The rise of childlessness

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Almost everywhere, the most educated women are least likely to have children. And the highest rates of childlessness are found among women who pursue degrees in non-vocational subjects. Researchers at Stockholm University have found that 33% of Swedish women born in the late 1950s who studied the social sciences did not have children, compared with 10% of primary-school teachers and just 6% of midwives. It may be that teaching and midwifery attract women who strongly desire children, or that these jobs offer more parent-friendly hours and conditions. But the difference is probably also down to job security. A trained teacher can expect to find a stable job at a younger age than a trained anthropologist can.

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In liberal Anglo-Saxon countries, though, middle-aged childless people appear to be slightly happier than parents. The same demographers find that young parents are gloomier than childless youngsters.

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Nobody knows whether childlessness will rise further. It has been going up in most European countries, but not all: the rate has fallen in Switzerland, for example. One possibility is that childlessness will veer up and down, mirroring the economic cycle. As the average age of marriage rises and couples push childbearing into their mid- or even late 30s, they become increasingly vulnerable to shocks. A bad recession or a mortgage-lending squeeze will encourage couples to pause—and, because many now give themselves only a narrow window before their fertility drops, some will be knocked out of childbearing altogether.

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