Is the iPhone to blame for our big baby bust? What to know about Australia’s record-low fertility rate

The average number of children Australian women have hit rock bottom.

Latest figures show Australians will have 23,000 fewer babies in 2024 than in 2018; despite this, the total population increased by approximately two million during that period.

What does the baby bust in Australia mean for us? Here’s what you need to know.Marija Ercegovac

The country’s fertility rate (expected number of births per woman) last peaked at 2.02 in 2008, but has since fallen 25 percent to a record low of 1.48 in 2024. So far the effects of low fertility have been offset by immigration, but this will affect our society and economy in the long term.

So what’s going on and should we be worried? This imprint has published a series of stories exploring the causes of Australia’s baby bust and what it might mean for the future.

Here are seven key takeaways.

Mothers under 35 are decreasing

Resolve Political Monitor’s exclusive survey for this imprint found that 50 percent of 25 to 35-year-olds have never had children. While the majority of those under 45 (68 percent) say they have or will have children, the proportion of those who prefer only one child is increasing. Demand for egg freezing and in vitro fertilization treatments has increased, but this is not a large-scale solution. It also does not address the social, economic and systemic challenges underlying the trend towards delayed childbearing.

So are teenage pregnancies.

Teen pregnancies are decreasing. according to Australian Institute of Health and WelfareMothers who gave birth under the age of 20 constituted 1.6 percent of all mothers in 2023. In 2010, this rate was more than double, at 3.8 percent.

Australia progressively decriminalized abortion from 2002, but this decline in births in the under-20s has been attributed to the increasing popularity and availability of long-acting birth control. in its place increase in terminations.

This is a win for reproductive freedom; Teen motherhood is associated with poorer health and well-being outcomes for both mother and child and can lead to intergenerational cycles of disease and poverty. But a La Trobe University study published in May found Australia’s sexual health education is not fit for purpose. Condom use among Australian teenagers is at a 30-year low, contributing to rising rates of sexually transmitted infections.

Middle children are out of fashion

The Resolve Political Monitor poll found that only 9 percent of 18- to 45-year-olds have three or more children; This rate corresponds to 27 percent in people over the age of 45. Meanwhile, one-child families are becoming more common; 25 percent of 35- to 45-year-olds reported having only one child; This rate is 10 percentage points higher than for those over the age of 45. The separate Australian Household, Income and Labor Dynamics survey, which surveyed a sample of 17,000 people over their lifetimes, shows that the “preference for small families” or having no children has increased markedly over the last 20 years.

Technology may have been more of a hindrance than a help

When mother-of-five Steph Powell, from the NSW South Coast, announced she was expecting her youngest son, she had to laugh at the joke: “Don’t you have a TV?” It is, but the critics may be on to something.

A study conducted by the University of Cincinnati has been making a lot of noise around the world since it was revealed. It was published In May. Researchers Nathan Hudson and Hernan Moscoso Boedo linked the decline in teenage fertility rates to the advent of modern smartphones, arguing that the number of births fell fastest in the United States and Britain in the regions that got high-speed mobile connectivity earliest. Another study published this weekThe rise of the iPhone may explain 33 to 52 percent of the decline in births among American women ages 15 to 44, he said.

Smartphones have sharply reduced face-to-face socializing among young people. We’re certainly seeing the influence of the lost art approach – it’s on display more than ever as fed-up singles leave ‘gamified’ dating apps and porn, but it’s something we need to watch out for.

Steve Jobs launched the first iPhone in 2007, just before the Global Financial Crisis, which effectively ended a decade of stable or rising fertility rates in Australia. As this series examines, raising a child today costs about as much as a small mortgage. And 42 percent of respondents to the Resolve Political Monitor poll cited cost as a reason they chose not to have children.

Our dictionaries need to be updated

Language is important. Those who choose not to have children are “childless”, but those who do not have children against their will are “childless”. “One child” implies an incomplete family, while “one-child” or “one-child” families focus on numbers. Even interesting terms have deeper meanings. The so-called “knock gap” defined in the 2024 data Pew Research CenterIt revealed that 57 percent of men aged 18-35 want children, while 45 percent of women of a similar age want children. Experts attribute this difference to the “impossible” question addressed to mothers. “Beanstalk families” – a long, thin family line consisting of several aunts, uncles and cousins - mean more resources can be focused on fewer children, but as the older generation ages, there are fewer children to draw on.

Mental health support is more important than ever

An exclusive Resolve Political Monitor poll conducted for this imprint found that 22 percent of childfree people choose not to have children because of physical or mental health issues they do not want to trigger or pass on, and 13 percent of parents who choose to have one child do not have more children for the same reason.

In May, Parenting Today The survey found that almost 60 per cent of Australian parents experience psychological distress and this is reflected in their children. The results are in Parenting Research CenterThe survey of more than 10,000 Australian parents, conducted in August, is the largest in the country.

In March, a world-first analysis by a team of Australian researchers found that suicide, accidental poisoning and undetermined intent were responsible for 26 percent of maternal deaths in the first year after birth and 22 percent within five years. A published study Lancet In May, it was revealed that one in every 15 women worldwide is affected by major depressive disorder in the year after giving birth, and one in 16 women during pregnancy.

Baby raid in Australia is part of a larger global story

Birth rates are falling almost everywhere. Two-thirds of the world’s 195 countries have a “replacement” level below 2.1, which is required to replace the population from one generation to the next without migration. This includes China and India, Asia’s twin population giants. Very low birth numbers in parts of Asia and Europe have triggered warnings of a “demographic winter” as the number of working-age taxpayers declines. Unless the trend is reversed, some governments will face new and potentially serious social, political and economic disruptions.

But there is some good news for Australia; Our openness to immigration will help us meet this challenge. Immigration may be hotly debated around the world, but a recent study published in lancet It concluded that immigration-friendly nations such as Australia, Canada and the United States could “maintain their working-age populations” in the long term and help them “do better” economically than others as this century progresses.

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