
Germany passes Japan to have world's lowest birth rate - ethana
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32929962
======
lern_too_spel
Birth rate is rarely the correct metric because it is affected by longevity.
The metric most people are interested in is fertility rate, where Germany
still has a long way to go to pass Singapore.
[https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-
factbook/...](https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-
factbook/rankorder/2127rank.html)

~~~
dheera
Not to mention that in these highly-developed countries with solid education
systems and modern career opportunities, the value-creating power of an
individual is several times higher than that of an average individual in a
developing country.

The fertility rate among founders in Silicon Valley is probably even lower,
but that group of people is creating an immense amount of value for society in
return for not creating as many kids.

~~~
sanoli
They're creating stuff that's valuable to society. I don't see though how
they're so much greater than other people who create value, like medical
researchers, biotech researchers, engineers, artists, etc.

~~~
dheera
All of those professions count too. My point is that the value-creating power
of any well-educated individual (in any profession) is higher; thus, the
government of a country with a solid education system shouldn't be afraid of a
lack of population expansion; value to the country isn't indicated by number
of lives.

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ajmurmann
As a German who lives in the US since 8 years I am not surprised by this at
all. By the time you finish university in Germany you are about 25 years old.
They introduced the Bachelor/Master system, but at least when I studied,
getting a Bachelor was more of a way to drop out gracefully. In addition there
was a culture that expected you to stay at home until your child is at least 1
year old. Therefore there was very little support to take care of very young
children. For well educated couples this leaves an extremely small window in
which you can have children. That doesn't even account yet for people with
other goals. Having a child means having time to try to bootstrap a startup
parallel to your day job or doing extensive travel becomes extremely hard if
not downright impossible. An additional factor is that most Germans aren't
religious and even the ones who are are only on paper, but don't actually care
very much. Religion often times plays a large role in people's desire to have
children. That rarely happens in Germany.

~~~
josteink
For the female part of a couple stability is important, and owning your own
house/apartment plays a big role there.

I've heard that getting into the house ownership market in Germany is
extremely hard, with high requirements set on your own savings to be granted a
loan, meaning most people don't until they are well into their 30s and maybe
even their 40s.

To me that certainly also sound like a contributing factor. Any comments or
perspective on that?

~~~
rbehrends
It's unlikely that this is a major contributing factor. German laws are
extremely tenant-friendly, there is no social stigma associated with renting,
and renting vs. owning is often a lifestyle choice rather than one explained
by income (according to a recent study, a great many Germans could afford a
home of their own, but choose to rent, anyway). Keep in mind that even Angela
Merkel is among those who rent, even though between her income and that of her
husband (who is a tenured professor), they could easily afford a pretty nice
home.

The low birthrate is primarily driven by college-educated women having few or
no children (over 30% of all German women who were born between 1964 and 1968
and had a college degree did not have _any_ children). It has historically
been difficult to be a working mother in Germany; it was both more challenging
(school being out at lunchtime) and society frowned upon you being a working
mother.

This has slowly been changing; reunification happened and East German women
weren't having any of this nonsense; politicians realized that the net effect
was that the fertility rate dropped; and the abortion debate and a subsequent
judgement by the Constitutional Court forced legislation that made having
children easier. As a result, it is now a whole lot easier to be a parent
(single or married, male or female) than it used to be.

This did at least stabilize the fertility rate, which had been dropping
before. While nominally, Germany's fertility rate is 1.4, this does not
account for the fact that the great majority of German children are being born
after their mothers reach the age of thirty; current estimates set the actual
fertility rate -- i.e. the average number of children a woman has over her
lifetime -- at 1.6. More importantly, this number did stabilize in the aughts
and has actually been increasing since then for college-educated women.

------
jtzhou
It is interesting how a country with a lot of seemingly positive aspects --
abundant natural resources and fresh water, temperate climate, stabile economy
and low unemployment, and great infrastructure -- cannot convince its citizens
to procreate, whereas a country like Yemen with little in development is
exploding in population (doubling every 20 years).

When given the choice, it seems humans have children more out of necessity
than desirability.

