Would you have a baby if your government offered you 9 grand?
That’s how desperate Russia is to offset the dying elderly population.
Canada, Australia and most of Europe also are facing a baby-bust crisis. The birthrates in Germany, Spain, England, Ireland, Wales, Sweden, France, Finland, Armenia, Austria, Belgium, Poland and Italy are so low that without the influx of immigrants, their populations would decline.
In America, we don’t have that problem – thanks to Latinas. But more on that in a moment.
Back to the cash-for-babies plan: President Vladimir Putin is hoping a $9,000 bonus, along with monthly stipends, will get Russian women to have more babies.
The fertility rate there is a paltry 1.25 – meaning an average of one and a quarter babies per woman – which is not enough to replenish the 700,000 people who will die annually for the next few years.
In Japan, the 1.3 birthrate prompted Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to make this odd announcement earlier this year: “It is the Year of the Dog. Dogs have lots of offspring, and I hear they have an easy time giving birth.”
Just what women want to hear.
It’s understandable for governments to want to control population so it doesn’t grow or shrink too quickly, which can damage the economy.
According to Carl Haub, a demographer with the Population Reference Bureau, if a country is seeking stability, the ideal fertility rate is 2.1.
Two babies per woman offsets the death of the woman and one man. (The 0.1 makes up for the lack of babies from women who have died before they were able to conceive.)
That is the U.S. rate.
If it weren’t for Latinas, the U.S. would have what’s called a “sub-replacement” birthrate.
The higher birthrate by Latinas, along with rates by other women of color, offsets the lower fertility rate by Caucasian women.
The most recent stats available show that in 2003 Latinas had an average of 2.79 babies, compared with 2.04 for women of Asian descent, 2.03 for African-American women and 1.85 for Caucasian women. (American Indians have even lower fertility rates.)
Without Latinas, Haub said, the fertility rate in the U.S. would be lower than 2, just below the sustaining level. But average in Latinas, and the rate rises to 2.1 – the perfect balance.
Their babies will enter the labor force in the next 15 years in time to offset the retirement of the first of the baby boomers. The taxes they pay and their contributions to the Social Security fund are vital.
This is something most Americans don’t understand, because it is complicated. It’s easier to read reports of higher birthrates among Latinas and worry about a Latino baby explosion.
But listen to Charles Rynerson, demographic analyst at the Population Research Center at Portland State University in Oregon: “The U.S. is one of the only developed nations that has a fertility rate that is at replacement level. Part of it stems from immigration of women from higher-fertility-rate countries.”
Of course, with any immigrant group, succeeding generations will have lower birthrates. It’s what happens as women enter college and then enter the workforce.
And it’s not just happening in the U.S.; the fertility rate is already declining in much of Latin America, Haub said. “It has to do with urbanization. As countries urbanize, they become wealthier and people become more educated, and they delay having children,” he said.
So don’t fear Latino babies. They’re the ones who will grow up and add to the workforce, ensuring that the rest of us will have a comfortable retirement.
Cindy Rodríguez’s column appears Tuesdays in Scene and Sundays in Style. Contact her at 303-820-1211 or crodriguez@denverpost.com.
