>Last year there were 45,935 live births, a 2% fall on 2022 and the lowest total since records began in 1855, according to National Records of Scotland (NRS).
…
>Just over half of births (53%) were to unmarried parents and the most common age for mothers was in the 30-34 age group, followed by women in their late 20s.
…
>The fertility rate – the average number of children a group of women would expect to have – was lowest in Edinburgh, followed by Glasgow.
>Generally fertility rates were highest in the most deprived areas, and lowest in the least deprived
Funny how after 10 years of ‘Move to Australia’ style tv shoes the birth rate goes down.
Not suprising folk aren’t having kids. What sort of world would we be bringing them into.
Welcome to the world kids, you’re all doomed. Planet is dying, nobody is doing anything about it and WW3 is looming and will likely result in the apocolypse.
I’d rather not inflict that on someone that doesn’t have a say on whether they want to exist through that or not.
Lowest level ever… so far.
Don’t worry guys, I’m a pure midden and I’m gonna come back.
The birth rate falls and living standards become more expensive and the government’s answer is not to make life cheaper for us to afford to have more children but to import people from third world countries to make up the short fall.
Cue shite theories.
A combination of a different lifestyle now and the fact that children is becoming an extreme luxury level of cost. Affording a 2-3 bedroom house/flat in an urban area where you can get a decent job is going to put a whole lot of people out of the running. A lot of that housing stock is still clung to by dying off boomers and the extreme older portion of Gen X which drives costs through the roof. A lot of empty nesters living in 4 bedroom detached houses. A lot 83 year old grannies living 3 bedroom properties that they have owned for 55 years. People are living longer and we are building less. If you want 3 kids you need a 3 bedroom property which puts the cost of going above replacement entirely out of reach for a lot of folk.
People will say it has more to do with the hopelessness of the modern world but I don’t really buy that. We have had many, many, many, hopeless periods in world history for different civilisations and people still had kids. People place less importance on it now and folks can’t afford it.
Regular jobs don’t even allow you to pay rent anymore and all these dumbass articles are constantly coming out being like WHY DON’T THE YOUNG PEOPLE WANT TO HAVE KIDS?!
I’m lucky enough to have one but I honestly would have had 5-6 if I didn’t spend the last 15 years barely scraping by financially.
I’ve been to a fair few playgroups and baby focused meetings in the last year and it did strike me how many mothers were over 30. Majority in the ones I was at for sure.
That’s fine, in 20 years the population will shrink, it’ll be a sellers market for labour and a buyers market for housing. My son might be able to afford to have more kids of his own. Provided we don’t destroy the country through mismanagement first.
People are realising they don’t need kids to be happy. I’m mid 30s, good job and make decent money, but I have no desire to have kids, and never have had.
There’s many people choosing not to have kids nowadays, and we need to change the immigration rules to reflect that fact.
12 comments
>Last year there were 45,935 live births, a 2% fall on 2022 and the lowest total since records began in 1855, according to National Records of Scotland (NRS).
…
>Just over half of births (53%) were to unmarried parents and the most common age for mothers was in the 30-34 age group, followed by women in their late 20s.
…
>The fertility rate – the average number of children a group of women would expect to have – was lowest in Edinburgh, followed by Glasgow.
>Generally fertility rates were highest in the most deprived areas, and lowest in the least deprived
Funny how after 10 years of ‘Move to Australia’ style tv shoes the birth rate goes down.
Not suprising folk aren’t having kids. What sort of world would we be bringing them into.
Welcome to the world kids, you’re all doomed. Planet is dying, nobody is doing anything about it and WW3 is looming and will likely result in the apocolypse.
I’d rather not inflict that on someone that doesn’t have a say on whether they want to exist through that or not.
Lowest level ever… so far.
Don’t worry guys, I’m a pure midden and I’m gonna come back.
The birth rate falls and living standards become more expensive and the government’s answer is not to make life cheaper for us to afford to have more children but to import people from third world countries to make up the short fall.
Cue shite theories.
A combination of a different lifestyle now and the fact that children is becoming an extreme luxury level of cost. Affording a 2-3 bedroom house/flat in an urban area where you can get a decent job is going to put a whole lot of people out of the running. A lot of that housing stock is still clung to by dying off boomers and the extreme older portion of Gen X which drives costs through the roof. A lot of empty nesters living in 4 bedroom detached houses. A lot 83 year old grannies living 3 bedroom properties that they have owned for 55 years. People are living longer and we are building less. If you want 3 kids you need a 3 bedroom property which puts the cost of going above replacement entirely out of reach for a lot of folk.
People will say it has more to do with the hopelessness of the modern world but I don’t really buy that. We have had many, many, many, hopeless periods in world history for different civilisations and people still had kids. People place less importance on it now and folks can’t afford it.
Regular jobs don’t even allow you to pay rent anymore and all these dumbass articles are constantly coming out being like WHY DON’T THE YOUNG PEOPLE WANT TO HAVE KIDS?!
I’m lucky enough to have one but I honestly would have had 5-6 if I didn’t spend the last 15 years barely scraping by financially.
I’ve been to a fair few playgroups and baby focused meetings in the last year and it did strike me how many mothers were over 30. Majority in the ones I was at for sure.
That’s fine, in 20 years the population will shrink, it’ll be a sellers market for labour and a buyers market for housing. My son might be able to afford to have more kids of his own. Provided we don’t destroy the country through mismanagement first.
People are realising they don’t need kids to be happy. I’m mid 30s, good job and make decent money, but I have no desire to have kids, and never have had.
There’s many people choosing not to have kids nowadays, and we need to change the immigration rules to reflect that fact.