~~~
ticksoft
Having children (and being married) is a tool for survival in harsh
environments. Conversely, it can be seen as a trap/burden from a legal and
financial perspective in a 'developed' country.

~~~
znpy
That is a very interesting observation.

Edit: In the land I come from (south Italy) it was fairly common up to 50s and
60s for a couple to raise many children, as many as 7 or eight.

The reason is dead simple: being the economy largely based on agriculture and
being schools not very common, more children meant more helping hands.

That need has basically disappeared.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Interesting! It's almost as if we've evolved out the need to have children (no
need for free hands working the fields, the ability to have sex for recreation
instead of procreation, and children typically providing limited financial
return compared to their historical role).

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sudeepj
I am from India, which is second most populated country in the world. A
generation ago, it was common for a couple having 3 to 4 kids. But now, even
here most couples (in urban areas atleast) plan for atmost 1 kid. The sheer
pace with which life moves has increased compared to one generation back.
Couples (especially when both are working) simply do not have money, energy &
time.

India is not a developed country and still in last decade or so the birth rate
is stabilising, but not decreasing.

~~~
thanksgiving
According to Google, total fertility rate is at 2.50 as of 2012. This is good
news.

Apparently,according to The Hindu at least two populous states - UP and Bihar
- have tfr above 3. Is this a matter of concern in terms of politics and
public policy?

~~~
sudeepj
It is definitely a concern. Based on my experiences of meeting people from
those states, things have start to change. But its slow.

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adevine
I'm not so sure I understand the point of view that labor shortages will be
such a bad thing for the economy. If you are a worker, "high labor costs" is a
very GOOD thing. For decades we've seen the value of labor fall behind the
value of capital, and a more constrained labor supply might help change this.

~~~
alkonaut
As long as it isn't global it will just mean that German industry will have to
move production elsewhere and/or it will be cost effective to employ ever more
expensive robots to do the work.

~~~
adevine
But it's already true that German workers are much more expensive than most
other countries, yet Germany still has very low unemployment.

Yes, a constrained labor supply will be problematic for everyone who is NOT a
worker (most importantly, a large elderly population), but if you are a
worker, it's almost always a good thing.

------
Xixi
Note that Japan fertility rate is not the worst out there: for instance Hong
Kong (1.1), Singapore (1.2) and South Korea (1.2) are all bellow Japan (1.4).

~~~
resonation
So you're drawing distinguishment between birth rate and fertility rate?

~~~
Xixi
Birth rate and fertility rate are not the same, so of course I distinguish.
Though to be fair I think the correct term is total fertility rate, as
sometimes fertility rate is defined as birth rate.

Birth rate (technically, births/population rate) is the total number of live
births per 1,000 of a population in a year. It is abysmal in Japan because the
population is very old, so not many people are in age of making children.

Total fertility rate represents the number of children that would be born to a
woman if she were to live to the end of her childbearing years and bear
children in accordance with current age-specific fertility rates. This rate is
going up as Japan is slowly making it easier for couples to have children:
more day-care facilities, and most importantly Japanese society is (slowly)
becoming more tolerant to mothers going back to work.

~~~
ekianjo
> and most importantly Japanese society is (slowly) becoming more tolerant to
> mothers going back to work.

Yup, but that won't prevent Japan from going right into the demography wall
within a decade or two (with serious consequences on its economy, since
current workers have to pay for retired ones, in a growing deficit and a
climate of increasing taxes).

~~~
justincormack
Japan has a lot of overseas assets, so to some extent foreign workers will pay
for Japanese retirees. It may not be enough though.

~~~
ekianjo
The debt of Japan is so huge (to put it in relative terms, Greece's debt is
nothing compared to it) that they would need half of the developed world to
cater to it.

~~~
mafribe
Japanese debt is mostly to its own population, while that of Greece is foreign
owned. That's a huge difference.

~~~
ekianjo
Not really. In the end Japanese will have to pay, in one way or another, and
that will be either with huge taxation, or dramatic inflation. Or Default. No
good options out there, really.

~~~
mafribe
The Japanese can themselves decide which option to take, rather than being
forced into one from the outside. The current elected government seems to have
taken the route of inflating away the debt.

