re: #56 Wendell Zurkowitz ((slave to the waffle light))

German birth rates are way below replacement, currently around 1.6.

This again is due to the economic situation in which housewives have to work full-time to help finance the cost of raising and housing a family, especially with ever-rising real estate and rental costs.

And their education system that keeps the most educated women in school/university until their mid-to late 20’s, whereupon they have to establish themselves in their new careers and are not in a position to think about taking time to raise a family until they are pushing 30.

My German nieces (early and mid 20s) are going through what you’ve described right now. Back in the 2000s my MIL in Japan ran for mayor of a small city (pop. 250,000) on the single issue of increased childcare for working women. She got walloped by the old man “women should stay at home and have more babies” candidate. Nothing has really changed.