In 2022, Canada’s birth rate fell to 1.33 children per woman, its lowest on record. This is insufficient to maintain our current population. We are not alone. The global fertility rate has fallen by half since 1950. Over half the world’s countries and territories are now below the replacement rate of 2.1. Even China’s population is declining.

A recent survey by the Pew Research Centre in the U.S. found that almost half of adults aged 18 to 59 who don’t have children said it was unlikely they ever would. Reasons included couldn’t afford it, state of the world, concerns about the environment, don’t really like children, infertility, and so on.

The main reason was they “just didn’t want to” with many more women giving that answer than men. Almost a third of those over 50 who don’t have children gave this as the reason.

This isn’t surprising. It is unlikely evolution designed us to want children. It didn’t have to. It designed us to have a powerful sex drive, and for eons if you had sex you had children. It was inevitable. Not any more. Now women can choose.

Raising children is both a burden, particularly for women, and a joy. Some women may be more influenced by the former, some by the latter.

And if they choose not to have children, so what, we might ask? It’s their choice. And if it leads to declining populations which in turn leads to declining demands on the Earth’s resources, it is a good choice for all of us..

We frequently hear the concern that declining populations means aging populations and fewer young workers to support more dependent old people. I have posted before dismissing that argument. Fewer young workers can be offset by the ever-increasing ability of technology to do our work for us. We can reduce the total demand on resources by reducing populations but maintain the per capita use of resources by exploiting technology. We can maintain our standard of living as we progress toward a sustainable economy.

There are those, however, whose concern about declining populations goes beyond the economy. Russian president Vladimir Putin, for example, has expressed concern that Russia’s ethnic survival is at stake. “If we want to survive as an ethnic group … there must be at least two children,” he said. Russia has a birth rate almost as low as ours, and of course sending young Russians to war, to say nothing of his war driving many out of the country, doesn’t help.

Leaders of other countries have expressed the same ethnic concerns about maintaining the tribe. In this country, and other Western countries, we solve the problem through immigration. This, of course, is of no help to those who are worried about the fate of their race or religion.

Personally, I have no sympathy for such ethnic aspirations. Let women make their choices in their own interests, not as moms for the motherland.