Australia's fertility rate is at its lowest level on record with just 1.5 babies per woman being born last year. That's down from a high of 1.86 in 1993 and 1.63 in 2022 following the COVID-19 lockdowns. The total number of births is also at its lowest level in 17 years. With the median age of mothers increasing to 31.9 years old.
For more, Demographer Dr Liz Allen from ANU joins.
Australia's fertility rate is at its lowest level on record, with just one point five babies per woman being born last year. That's down from a high of one point eighty six in nineteen ninety three and one point six three in twenty twenty two following COVID nineteen lockdowns. The total number of bursts is also at its lowest level in seventeen years, with the median age of mothers increasing to almost thirty two years old. Joining me now is demographer doctor Liz Allen from A and you great?
Have you with us? So what are these numbers telling us?
Well, it says that we've got a big job on our hands. It feels a bit like we've hit rock bottom here, certainly with the bottoming out of a total fertility rate. But the sad thing is it's likely to go further. What's causing this big drive. It's not because of choice. Australians are not saying I want fewer children. In fact, young people are unlikely to achieve their desired family size and that's because life is too tricky.
So what about the economics of it all?
Because it feels like this cost of living crisis right now, Housing is contributing to.
The issue most definitely. We've got housing, we have economic security, we have gender inequality, and of course climate change all coming together making it really the barriers insurmountable for young people to achieve their desired family size. This has been called a human catastrophe in fact, and if we think about it, young people have lost the hope for the future. They feel a deep insecurity about tomorrow. Government's really got to step up.
Yeah, it's interesting, isn't it.
So if an economic factor is part of it, should we bring back the baby bonus?
Oh, let's talk about the baby bonus, shervo. It's a pierce in the pond. It's not going to do anything. No one has a baby, you know, incubates a child for nine months just for a couple of grand No, we need structural reform. That means childcare, that means education, it means health, it means support right before even before a baby is born, to through life and so on, so that we can ensure that a young person has the maximum potential at life.
So, Liz, we've been talking about this since the seventies, right, does it frustrate you that nothing is really changing at the end.
Of the day.
This is really frustrating. In fact, we've had inquiries since the early nineteen hundreds, particularly around birth rates. Right, it is beyond frustrating. And as you say, since the nineteen seventies, the alarm button's been hit, nothing's being done. Demography is a slow moving train. I'd really like it if policymakers stepped up and really concern themselves about tomorrow and instead of looking at short snippets of political cycles.
I mean, housing seems to be the critical one, right, because you can only have a family if you've got a.
Roof to be able to over their heads.
And that also creates the size issue, how big a family. As you were saying, people want big families in Australia, but you need homes too.
Well, let's be clear, Australians don't want big families. I'm talking one or two children. That's not noodles and noodles of kiddos. But you're right, you've hit the nail on the head. Australia has a housing mismatch. On one level. We've got people in houses that are too big, empty nesters and so on that need to be supported, particularly in their senior ages, where that housing becomes inappropriate for their mobility and so on, to be able to downsize in their local area and so on. So we've got to really take a more holistic examination of housing. And you know, we've got to stop blaming immigration because without immigration, our economy would really seriously tank. And who's going to help us build our essential homes.
Childcare is the other big issues too, right, because as costs go up for families, both parents need to go to work and the cost of child care is exorbitant.
Yeah.
Look, we've got a nineteen fifties model of care and family in this country. And I hate to tell you politicians, but we've moved on since the nineteen fifties. We are no longer that kind of notion of the male breadwinner. We need multiple people in the home to be earning income, and a big income to survive, So.
Get with it.
Childcare is really about the livelihood of that future adult as well in that child. Let's think big, be bold, be brave, and let's innovate.
Think outside the box. Thank you, Liz, appreciate your time.