German Birthrate Hits Bottom: Lowest in Europe
LifeSiteNews.com
By Gudrun Schultz
BERLIN, Germany,
March 17, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Germany’s birth rate is
now the lowest in Europe. Only 8.5 babies were
born in Germany
last year for every 1,000 residents.
In 1964, 1.36 million babies were born in Germany. In 2005, half as many
children were born, at just 680,000—the birth rate hasn’t been this low since
the end of the Second World War, according to the Federal Statistical Office.
The German
city of Chemnitz, in former East Germany,
has the lowest birth rate in the world, with 6.9 babies born per 1,000
residents.
“The tradition in the 1950s, 60s and even the 80s in Germany was that a mother was only a mother and
looked after the children,” Michael Hüther, who heads
up Cologne’s
economics institute, told the Guardian.
“We
are reaching a critical point,” he said to Die Welt newspaper. “The number of
births now determines what happens in the next decade-and-a-half to two
decades. You can’t
revise it afterwards. The availability of human capital will get worse, and act
as a brake on growth.”
Efforts to shore up the birth rate have been mainly
unsuccessful so far. Germany’s
family minister Ursula von der Leyen
introduced tax breaks last year to help couples that wanted children. Increased
nursery places and a new state-funded welfare scheme requiring men to take two
months off work for families to qualify were also introduced, but none of the
changes have had a significant impact on the rate of birth.
All of Europe is facing the
same plummeting birthrate. According to Eurostat, the
EU’s statistics agency, by 2050 Europe’s
population will have fallen by around 1.5%, or 7 million people. The birth rate
in Britain
is at 12 births per 1,000 residents. In France
the number is 12.7, in the Netherlands
11.9, and in Ireland
15.2.
In Eastern Europe and the Baltic states,
birth rates are falling as well. Poland’s rate is 9.3, Bulgaria is at 9 and
Latvia has one of the lowest rates, at 8.8.