Fertility trends in rich countries (and in many others) seem to have entered an unstoppable decline. Just a few days ago, the Financial Times warned that, year after year, the actual figures fall short of the most pessimistic population projections. What’s more, official statistics may not reflect the intensity of actual declines. Many of us consider this panorama alarming. Finally, this question, traditionally relegated to academic debate and the agenda of conservative pro-family sectors, is beginning to arouse a broader and transversal concern.
In Spain, the fertility rate is around 1.12 in 2024, and has been falling from 1.18 in 2020 and 1.33 in 2015. Among my demographer colleagues, some say there is no need to worry. Many of his arguments are not at all trivial, they are well-founded and stimulate debate. However, more and more people are questioning the idea that the decline in fertility is only an expression of individual freedom, or the manifestation of the preferences of a society as individualistic as ours, which, fortunately, facilitated the diversification of life paths. . It is true that we share a diagnosis with other Mediterranean countries: Italy, which almost always ranks alongside us in terms of social statistics, barely reaching 1.19. But Greece reaches 1.25; Portugal at 1.42; and France marks a considerable difference with its 1.63. Recovering part of the tenths that separate us from our neighbors through family policies is a realistic and legitimate objective.
To better understand some of the processes that brought us here, we can compare the ideal number of children and those actually had by those surveyed by the CIS who, in 2024, are between 35 and 45 years old. This age group is at a stage of life where many will have made most of their reproductive decisions, and others will be close to doing so. Of course, there is time for the youngest, but not for everyone. Additionally, I will show the answers separately for men and women, with and without a college degree. Thus, we can describe a particularity of the Spanish context: the fertility of university women seems more depressed than one might expect. Although this fact has been known for a long time, in my opinion it is not as present in the media as it should be.
Preferences: Preferences regarding the ideal number of children in Spain are quite similar depending on gender and education level. Very few people consider that the ideal is not to have children. This suggests that voluntary infertility, although difficult to separate from non-voluntary infertility, is a minority phenomenon.
Only 10% of those questioned say that the ideal is to have only one child, while the majority opt for the famous formula ruler of two children, which constitutes the option favored by men and women, whatever their level of education. If there were a difference, it would indicate that university students are more inclined to the three-child model: around three in ten express this preference, while for all other groups the figure is around 23%.
The reality: Now let’s see to what extent these family aspirations translate into reality. By observing how many children were actually had between the ages of 35 and 45, it is easy to see that there are two groups who have more difficulty satisfying their reproductive desires.
As I said, there is one that is well known: that of university women. While nearly 90% of college students would like to have two or more children, about 35% of them do not. This figure drops by 10 points among those who have not completed university studies. The causes of the worse relative situation of university students in Spain are multiple. Academics might have a harder time mating now that there are so many more of them than academics. Additionally, given that most of the gender gap in job performance actually appears to be a motherhood gap, female academics may have a greater need for work-life balance than other groups. . These demands must be met in such a way that they do not have to bear a very high opportunity cost to have the children they want.
Second, and perhaps more surprising to some readers, the least educated men have higher levels of infertility than others: around 45% of them do not have children at these ages. The surprise is only relative. These data confirm a trend already observed in other European countries with better statistical sources, according to which less qualified men constitute a particularly fragile group who have great difficulty materializing their reproductive preferences throughout their life cycle and, On another note, they maintain their social networks deteriorate over time and become more isolated in adult life.
Should we be worried? For two fundamental reasons, I would say yes. On the one hand, beyond individual preferences, having children is associated with an increase in individual well-being. But most importantly, many people who want to have children end up not having any, or having fewer than they would like.
AND, what can we do? Policies aimed at promoting birth rates have not proven effective. Its impact seems to focus more on “when” you have children than on “how many” you end up having. But figures from other countries suggest that other policies matter. I’m not talking about the strange ideas that an elected official may have on the horizon of a mandate. I am talking about stable and expensive programs in favor of conciliation and the well-being of families, including those which would not otherwise form. And all this must be done without complexes. Our social effort focuses almost exclusively on compensating for economic vulnerability. But social problems are not limited to this source of disadvantage. It would be desirable to broaden the objectives of Spanish social policy, so inclined to evaluation based on emotions and so reluctant to think outside the box. As we have seen here, and as we could see in many other ways if we had the appropriate statistical infrastructure, academics and less educated men are two of the groups that face the most obstacles in meeting their needs. expectations in life. Naturally, the solutions the two require are very different. But if their difficulties were part of the objectives of our family policy, we could recover, at least, the tenths that separate us from the fertility of our neighbors.