~~~
ekianjo
> The current elected government seems to have taken the route of inflating
> away the debt.

Yeah, and it's not a pretty way to go with solving the debt problem. This will
result in higher prices for everyone, destroying savings and hurting in result
the private sector. "Just" to save the government.

~~~
justincormack
It is not to save the government, it is to save the money from the people who
own the government bonds, who are mainly Japanese. It is a redistribution
issue.

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kiba
When population growth rate is negative, it makes immortality all the easier
to contemplate.

~~~
zodiakzz
Explain?

~~~
everly
I think he/she might have meant that immortality isn't really sustainable
because of overpopulation concerns unless population growth rate is negative.

~~~
SiVal
Even if population growth rate is negative, that only means that birth rate
minus death rate is negative, not that birth rate itself is negative. If
immortality makes the death rate zero, the growth rate can't be negative, and
the birth rate would have to also be zero or growth rate would become positive
again.

~~~
everly
True, and I wasn't necessarily advocating that point of view, only trying to
clarify what the OP might have meant. However, I'd also add that immortality
being an option doesn't necessarily mean that the death rate would become
zero. Some people may opt to die or be unable to afford whatever the cost may
be (not to mention homicide, accidental deaths, etc).

~~~
SiVal
Also true. As you are saying, growth rate will remain non-zero birth rate
minus non-zero death rate.

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pvaldes
Is a normal consequence on the poverty fuelled by the policies of those last
years, probably. You can not expect that people think too much about having
babies whereas struggling to live on microjobs. No real jobs, lots of cats and
dogs. No real new babies.

~~~
jarek-foksa
Are they worried about being killed by famine (after having eaten their own
cats and dogs), war or pandemic soon? If not, then they are not "struggling to
live", which in turn means there is no need to reproduce that much.

From the biological perspective, excessive population growth can be dangerous
to the species [1].

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_sink](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_sink)

~~~
pvaldes
Probably not but I can't see why "to be killed by famine" is a relevant point
here (A lot of alive germans had experienced the fear to be killed by famine
in their past, that's for sure, as many other people that was children in the
wars and postwars).

Today 7 millions of germans live with minijobs and for most of them is its
only source of income. I don't really see those people reproducting like
bunnies, but well... I can be wrong. Is a different kind of poverty, not the
classic one.

> Excessive population growth can be dangerous to the species

I guess that you don't encourage the reproduction of this people?. Again, this
is not the point here. We are trying to understant why germans have a low
natality, not if this is convenient or not for the rest of the planet.

~~~
jarek-foksa
Those who remember famine and war are usually past their reproductive age. The
young people take it for granted that they will live until their eighties,
even on their low paying jobs.

If poverty was causing reduced birth rate, we should have gone extinct long
time ago. I suspect though that increased competition for non-essential
resources and territory (like a new car or a house) might somehow turn off our
reproductive instincts because in the past this was usually a prelude to self-
destructive competition for essential goods.

I'm not encouraging or discouraging anything, I just don't see the problem.
Everything seems to work according to the nature. The only thing that needs
adjusting is the social security system which is based on the flawed
assumption of infinite population growth.

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blux
A diminishing population only has negative consequences for an economy in the
short term, right? In the end, less people means less money needs to be made
to sustain a certain standard of living.

~~~
jacquesm
It has a huge impact on long term quality of infrastructure and an immediate
impact on social security (pensions especially).

Infrastructure needs a certain population density in order to be maintained
and since countries usually do not give up territory when their population
drops the number of people available as a tax bas dictates that if the
quantities of infrastructure remain the same that the quality should decrease.

Canada would be lot more efficient for instance if it moved all of its
population to the west coast but of course that's not an option for many
practical reasons.

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jotm
Can I just say that it is not a problem for Germany because they figured out
they need to let immigrants in, unlike Japan. Germany has a very high number
of immigrants, including (actually, mostly!) young adults who are eager to
work.

