wouldn’t we expect countries with strong social programs like Norway to have much higher birth rates? I suppose those social programs would tend to correlate with birth control

I was unfamiliar with Norway’s program so I looked it up…

49 weeks of maternity leave? FUCK YEAH!

$160/month (USD equivalent) for kids under 6? Not nearly enough! That is of negligibe impact and doesn’t come close to offsetting the costs of raising a child.

My two takeaways from this, learning about Norway’s programs:

• The most impactful change was paid paternity leave! Turns out, letting dads stay home too resulted in a fertility rate increase from 1.6 to 1.9!
• Subsidized daycare increased the fertility rate from 1.9 to 1.98.
• The most recent drops in the fertility rate seem to be tied to the increased cost of housing. Meaning: All those benefits are great and all but they can’t make up for the fact that no one can afford their own home and kids anymore.

Also, “when everyone gets a subsidy, no one gets a subsidy” (my own saying). It seems inevitable that daycare costs would increase by the subsidy amount in order to capture it as profit. Basically, long-term subsidies like that ultimately fail because of basic economics. They can work fine in the short term, though.

I still stand by what I said: Having kids makes you less economically stable and until we fix that, fertility rates will continue to decline.

Seems like the biggest thing that needs to be fixed though is housing costs.