This is not the main issue of concern for the French, but it is nevertheless the one that poses the greatest threat to the French economy. The birth rate continued to decline in 2024 and the number of births in France even fell sharply in June, INSEE indicates.
After a relative stabilisation in April and May, the number of births fell by 7.9% in June over a year. In total, just over 326,000 babies were born in France during the first six months of the year, a decrease of 2.4%.
The fertility rate (average number of children per woman of childbearing age), which remained above 2 until 2012, close to the threshold of demographic renewal, has now fallen below 1.7. In other words, without a positive migration balance, the French population will be forced to mechanically shrink in the coming years.
What are the consequences? A declining birth rate means an ageing population. This further exacerbates the issue of pension funding. Let us remember that today the country has 1.67 active contributors for every retiree, compared to 2.04 in 2004, according to the National Statistics Institute. INSEEHow can we finance the pensions of millions of French people tomorrow when the ratio is approaching 1, while French society has repeatedly expressed its refusal to work longer hours?
The consequences of demographic decline
But declining demographics also mean a working population that is also expected to decline. Production is therefore declining, especially since productivity in France has been at half-mast for several years. Fewer workers, but also fewer consumers. Yet household consumption accounts for 55% of French GDP.
For all these reasons (and many more), a falling birth rate today is synonymous with stagnation tomorrow and impoverishment in the long term. Hence the enthusiasm of many countries even more affected than France to implement pro-natalist policies.
How can we revive the birth rate in France? Will the government’s actions bear fruit? What other ideas could be explored? These are the questions that sociologist Julien Damon, associate professor at Sciences Po, attempts to answer in his essay “The battles of birth rates”, just published by Editions de l’Aube.
BFM Business: How can we explain the fact that the French birth rate, which was resilient, has been falling for several years?
Julian Damon: Each one has his own explanation, depending on the ideology that comes out of the interlocutor’s hat. We say that it is the crisis (but which one?), that it is linked to the “general context” of geopolitics and the environment, to widespread anxiety, to the collapse of family policies… Which is true, in any case, that it is multifactorial and complex.
First of all, we must remember that if we are worried, we tend to be very scared. In fact, the current fertility rate (around 1.7 children per woman) has returned to its 1993 level. Between 1994 and 2010, France experienced an extraordinary period of births that our neighbours had not experienced. Today we simply have a new demographic regime that has reached the level of other Western countries. But we are still above many countries such as Germany, Italy, Japan and even the United States. Because the movement towards a decrease in fertility is a global phenomenon that affects even poor countries.
“The French are much better”
BFM Business: Why have the French started having fewer children over the last 15 years?
JD: When we ask young people, they often talk about geopolitical or environmental anxiety. But it is more complex than that. It is worth remembering that the famous “baby boom” in France began in a very difficult period in this regard, since it was from 1943, in the middle of the World War, that the number of births began to increase again. [plus de 100.000 naissances de plus en 1944 qu’en 1941].
So we need to dig a little deeper. However, young people highlight two problems: on the one hand, the fear of not having childcare before school and on the other hand, they say they do not have a partner or a partner who wants a child.
BFM Business: Is France lacking early childhood care services?
JD: Not even! I asked family policy experts from the OECD in which country they think it would be easier to raise a child. And they all say “France”! We have very strong social protection, early childhood services, free nurseries… The French are much better off than everyone else.
BFM Business: What could make us pessimistic about the birth rate if it falls despite this favourable context?…
JD: Yes, but there are levers for improvement. We are waiting for the creation of a public service for early childhood. Today, the main mode of care is nannies (about 60%), compared to only a third in nurseries. The latter must be supported, because there is a vocational crisis. Today we have places in nurseries closed because we lack staff. It is the same problem as in nursing homes elsewhere. We need better paid and more qualified jobs (child care, it is only 80 hours of training).
But it must also come from the private sector: over the past 15 years, the increase in the number of childcare places has been almost exclusively due to profit-making companies. So, even though there have been media scandals in private childcare centres, we should not throw out the profitable baby with the bathwater.
BFM Business: In your book, you also suggest reviewing family policy, which you consider outdated.
JD: Yes, because it is aimed at large families, which is outdated today, where the issue is the first child. We can have a family benefits policy that would not be much more expensive, but more attractive. Today you do not receive help with the first child, approximately 130 euros for two and 180 euros for three. You would have to pay 70 euros for the first, then 140 for the second, etc. The services must be packaged.
“We need to build pavilions”
BFM Business: What you also show is that seemingly unrelated issues also influence the birth rate.
JD: Yes, including housing. Nowadays, it is difficult for young people to leave their parents’ home. You should know that we consider that with every child born we move 10 km away from the city centre to find more spacious accommodation. So if we do not build more houses, it will have a negative impact on fertility. Environmental laws such as “net zero artificialisation” reduce the housing supply in the suburbs and this does not favour fertility. And there is also the question of social housing. Should single older people stay for life in social housing instead of a young couple?
BFM Business: Another lever for making proposals is meetings. Things that might make you smile, but they are essential, you say.
JD: Yes, for one simple reason: it takes two to have a child. Yet today, 20% of families are single-parent. More and more people are isolated and yearn for an adventure. We need to offer ways for people to get to know each other better. My proposals may make you smile or you may criticize them for the intrusive side of the State. But you only have to watch shows like “L’Amour est dans le pré” to realize that it is sometimes difficult to find someone. This should not be viewed with condescension.
So we could imagine the Allocation Funds financing subscriptions to online dating sites. These tools can be expensive for people on a budget. Two in five new couples since Covid have met online.
Or we could imagine public dating services for those who are less comfortable with digital tools or are reluctant to use dating sites. Organizations could organize parties and dances. Or it could involve paying memberships to gyms where we meet more and more people.
This is already happening abroad. Tokyo organized parties for Tokyoites to get together. A kind of “Love is in the city.”
Everyone agrees on fighting isolation. But we need to make bold and fun proposals. After all, it is by having fun that we become children.
“Fertility has increased in Germany”
BFM Business: Could the government’s proposals focusing on infertility and parental leave have any impact?
JD: The issue of infertility is not stupid, but it only affects a very small part of the population. It is not going to have a massive impact on the birth rate.
The issue of shortening and improving parental leave is also going in the right direction. Because if some people are reluctant to have a child, it is because it still has a negative impact on their career.
BFM Business: But can policies, however bold, have a real impact on birth rates?
JD: It is difficult and haphazard, but it can work. I can cite the example of Germany, which was a latecomer and, under Schröder, launched a care offer for all children, a kind of public service for early childhood. The fertility rate rose from 1.4 to 1.6. In Germany, working women are less seen as “mother crows”, as the country calls them. There have also been examples that have changed mentalities. Like that of Ursula von der Leyen, who has seven children and is president of the European Commission.
Then there are counterexamples. Japan and South Korea have invested heavily in increasing the birth rate, but it has had no impact. In these countries, having a child is still a catastrophe for a woman’s career.
In Hungary, things hardly worked better. The birth rate briefly rose again, but has since declined.
Paradoxically, it is in these countries that are more traditional in terms of values that birth rates are lowest. Because, as everywhere, women aspire to be equal to men on a professional level, but society tends to limit them to their role as mothers when they have a child. This does not encourage them to have children.
Source: BFM TV
