End of the Spanish baby boom?

[Deleted]

Since July 2007, the Spanish government has been paying a bonus of 2500€ for every baby born, but the programme ends tonight at 23:59.

Pregnant women in Spain have been doing everything possible in the last 10 days or so to give birth before the cut off time. Apparently there are huge internet forums giving methods to provoke labour, such as climbing stairs or drinking raspberry tea.

The medical authorities have been trying to convince people that one should not try to modify what nature should decide, but they have been met with the retort that movie stars and rich people do it all the time, so why shouldn't ordinary people be able to do it?

In spite of the bonus, the birth rate went down in Spain in 2009, putting the fertility index at only 1.40 instead of 1.46 in 2008.

Not many babies will be born in Spain in the first two weeks of January.

[bixaorellana]

Guess they don't do what's done in Mexico -- C-section on demand. Actually, even if you insist that's not what you want, it seems the doctors find some excuse to do it anyway.

How was it decided that Spain was under-populated enough to need this stimulus?

[Deleted]

A birth rate of 1.40 rather than the necessary 2.10 indicates that a country is in decline. Numerous countries in Europe have been declining in population for years, as well as Japan.

[lagatta]

I was surprised to hear that there was a baby boom in recent years in Spain. Indeed 1.40 or even 1.46 is very far from a boom.

France has a slightly higher rate than most comparable countries, but that is because of daycare and other measures so women can have the babies they want while remaining in the labour force (of course there are other reasons, but the higher birthrate is NOT just among immigrant and/or poorer classes). Québec, which had an extremely low birthrate after an extremely high one in earlier generations, has had some success drawing on the French model, with daycare available for a symbolic fee and generous parental leaves.

Of course the problem is the "pyramid of ages" as we boomers pass through life, but I don't think a smaller population is necessarily a bad thing.

Useful as that money is to a hard-pressed family, I can't imagine doing anything to imperil the best possible conditions for a baby to emerge on his or her own.

Bixa, that stuff has also been called "too posh to push", but cripes, I'd rather have one the normal way rather than an opening in my gut if I had the choice.

[Deleted]

There are only 3 countries in Europe with a fertility rate above 2.00: Iceland, France and Ireland. Meanwhile, 9 countries have fertility rates below 1.40: Ukraine (1.10), Poland (1.23), Moldova (1.28), Armenia (1.30), Bosnia & Herzegovina (1.30), Slovakia (1.33), Romania (1.35), Portugal (1.37) and Germany (1.37).

This is considered to be a major demographic time bomb in Europe, because most of these countries do not really attract immigration except for Germany. Will the young flee these countries even more to not be crushed by the needs of the elderly, or will some solution be found at last?