We've stopped having babies
The Times, Tuesday, 16th December 2008
Malta has second lowest birth rate in EU
Ivan Camilleri, Brussels
Malta has the second lowest birth rate in the European Union but also one of the lowest death rates, according to new figures issued by the EU’s statistical office.Having a baby does not seem to be high on the agenda for Maltese couples these days and with the exception of Germany, Malta registered the lowest crude birth rate in Europe in 2008.
The crude birth rate is the number of births per 1,000 inhabitants. While the average across the EU was 10.8, in Malta the rate stood at 9.2. Only Germany performed worse with a rate of 8.3. The highest birth rates per 1,000 inhabitants were registered in Ireland (18.1), the UK (13), France (12.9), Estonia (12.2), Sweden (11.9) and Denmark (11.8).
At the other end of the life span, people here appear to be living longer, with the number of deaths per 1,000 population being 7.7 – far lower than the 9.7 average in the EU. Malta’s crude death rate is in fact among the best in the EU, with just Ireland (6.1) and Luxembourg (6.9) performing better.
Despite its low birth rate, Malta’s population by January 1 is expected to reach 412,600. Over the past 12 months Malta’s overall population increased by 2,300, mainly due to immigration and the fewer number of deaths. Thanks to the substantial rise in immigrants, the population increased by 5.6 persons per 1,000 inhabitants. The same trend was witnessed in the EU, but here the increase in migrants is 4.2 per 1,000 population while the EU average is of 3.3.
Eurostat said that the EU27 will have a population of 499.7 million on January 1, with the population growing by 4.4 per 1,000 inhabitants in 2008 due to natural population growth of 1.1 per 1,000, and net migration of 3.3 per 1,000. In total, the EU27 population is estimated to have increased by 2.2 million in 2008.
20 Comments Comment
Leave a Comment
Malta, being so crowded, is it any wonder people don’t want too many babies? It would be interesting to plot the birth rate against average size of living space. Having said that, Germany’s average living space can’t be that bad, so perhaps that’s not the reason why!
[Daphne – I don’t think anyone sits down and says: gosh, it’s looking a little crowded. I won’t have a baby. People have or don’t have babies for entirely selfish reasons, and this is as it have always been, because the drive to procreate is essentially and biologically a selfish one.]
The numbers are pretty serious. If you take immigration off the table for a moment, the picture would be one of demographic collapse. And if you put it back on the table, the prospect of an ageing, and increasingly insecure, indigenous population having to share its traditional space with a young and growing immigrant community that’s virtually impossible to assimilate might not be so attractive either.
Usually, birth rates collapse when society does not offer adequate support to families (they are, after all, performing a public service) and when it makes it difficult for women, and men, to combine career with family. That’s why southern Europe is doing poorly while Scandinavia has managed to achieve a degree of demographic stability.
I think this is one of those misleading stastistics that should not be taken at face value. The statistical figure is worked as births per 1,000 population without any reference to the age distribution of the population. Malta has an ageing population and quite a large percentage is above child-bearuing age. I wonder how this statistic would turn out to be if instead of births per 1,000 population it is worked out as births per 1,000 people of child-bearing age.
Now watch the Times comments to see Denis Catania and the usual bitching brigade quickly turn the story into the same old crap on how the powers that be will see this as another opportunity to bring in more illegal immigrants.
I don’t think it’s a conscious thing, it’s just if all you can afford is a one bedroom studio flat, you are very unlikely to have 4 children. Let’s not go to extremes though. If you live in a medium sized (for Malta) two bedroomed flat, having more than one child will make things pretty cramped. Is personal space not a selfish reason? More babies, less space for me.
madonna f’kollhox tifhem int
May I ask a question: When do immigrants (returned, illegal or otherwise) start being counted as forming part of a country’s population? In other words, when will they cease to be “just visiting” and start being considered fully-fledged Maltese?
[Daphne – Simple: when they have the official status that makes them Maltese – citizenship.]
Bernard is right – I live abroad and the childcare facilities are great. In public schools, during the holidays (even Christmas and Easter) childcare facilities are available for children who have working parents and this is at a very low charge. In Malta there are several disincentives for having children, unless the mother is willing to undermine her career. We have the lowest level of maternity leave in Europe, and this has some impact too.
