07-07-2010, 07:42 AM
Comment Columnists / Mindelle Jacobs
Whoa baby! A downside to going childless
By MINDELLE JACOBS, QMI AGENCY
When I was in university, one of my favourite T-shirts featured the panic-stricken face of a woman. “I forgot the baby on the bus!” shrieked the cartoon bubble coming from her mouth.
Several years later, I got involved with a guy who wanted to get married and have kids. Having just started working and embarking on a life of independence, the thought of having a baby turned my stomach.
I had my first full-time job with a steady paycheque in a new city with a gaggle of new friends. A baby didn’t fit into my plans.
That relationship ended and the years flew by. I moved from province to province and then abroad for a while, fuelled by adventure and opportunity. My parents worried I’d never settle down.
Then I met the man I ended up marrying but I was 39 by the time we tied the knot. Sure, plenty of women in their 40s are having kids but I didn’t relish the prospect of late motherhood.
Consequently, I am among the growing percentage of women who are childless. Nearly 20% of American women finish their childbearing years without having kids, according to a new report from the Pew Research Center. In comparison, only 10% of American women aged 40 to 44 had never given birth in 1976.
There are no comparable Canadian figures but the 2006 census indicated that 29% of couples living together didn’t have children.
Declining fertility in industrialized countries is not a new phenomenon, of course. Canada’s fertility rate has been dropping for a century, except for the baby boom years after the Second World War.
Fertility rates below replacement levels “are likely to become a persistent feature” for most Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development countries in the years to come, a 2005 OECD report concluded.
Delaying childbirth can increase the extent of childlessness because the longer women wait to have children, the greater the chance they won’t be able to, the study said.
It can put women who’d like to have kids in a tough spot. You have to be educated enough to get a good job and then hope you meet Mr. Right before your eggs get stale. (Yes, single women can have kids but it’s not ideal. You have to be extremely hard-working, lucky or rich to lead a comfortable life.)
Notably, the Pew study reports that among older U.S. women, there are equal numbers of women who are childless by choice and those would like kids but can’t have them. One bright spot in the report is that while childlessness had risen for all racial and ethnic groups in the U.S., it’s fallen over the past decade for women with advanced degrees.
The most educated women are still among the most likely never to have had a child. But in an exception to the rising trend, 24% of women aged 40 to 44 with a master’s, doctoral or professional degree had not had children in 2008, down from 31% in 1994.
And the rates of childlessness have increased most sharply for the least educated women, according to the Pew report. The likelihood of bearing no children jumped 66% among women with less than a high school diploma from 1994 to 2008.
Blame it on changing values, the birth control pill or feminism, but fertility rates are unlikely to increase much in the future. Women aren’t about to drop out of the labour market and stable jobs are hard enough to find in the current economic climate.
One thing’s for sure. We childless folks had better save our pennies to pay home-care workers when we’re old. Who else will take care of us?
mindy.jacobs@sunmedia.ca
Whoa baby! A downside to going childless
By MINDELLE JACOBS, QMI AGENCY
When I was in university, one of my favourite T-shirts featured the panic-stricken face of a woman. “I forgot the baby on the bus!” shrieked the cartoon bubble coming from her mouth.
Several years later, I got involved with a guy who wanted to get married and have kids. Having just started working and embarking on a life of independence, the thought of having a baby turned my stomach.
I had my first full-time job with a steady paycheque in a new city with a gaggle of new friends. A baby didn’t fit into my plans.
That relationship ended and the years flew by. I moved from province to province and then abroad for a while, fuelled by adventure and opportunity. My parents worried I’d never settle down.
Then I met the man I ended up marrying but I was 39 by the time we tied the knot. Sure, plenty of women in their 40s are having kids but I didn’t relish the prospect of late motherhood.
Consequently, I am among the growing percentage of women who are childless. Nearly 20% of American women finish their childbearing years without having kids, according to a new report from the Pew Research Center. In comparison, only 10% of American women aged 40 to 44 had never given birth in 1976.
There are no comparable Canadian figures but the 2006 census indicated that 29% of couples living together didn’t have children.
Declining fertility in industrialized countries is not a new phenomenon, of course. Canada’s fertility rate has been dropping for a century, except for the baby boom years after the Second World War.
Fertility rates below replacement levels “are likely to become a persistent feature” for most Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development countries in the years to come, a 2005 OECD report concluded.
Delaying childbirth can increase the extent of childlessness because the longer women wait to have children, the greater the chance they won’t be able to, the study said.
It can put women who’d like to have kids in a tough spot. You have to be educated enough to get a good job and then hope you meet Mr. Right before your eggs get stale. (Yes, single women can have kids but it’s not ideal. You have to be extremely hard-working, lucky or rich to lead a comfortable life.)
Notably, the Pew study reports that among older U.S. women, there are equal numbers of women who are childless by choice and those would like kids but can’t have them. One bright spot in the report is that while childlessness had risen for all racial and ethnic groups in the U.S., it’s fallen over the past decade for women with advanced degrees.
The most educated women are still among the most likely never to have had a child. But in an exception to the rising trend, 24% of women aged 40 to 44 with a master’s, doctoral or professional degree had not had children in 2008, down from 31% in 1994.
And the rates of childlessness have increased most sharply for the least educated women, according to the Pew report. The likelihood of bearing no children jumped 66% among women with less than a high school diploma from 1994 to 2008.
Blame it on changing values, the birth control pill or feminism, but fertility rates are unlikely to increase much in the future. Women aren’t about to drop out of the labour market and stable jobs are hard enough to find in the current economic climate.
One thing’s for sure. We childless folks had better save our pennies to pay home-care workers when we’re old. Who else will take care of us?
mindy.jacobs@sunmedia.ca