Photo: nd3000
Not sure I ever thought I would see a campaign slogan that reads, “Be responsible – don’t use a condom tonight.” But that’s exactly where we find ourselves before the robots take over.
The world’s fertility rate is declining rapidly, meaning women are having fewer kids. Considering there’s over 7 billion people on the planet already, this news shouldn’t be shocking. But what is shocking is to see what countries are doing in order to keep those babies pumping out, because as population growth stalls, so do things like jobs, pensions and social security.
Around the world women are having fewer children.
[from the entry on fertility rates, which got pretty long over the last months: https://t.co/EPs2dM1w6d] pic.twitter.com/WdaCQdwhzJ
— Max Roser (@MaxCRoser) December 2, 2017
I wouldn’t necessarily constitute these numbers as alarming. What happens when the Earth hits 10, 15 … 30 billion people? I don’t feel like packing up for Mars just yet.
Part of the reason women are having fewer kids is because fewer kids are dying. Infant mortality rates are exponentially lower and our life spans as a whole are much longer.
Still, because the world economy depends on growth, here’s what some countries are doing to promote those baby-making skills, according to Indy100:
Spain: Hired a special commissioner named Edelmira Barreira Diz to help reverse declining population growth.
Hong Kong: Proposed the idea of cash rewards to couples to make babies. This bill hasn’t yet passed. But, depending on how much money we’re talkin, how could that not work??
Italy: Put up advertisements that say things like, “Beauty knows no age, fertility does”.
India: Their advertisement heard ’round the globe read, ““Be responsible – don’t use a condom tonight.” This ad was geared towards the country’s Parsi nation, which is dwindling.
Denmark: A travel company offered to provide three years worth of baby supplies for any child conceived on a holiday booked through their company.
Russia: September 12 was deemed the official ‘Day of Conception.” Yup, a national holiday to encourage citizens to get it on. Women who gave birth nine months later were supposedly rewarded a refrigerator.
Japan: “A group of students introduced Yotaro in 2010, a robot designed to give couples a preview of parenthood.”
Singapore: “The country spends roughly £1.6 billion annually on programs encouraging people to have sex. They have even limited the number of one bedroom apartments available to encourage people to live together in the hope this might help improve things.”
South Korea: They’ve reportedly offered cash incentives as well. They’ve also had offices shut off their lights at 7pm every Wednesday for “Family Day”.
The global average fertility rate in the pre-modern era was anywhere from 4.5 to 7 kids per woman. Ya know, the time when we all traveled by horse and buggy and used straw as tooth picks.
Today’s global average fertility rate is just below 2.5 children per woman, a rate that’s halved over the last 50 years. I can’t wait to see what the U.S. does under the current representation.
If you want get all geeky and dive into the numbers you can read more about the decline of the world’s fertility rates here.
