Full effect is already known. Australian birth rates are declining despite an increasing population. Meanwhile, IVF babies as a percentage of overall births is increasing. Not only that, but number of IVF births on their own are up, not just a percentage, but as a whole.
Australian economy, according to some, has never been doing well. No matter when youre at you can always find the brown lining instead of the silver lining. Always something negative for the miserable man to ponder on. Anyway, IVF would not be growing so strongly if the economy was doing poorly! Just see how rapidly IVF has grown over the last 4 years. Those 4 years were hailed as some of the worst for the economy and cost of living.
Need I say that the poorest and most suffering people groups around the world have the highest birth rates! Why? Because having children is the original retirement plan before superannuation came about. The high immigration rate (with high cultural immigration) coupled with cost of living will inadvertently stimulate reproduction. These people come from the fire, and those nearest to the fire will be most inclined to add fuel to it.
Simply look at birth rates as a number and its trajectory over the last 10 years, as below. Please note the baby boom in 2021 from the lockdowns, when people arguably were in the most despair in regard to their economic situation. I will argue that the richer, more comfortable, lavish, pompous and decadent the society is, the lower it will reproduce due to the ingrained tendency through wealth to be exclusively self-interested. It is very selfless to have multiple children, especially at a young age.
Year
Number of Registered Births
2013
≈ 305,000¹
2014
≈ 304,000¹
2015
≈ 300,000¹
2016
≈ 293,000¹
2017
≈ 296,000²
2018
≈ 295,000²
2019
≈ 292,000²
2020
≈ 291,000²
2021
≈ 315,000³
2022
≈ 303,000³
2023
286,998⁴
Then, look at the Australian population growth over the last 10 years, as below. As you can see the population growth far outpaces the registered births.
Year (Dec 31)
Population (millions)
Year-on-Year Change
2013
23.62
–
2014
≈ 23.94
+0.32 M (1.35%)
2015
≈ 24.26
+0.32 M
2016
≈ 24.57
+0.31 M
2017
≈ 24.92
+0.35 M
2018
≈ 25.28
+0.36 M
2019
≈ 25.63
+0.35 M
2020
≈ 25.99
+0.36 M
2021
≈ 26.36
+0.37 M
2022
≈ 26.74
+0.38 M
2023
≈ 27.10
+0.36 M
2024
27.40
+0.30 M (1.7%)
Now see the total IVF conceived births over the last 10 years, as below. These are very rough numbers. They correlate more to population growth than actual total births. We are missing the last 2 years of data, but the growth from 2013 to 2022 was about 25% total, while population growth is about the same but a few percentage points lower (~19%) to 2024, unlike 2022. This has absolutely no correlation to the birth rate, which you would think would grow at the same rate. This would suggest many who are simply immigrating for economic reasons.
You can see that IVF births continue to make up a higher percentage of overall births, especially when you consider that IVF has a higher likelihood of giving multiple children per pregnancy. Unsurprisingly, nature knows best, with recent years consistently showing female births outnumbering male births by a few thousand of the total ~300,000 each year. It is as if God himself is telling the laity to procreate.
In conclusion, this trend will not be dislodged as long as societal pressures toward young women remain academic, economic and individualist centric. Basically, in alignment with feminist dogma of the 1970s. There is no structured societal life path that guides women toward forming a family and having children in their early twenties, especially in modern society. This is very contrary to life pre feminist 1970s western society. Where all that was expected of them was procreation and family. Evidently, extremes of either are not sustainable. You will notice that birth rates dropped dramatically right around the time of the feminist movement and have stayed subdued since and continued downward. Many study and work in their twenties just so they can spend that same money paying for IVF in their 30s. A sad situation, but one that is the societal peer pressure induced framework that upholds GDP figures.
To eliminate the IVF sector and restore birth rates to what many want them to be, female reproductive freedom must be put on notice. There would need to be drastic shifts in incentives, or some societal trauma in this department should shift change. Maybe a new generation will see the foolishness of their parents and choose to have children early at their expense? Maybe pre 1960s family values will resurface, promulgate and cause a counter modernity movement for the old school values on the heyday. Alas, as fashions come and go so do social values. This is all possible, and likely, but I do not see it happening in the short to medium term.
In support of my argument, below are the figures of births from 1950 to present per 1000 people. A lot of these reason are my thinking that government intervention will transpire. Baby bonus, free IVF etc are highly likely, this will highly benefit MVF. There is no society unless births are above replacement rate, and in Australia, we are slightly below replacement. I actually think government intervention at this point is almost guaranteed, the baby bonus introduced in 2001 saw a substantial increase in births in the following years. There needs to be a government in place which is family friendly and baby friendly. If the societal norm and economic pressures in place dissuade people from procreation, then the government body is failing its population. There needs to be a shift.
MVF Price at posting:
62.5¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
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