Is the birth rate in France at half mast? In any case, this is what Nadine Morano asserts. MEP Les Républicains and supporter of Valérie Pécresse in the 2022 presidential election expressed concern on Wednesday March 23 on Cnews about the number of births which is falling in France: “We can clearly see that for ten years the birth rate has fallen by 12% in our country”she said, pointing “the lowering of the family quotient, the universality of family allowances which has been abolished and the young child allowance which has been lowered.”
What Nadine Morano says at first is true. Even if the number of births stabilized last year, in 2020 we experienced the lowest birth rate since 1945 according to INSEE. There were just under 740,000 births, with a very marked drop at the end of the year, that is to say nine months after the first confinement.
However, the Covid-19 is not the only culprit. If we look at INSEE figures for a decade, the decline has been continuous since 2014 and it had even started in the 2010s. At the time, there were just over 820,000 babies born each year. , about 10% more than today.
Is– whether this fall is linked to the fall in allowances or the family quotient, as Nadine Morano says? It is not so simple. Several studies have looked at the link between family policy and fertility, and according to them, financial aid does play a role, but it remains relatively modest.
Not to mention that evaluating family policy is very difficult because it is broader than tax measures. For example, it can be leave at the time of birth, part-time work or places in a nursery to be able to reconcile professional and family life. And that, say the researchers, is difficult to precisely measure their effectiveness or ineffectiveness, in particular because these policies are often intertwined.
There is also another factor that matters a lot. According to INSEE, the number of women of childbearing age in France, that is to say between 20 and 40 years old, fell sharply in the mid-1990s, almost by 10%, and has stagnated since 2016. , which partly explains the drop in fertility.