The decline in the number of births should be seen in connection with the ‘gender divergence’ between increasingly progressive young women and increasingly conservative young men, observes economist Pauline Grosjean in her column.
The number of births has continued to decline in France in 2025. The fertility rate, at 1.56 children per woman, reached its lowest level since 1918. It is true that most of France’s neighbors are faring even worse, and France still holds its – rather relative – status as a champion of birth rates. This decline is a universal and long-term phenomenon, with explanations that have shifted over time.
The initial phase, which has been the most studied, is that of the demographic transition, marked by the shift from a regime of high mortality and fertility to one of low mortality and fertility. France was already an exception, having started its demographic transition in the 18th century, before other countries. Without this early transition, some economists estimate, France’s population would today stand at 250 million.
Over here in Estonia, we have observed that it is a financial thing. Research has shown that parental pay (the state pays X% of your previous salary for up to 475 days of being on parental leave - and as a sidenote I think the measure is wrong, because it means the rich and poor get different sums) encouraged people who already had children to have a second or third child.
But the measure had limits. It did not measurably encourage people to have their first child, and the birth rate continues to decline despite the measure.
I don’t know the details because I’m not a parent. On personal notes, if suddenly, I discovered myself in a stable relationship and a hypothetical partner asked me if I want a child, I would reply “do I look like a big wheel? I can’t afford that”.
Hypothesis: today’s young people know a bit more about finances than previous generations. They know that one should not have a child before one has stopped renting and bought a place to live in. This being impossible early on, decisions are delayed and the suitable time passes. Grandparents who could potentially help with child care start needing care themselves. Also, people increasingly live at distance from their parents, so grandparents’ chances of helping with child care are reduced even if they aren’t elderly yet.
As for relationships, research indicates that they break more often. Arguably the reason is that people don’t want to remain in a badly functioning relationship, and haven’t got the skills to keep it from breaking. (I don’t even want to get started about dating sites - it’s not profitable for dating sites if people find compatible partners. It’s their customer disappearing and stopping to pay.)
Skills could be taught in school. Dating sites could be told to redesign themselves, accounting for sociological knowledge. Social security for parents should be effective enough to support a single parent who is renting their place of living, and should last long enough for a child to reach shool age. Such a policy should have constitutional guarantees (not changeable with 1 parliament). If this was done, population decline would slow over here. Not sure about France.
And sure enough, it requires money.
Finances play a part, sure, but it cannot be the main one because, again, truly poor, barely off the boat immigrants keep the French birthrate from falling dramatically. It cannot just be that, it can be a factor but not the main one. People in Gaza have children and they’re occupied, have nothing, and are murdered on a regular basis…
And why can’t you have kids whilst renting? Like I said, most of the people I know who have kids are fully employed but make little money and are renters. And that’s okay, they have their children in a nice, safe environment and that’s what matters. “Money will come, we’ll reach some economic stability, it’ll be fine, God has our back” is what these poor immigrants are thinking, and it might be the reason for the difference in attitudes even though they’re considerably poorer and with less of a helpful network in their new countries.
Another hypothesis: people who recently immigrated more typically live in settings where an older family member can help with child care. Could it be true?
As for Gaza, it’s not suitable comparison material due to high mortality. What is being sought is a solution that works for low-mortality societies where care for the elderly is a considerable job and budget line.
I think that providing people with total economic certainty of being able to raise a child without risk of poverty, early in their life (before their parents start needing care) might hit a nail. Not sure if it’s the only nail, though.
It’s not the only nail, and how big that nail is depends a lot on your cultural background. The immigrants have basically nothing, man, they escaped their countries to rebuild because of war, famine or simply economic uncertainty, whilst the locals have or should have strong family ties and more financial ease, and these are the ones not reproducing, usually. I’d say that, for those who want kids, this is certainly an impediment, a deterrent, but for those who don’t this doesn’t matter and many simply don’t. They don’t consider it an extremely rewarding, valuable and developmentally necessary part of life, so they don’t think about it, and sometimes they do when it’s already kinda late too.