@ Michael Falzon
Actually our population is still significantly younger than the European average. So our pathetic birth rate implies a lower total fertility rate rather than a higher one (in fact, from several other Eurostat and NSO studies, we know that that’s the case).
Incidentally, that’s also why our mortality rate is lower than the European average. We’re just younger.
@Nicola,
“We have the lowest level of maternity leave in Europe”
Isn’t forking out 3 months salary for nothing enough for an employer?
I don’t think that anyone should be viewing these statistics as anything but positive. Malta cannot sustain a huge birth rate, the likes of which was the norm the century just passed. Not without the safety valve of emigration, which has been closing as an escape for overpopulation for decades.
Maybe the Maltese are getting it right.
@ E Grima
Yes, a stable population is fine but that’s not where we’re heading. A rapidly contracting population will mean a rapidly contracting total GDP and a loss of whatever limited economies of scale we benefit from at the moment.
It’s not as if the economic cake is of a fixed size and when the number of guests at the table is reduced we’ll all have a bigger piece.
This certainly hasn’t stopped my family, we’ve just had our seventh baby, against all odds can I say;
we haven’t got a single cent of children’s allowance until this year, just because we have skipped the limit of income by a few hundred euro. This year’s budget’s concession for large families was only cosmetic, we still only get a couple of hundred euro, less than a one-child family gets, despite that they only earn a few hundred euros less. All our children go to private schools, and that absorbs most of the pay we have left. Only a very small amount is tax deductible from this, and yet we are sponsoring the state education of one-child families with incomes greater than ours. At three months’ paid pregnancy leave this is by far the worst in Europe, and anti-family. We have to buy a 7-seater car by force, we are given no allowance for this when calculating VRT, VAT , fuel, motor tax etc. We live in a two bedroomed house; we are not given any living allowance or any aid in accommodation, despite that many so called “single parents ” are given free accomodation, sponsored by our taxes. Gonzi claims this is a pro-family government, yet the facts prove otherwise, this is a government that positively discriminates against large families.
[Daphne – First you go to the extreme of having seven children, which was entirely your choice, and then you complain because you don’t get financial assistance. Excuse me for saying this, but you have a ruddy nerve to expect those who responsibly have no more than two or three children to subsidise your seven by means of their taxes. Not only that, but you also expect to send all seven to private schools. I don’t know whether you’re telling the truth, or whether you mean church schools rather than independent schools, but sending seven children to independent schools would eat up that entire salary that misses the children’s allowance threshold by a few hundred euros, even before you’ve paid tax and national insurance, so what are you eating? More to the point, what in heaven’s name were you thinking of?]
@ Daphne
“Excuse me for saying this, but you have a ruddy nerve to expect those who responsibly have no more than two or three children to subsidise your seven by means of their taxes.”
No, I don’t expect another family with two children to subsidise my own family of seven children, but neither do I expect my family with seven children to be subsidising a family with two children just because we earn (or rather, declare to be earning) a few hundred more euros a year. This is unjust, however much you attempt to twist what I said.
On what basis does the government determine that the value of each child in a two-child family is worth much more than each child in a seven-child family? Not that this did stop us anyway.
@Paceville:
Congrats. You seem to be doing quite well as it is anyway and I hope that you get some help from the government for some home improvement to make life easier. God bless your big family.
@Paceville,
Whilst I agree with Daphne 100% since last year everybody is eligible to receive children’s allowance. With 7 kids that leaves you with €1750!
You did remember to register them with social services didn’t you?
And as Daphne said – you send 7 kids to private school on the salary you claim? U ejja gbin, can you tell me the name of the school as I would like to send my kids there too!
@paceville
I agree think you need some help.
http://hcd2.bupa.co.uk/fact_sheets/html/Vasectomy.html
Did you see this comment in The Times?
”
Marisa Mifsud (1 hour, 16 minutes ago)
I think women who state “father unknown” on the birth certificate should be forced to give details of their sexual partners so that paternity tests can be carried out. If they fail to do so, they should have their benifits cut/reduced. Too much money is being handed out to these fraudulant people. I assume that nobody sleeps with someone without knowing about it or who the other person is (with exeption to rape cases obviously).
”
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20081219/local/marriage-act-anomaly-settled
I give up!
I think she makes a very valid point. Read the rest of the comments on the link you kindly posted.
Yes Sybil, sure she does!