India & Japan's Baby Bust: A Systemic Warning

Added: 2026-06-06

[00:00:00]I open up my news app and my news app knows what we like. I am on team let the birth rate plummet to hell and right now we are about to talk about India. This article just dropped from the economist India surprise baby bust is a warning to the world. It's not just rich places that are becoming less fertile. And we have talked about this. Are these women less fertile or are they just choosing not to have so many kids? Let's let's see what they're saying in the economist.

[00:00:31]You are having too many babies. For decades, that crude message was drilled into the minds of Indians by their rulers abetted by inept foreign donors.

[00:00:41]In the 1960s, slogans on school buildings chided parents telling them two or three children enough. By the 1970s, officials had taken a cruer turn, overseeing the sterilization of millions of young adults, usually the poor, many forcibly. When Indian school textbooks are reprinted this summer, they will carry a very different message. They will warn not of the dangers of having too many babies, but the risk of having too few. That's because the world's most populous country is experiencing a baby bust. India has a total fertility rate TFR, a measure of children per woman of 1.9 and falling. This is below the replacement rate of 2.1 or so needed for a stable long-term population. In several Indian states, the TFR now matches the sputtering rates you find in rich European countries. Tamil Nadu an industrialized state in the south and West Bengal a populous one in the east each have the same fertility rate 1.3 as Finland Maharashtra a big western state encompassing Mumbai is on par with Norway at 1.4 Four, if you think of Indian demography, Scandinavia is not the natural reference point.

[00:02:02]Increasingly, it will be. India's population will still continue to grow from its current tally of 1.45 billion.

[00:02:11]It takes time for fewer births to translate into fewer people overall, but the number of births is already down by a fifth from its peak in 2001. and Tamil Nadu. 1,200 schools were closed last year for a lack of pupils to fill their classrooms. Those who do attend increasingly show up without any siblings. The government frets that India will get old before it gets rich, that the country is on a similar path to China, where the population has already peaked and is starting to fall. Some politicians are offering cash to encourage Indians to procreate. India's demographic transition is the most striking example of a global trend for it is no longer just wealthy places where families have few or no kids. Over 2/3 of all countries are now below the replacement rate. Middle income ones like Brazil, Iran, Iran really, Thailand and Turkey have been well below it for years. Poorer countries are steadily joining their ranks. The reason why I said Iran and even Turkey because those places are not known for um women having very many rights. And typically those places I would think would have higher birth rates simply because women are oppressed. That's why I did that. Sorry y'all. Sri Lanka has a TFR of just 1.3.

[00:03:35]Tunisia is 1.6. Morocco has fallen below replacement rate. Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, may be close to that point. In many places, birth rates are plunging despite marriage remaining near universal and even though few women have formal jobs. India also exemplifies why this global slump is happening. Falling rates of child mortality provide one explanation. Parents need not have as many children if they can be confident they will make it to adulthood. But demographers have long shown that what really counts is girls education.

[00:04:12]Schooling means that girls gain more autonomy and a greater say in life's decisions. It is no coincidence that in the 1990s both India and much of Africa saw a huge surge in girls attending schools. It is not only is not only in the few places where most girls still do not go into formal education like Niger, northern Nigeria or Chad that fertility has hardly budged.

[00:04:40]Education shoves down fertility in another way. The more aspirational parents get, the more they need to invest in each child. This dynamic is accelerated when public schools are dire. Remarkably, 39% of Indian children went to fee paying schools last year, up from 32% in 2015.

[00:05:03]Parents are caught in an educational arms race. If your neighbors have few kids and spend more on their education, your own will be out competed unless you do the same. Aspiration also spreads more easily than it once did. One study showed how the arrival of cable television in Indian villages in the 2000s led to a moderate fall in fertility. Soap operas depicting urban middle-class women with small families may have changed norms, though some wonder whether people were just watching TV rather than having sex. The smartphone, there's that smartphone. The smartphone is an e is even more powerful and distracting device for bringing the lifestyles of richer peers into poorer places. So, we have cable and smartphones that are to blame for lower fertility in India. Not just smartphones like here in the United States. Whatever its precise cause, the baby bust has big implications. The UN, which tries to predict such things, has failed to account for the speedy fertility decline in its central forecast for global population. Its lower forecast is likely to be more accurate. That suggests India's population will peak at around 1.6 6 billion in 20 years or so and then fall back dramatically to just under a billion before the century ends. Asia as a whole may also reach its apex in the 2040s. As for the peak of the overall human population, that is probably coming sooner um than most expect, perhaps in the 2050s because Africa won't be as populous as previously thought. In the worst run, most conflictridden places, fertility will stay high. But the lesson of India is that predictions of a future and where there are 500 million Nigerians or 3.8 billion Africans should be treated with appropriate skepticism.

[00:07:00]They grow up so fast. If countries are set for low fertility, it would be harder for anyone to bank on imports of migrant labor to tackle their own worker shortages. The fact that they're talking about imports of people like they are like it's coffee or like it's a smartphone is kind of ridiculous. But that is what they just did. In India, fertility fell below the replacement rate at a much lower level of development than most countries. Its GDP per person at purchasing power parody was less than half of that of Malaysia, Mexico, and Turkey at the same point.

