

Here is an example where do-gooders caused an abundance of other problems by being "helpful".

Prior to HIV, in Africa, there were tremendous increases in the population with the introduction of WHO vaccination programs. Clearly a good thing to decrease infant mortality, but the do-gooders forgot to address the other side of the coin, population explosion, and therefore starvation.

They did not adequately address family planning in conjunction with the projected increased child survivial rates.

In Ethiopia, the population continues to expand due to persons receiving the minimal food sustanance to go on, but it is a vicious cycle where the more people there are, the greater numbers to feed, and the greater the level of foreign aid needed.

nooo imissed that point totaly...


i know but in joking you did reveal a political problem. the system was made for a middle-class matriachal society. i say middle as in the working classes women have been balancing work and kids for generations out of necessity.

I think she said 'number of children' rather than children yes/no

All the senses become less acute with age. Vision, audition, olfaction and taste (can't remember the fancy name for that one) so yes older people's sense of taste tends to diminish but that doesn't mean they can't taste at all. They just tend to oversalt things a lot.

There is a huge market coming up as all our rich baby boomer start hitting retirement and I, for one, am looking forward to capitalising on it

so women were subconsciously making an effort to delay pregnancy?

Referring to sense of taste: gustative, hence "gustation".

Thanks.

Anyway the point I was trying to make that although the sense of taste does get duller with age it is apparent that some people lose their sense of taste much earlier in life which is evidenced by their insistence on adding carrots to the spehard's pie.

Emancipation was oviously a factor in the declining birth rate but the emancipation was only really possible once the need for babies was reduced. This came about two-fold: reduced infant mortality menaing less babies needed to ensure genes are passed on to adulthood; and a reduced reliance on children to support you in your old age.

The first factor does not actually explain the lower popukation growth rate, indeed, if all else is equal, populations should explode. But combined with a lower reliance on the children it becomes important. Couples can get away with having one perhaps two babies instead of five or ten. two per couple is not enough, which is why we have the problem.