Childlessness in Spain: Tick Tock, Tick Tock, Tick Tock!

Abstract

In less than a decade, women born in 1975 will be reaching half a century of existence as members of the most infertile of all cohorts born in Spain in the past 130 years, the period for which we have statistical information. In all likelihood, one in four women born in 1975 won’t have had children when she turns fifty, the cut-off point at which demography appraises the completed fertility of a birth cohort. Part of this childlessness is due to frustration of the reproductive project of these women and, eventually, that of their partners. This little-known datum has been envisaged year after year because of causes that are known in theory but difficult to discern and quantify. In societies like ours, which are so concerned about population ageing and its consequences for sustainability of pensions, the viability of a universal health system, increased dependence and its repercussions on gender inequality, or the decline of the working-age population, it’s surprising that there is so little discussion of the fact that, contrary to her own expectations and wishes, one in every four women will be childless. This is why the first number of Perspectives Demogràfiques, a scientific publication on demography addressed to the general public, is devoted to the trends and possible causes of infertility in Spain.