By all means, the country is more than safe in this regard, in stark contrast
to Japan, which is trying to turn to robots for future workers (which is fine
for the rest of the world, imo).

~~~
xaver
How does that make it not a problem for Germany? Are you talking about Germany
the landmass? Germany the state? Germany the nation or the ethnicity?

Cause, I mean, sure its no problem for the landmass or the state. For the
nation/ethnicity though, it means extinction.

~~~
thanksgiving
Nations are not ethnicity. Did you mean culture?

~~~
mpyne
Well, that is very close to the meaning of 'nation', which is why
international relations students often talk of the nation-state; the nation is
the cultural community, the state is the national-level government.

Some nations have no state, such as the Kurds.

Some states have multiple nations within, such as the USA (which is where the
hyphenated-American thing had actually started; it made perfect sense to speak
of a German-American or an Irish-American, because these persons would often
merge elements of both nationalities).

------
known
RACIALLY THE MOST TOLERANT COUNTRIES have the least birth rate;

[http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/05/16/article-2325502-19...](http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/05/16/article-2325502-19D0189E000005DC-313_634x274_popup.jpg)

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birth_rate#/media/File:Birth...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birth_rate#/media/File:Birth_rate_figures_for_countries.PNG)

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arjn
I'm skeptical of the Hans Rosling talk that many people will bring up. For
one, there is no indication that the poorer countries with higher birthrates
will be educated in time. Secondly, just because we can calculate the world
can support more people doesn't mean that's a good thing to have. We're
already losing our flora and fauna at an alarming rate. This is going to get
worse with a higher population.

I think sometimes people are blinded by TED talks and fail to question them.

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Zigurd
Germany and Japan are densely populated. Except for the economic dislocations
of population decline, nothing bad will happen to German or Japanese culture
or society if their populations have peaked and are declining.

China is also nearing zero population growth. That's when things will really
start to change.

On top of that, the consequences of missing population stability projections
on the high side are much worse than missing them on the low side.

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ExpiredLink
That's the price of Germany's success. Force women into wage-slavery, increase
immigration from all over the world. Brave new economic world.

------
gizi
_And more women were needed in the workforce to avoid economic problems._
Maybe there is a link between lots of women in the workforce and the low birth
rate? Maybe if they stopped micromanaging these problems, they would
spontaneously solve themselves? They always did.

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mg1982
It's difficult not to see to the word 'slumped' as an editorial judgement, and
I find it quite strange. The world is grotesquely overpopulated and at some
point it needs to stop.

~~~
joshuapants
The world is not overpopulated by a long shot. There may be a lot of
overconsumption in certain regions, but that's a different issue.

~~~
bitwize
Currently it takes 1.2 earths' worth of resources to support the earth's
population, which means the earth cannot support all of us without starting to
deplete resources. So yes, the planet IS overpopulated.

~~~
ekianjo
> Currently it takes 1.2 earths' worth of resources to support

LOL, this kind of "x amount of Earths" to support ourselves always make me
laugh, because it assumes energy cannot be produced and that productivity
gains do not exist. 30 years ago we were supposed to reach the "Peak petrol"
point very soon, yet we found new ways to extract fossil fuels and push back
that peak time to a much later time, leaving us time to develop alternative
energies as well.

And we are still just literally scratching the Earth's surface. The Earth is a
ball and most of its resources are far below the ground.

~~~
bitwize
What is meant by that is that thebcurrent worldnpopulation exceeds Earth's
_carrying capacity_ by a factor of 0.2. That means that there are more people
than the Earth can _sustainably_ \-- note the world _sustainably_. Once you
overshoot the carrying capacity, you're in a situation where even the Earth's
renewable resources are being depleted, in a way that may not recover for a
very long time.

Overpopulation is a glibal crisis.

------
sitkack
We all need birth rate below the replacement rate as well as an increase in
the quality of the citizen (good education, safe environment, stimulating
activities).

------
philippnagel
Well, time to automate everything then.

------
jokoon
isn't this why germany allows more immigration ?

~~~
gahahaha
No - that has probably more to do with guilt after WWII than the low birth
rate. A low birth rate (within limits) is obviously a good thing - the world
is over populated as it is.

