Alain Paillard is a graduate in economics and law. He teaches at the Catholic University of the West.
Jacques Bichot is emeritus professor of economics at Jean Moulin University (Lyon 3), and honorary member of the Economic and Social Council.
In 2022, Argentina recorded 818,000 births for 46.4 million inhabitants: this means 17.64 births per 1,000 inhabitants, or 17,640 babies born for each million Argentines: the renewal of generations is assured.
Japan, with 800,000 births for 125 million inhabitants, cannot say the same: its birth rate, 6.40 per 1000, will lead, if it continues, to a decline in the number of Japanese and to a dramatic ageing.
One could almost speak of demographic suicide for this archipelago which, despite its small size, has played and still plays a very important role economically and culturally.
We would like to encourage the Japanese to pull themselves together!
Metropolitan France, with 10.43 births per thousand inhabitants, is between Japan and Argentina.
Without having chosen, like the Japanese, a sort of demographic suicide, our country has just crossed the threshold of 700,000 annual births downwards: the year 2022, for metropolitan France, saw the birth of 687,000 babies.
This corresponds to a fertility rate of 1.76.
Admittedly, the First World War had caused a record infertility in our country, the fertility rate having fallen to 1.52 in 1915, but this historic low corresponds to a very special situation due to the intensity of the fighting and general mobilization.
That the French birth rate was in 2022, a peaceful year, halfway through this historic weakness, is a sign of
alarm which should be deciphered by our leaders, if however their concern for French demography has not become the least of their concerns.
To the French as to the Japanese, we say: despite all the difficulties, life is beautiful, let's give it with optimism.
This situation stems in part from a kind of amnesia on the part of the public authorities: they forget that, without a sufficient number of children, it is difficult to ensure the future of the country.
Alain Paillard and Jacques Bichot
What is the meaning of this excessive caution which has spread with regard to the gift of life?
Of course, the causes are multiple and complex, there is no question of going around in a brief article.
Let us confine ourselves to pointing out one that relates to the economy: currently, having a large family means living quite sparingly, seeing one's standard of living fall below that achieved on average by people with the same income from work. .
Family benefits are far from compensating for the decline in the standard of living that occurs, notwithstanding some economies of scale, when the number of mouths to feed increases and full-time work for both parents becomes difficult or impossible.
This situation stems in part from a kind of amnesia on the part of the public authorities: they forget that, without a sufficient number of children, it is difficult to ensure the future of the country.
They also forget that a large family can hardly count on two substantial incomes, because the attention required by the children reduces, with some exceptions, the capacity for professional commitment.
It is true that family benefits are provided, but these are far from rising to the level that would be necessary so that the increase in the number of children in a family does not result in relative impoverishment.
Our rulers and representatives have not, as a whole, truly become aware of the fact that the future of the country depends primarily on sufficient fertility,
Our leaders are as bad at investing in youth as they are at providing good quality pensions
Alain Paillard and Jacques Bichot
This situation is largely due to the fact that bringing children into the world and raising them as well as possible is not felt, particularly by the public authorities, as a vital imperative.
The family policy was, at the Liberation, conceived as a key element in the restoration of our country exhausted by the war and the Occupation.
But since then, the budget for allowances and other means made available to families to invest in young people has undergone a slow but profound relative erosion (that is to say in proportion to professional income).
The mediocre birth rates are in good part the consequence of this poor assessment, which is unfortunately observed in the vast majority of developed countries.
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We can say that our leaders are as bad when it comes to investing in young people as when it comes to putting in place good quality pensions: successive governments and the parliamentary assemblies on which they depend, as well as the presidents of the Republic, persist in distributing pension rights, not according to what gives them an effective content – the birth and education of children – but in proportion to the contributions paid to pension funds!
What is used to maintain retirees is treated as an investment, whereas it is a return on investment!
Faced with such intellectual confusion, raised to the legislative level, we can only hope for the arrival of an institutional reform capable of getting rid of stupid and unjust laws: these rules designed by people who ignore the basics of exchanges between successive generations must give way to real legislative recognition of the contribution made by the bringing into the world of children and their education.