[00:07:36]That need not cramp growth. China and Vietnam cross the threshold at an even lower level of income. But it will complicate policymaking. In particular, India and other countries like it will be forced to divert scarce polices into things like pensions and old age care sooner than expected. That makes it more important than ever to increase the tax take. Far more people, especially women, should be brought into India's former labor force. For example, the sources of falling fertility, girls education, lower child mortality, and the choices of individuals are unambiguously good. But as India and others hurdle through their demographic transition, the consequences will not be pain-free. And that is it from the article. No talk of the oppressive patriarchy. No talk of how they use women and how women basically become house slaves to their in-laws. How women are treated in India. How India has a grape culture that is undeniable. India has its own issues. And I'm seeing tons of Indian women who are over the whole arranged marriage thing and who are getting their education so that they could try to scadaddle out of there. I have seen Indian women in their subreddits talking about this thing and how they are trying to, you know, not have kids and be child-free. On top of that, there is an imbalance as far as genders. There are more males than females because they did prioritize having male children. So, India on top of cable TV, um, soap operas and smartphones, they have some policymaking issues and some cultural issues that are causing women to not want to procreate with these men. Anyways, y'all go ahead and chime in on this one. We just talked about India as far as their birth rate, even though they keep saying fertility rate. Now, let's move into Japan. This article is actually from the end of May, but listen to this title. deeply entrenched gender roles a key factor in Japan's low birth rate. They are finally that title alone. These gender roles, they're finally saying something that makes sense. Let's check out the article, though. This opening sentence says it all. Listen to this, y'all.

[00:10:02]Women in Japan are more likely than men to view the disproportionately heavy burden of housework and child care placed on them as a major factor behind the country's low birth rate. A survey by a private sector advisory panel has found the findings suggest that many women feel constrained by social norms including unconscious gender bias which remain deeply rooted especially in rural areas. The panel said panel members warned that unless such outdated attitudes are addressed, communities in the countryside could face a serious demographic crisis. The panel known as the forum for the future we choose brings together business and labor leaders, local government heads, and researchers. One of his co-chairs, former internal affairs minister Hyroya Masuda, also led the expert group that warned in 2014 that about 900 m municipalities in Japan could eventually disappear because of population decline.

[00:11:04]That earlier report spurred the central government to strengthen measures aimed at reversing depopulation and the falling birth rate under its regional revitalization banner. The latest survey was conducted online in January and February this year, targeting about 22,000 people aged 18 and older across Japan. Respondents were asked about 11 possible causes of the low birth rate and indicated their views by choosing one of the five responses. Strongly agree, agree, disagree, strongly disagree and don't know. On the economic burden of raising children, a large majority of both men and women said high child rearing and education costs played a role in the decline of births. The share was 76.2% among men and 81.2% among women. combining those who answered strongly agree and agree. The widest gender gap appeared in responses to the question of whether entrrench gender roles and marriage norms such as the idea that men should work while women should stay at home are contributing to the problem. Among men, 53% said such norms were a factor compared with 72.1% of women. The gap was even more pronounced among those who selected strongly agree. 11.9% of men versus 26.4% of women, showing the proportion among women women at more than double that among men. A more detailed analysis, including regional differences, has yet to be released, but Massuda named lingering social pressure in rural areas as a possible reason for outflows of women to Tokyo and other major cities. The suffocating pressure of old norms that still remains deeply rooted in rural areas may be causing women to move to Tokyo. Massuda said, "As a result, the declines in the number of births and overall population may be accelerating." He added, "The government is increasingly focusing on the role of social norms and unconscious bias in the falling birth rate and migration to major cities. In formulating its June 2025 basic policy on regional revitalization, the government surveyed people who had moved to urban areas about their perceptions of rural communities. Many responses pointed to the entrenched gender expectations and limited opportunities for women. Some respondents said rural areas were seen as places where women are expected to play only supporting roles to men and there are no jobs they truly want to do.

[00:13:42]Others cited local customs in which women are expected to prepare food and drinks for men at community events. Some also described social pressures to marry and have children as suffocating. The policy paper says conventional measures to counter population decline have failed to adequately address the concerns of the people most affected. It identifies as a central priority the need to create communities chosen by young people and women, including by fostering more comfortable and inclusive workplace environments. Massuda said local governments also have an important role to play in encouraging change among local businesses. Effort and ingenuity are needed to change outdated norms. He said it is amazing that they are finally saying these things out loud. But society will have to change. Culture would have to change. People imagining that women are people will have to change. Women are not going to keep on having these kids if they know that they are going to simply be reduced to a wife appliance incubator and bangade. They are not going to do it. And what I am seeing so many people are failing to grasp that these people at least said it out loud. But are they talking to the men? Are they talking to the boys at a very young age? Because otherwise these these countries are going to continue to just kind of disappear. these rural areas. And this is not going to just be in Japan because we're about to start seeing this in our country as well with many of these forced birth or cristo fascist places as well where they still expect women to be, you know, submissive and all that. We're going to see all of this, but so many of these politicians and so many of these religious leaders and all of that refuse to change. I love these stories. I love that they finally have said it out loud, but what will the men do? All right, y'all. Let me know what you think about this article out of Japan.