ROB SCHMITZ, HOST:
Birth rates are falling in the U.S. and around the world. As families shrink, researchers say it means big changes for economies and whole societies. Most of the public discussion around this population shift is being shaped by conservatives, but some progressive groups and mainstream experts say it's time for a broader discussion about a future with fewer children. NPR's Sarah McCammon and Brian Mann report.
SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: When Brian and I first started looking at this shift towards smaller families, we found a lot of people who describe themselves as progressives are thinking about this issue - a lot.
EMMA BRENNAN: A lot of people our age are not having kids or waiting for very long, and they, like, have a great life regardless.
BRIAN MANN, BYLINE: Emma Brennan and Lauren Wright got married recently. They live in a warehouse loft in Baltimore. They say they want kids, but the world often feels like a scary place to raise children. They worry about climate change, rising income inequality and America's polarized politics.
BRENNAN: It's really making me personally question, OK, do I really, really want this?
LAUREN WRIGHT: I feel like we have conversations about the state of the world, and I feel like we've seen a lot of change in our lifetime and not necessarily for good.
BRENNAN: Yeah.
MCCAMMON: Wright and Brennan told us they are hearing leaders talk about parenting and falling birth rates, but those voices are mostly on the right.
BRENNAN: That whole Trump thing - like, we'll give you a bunch of money or a few grand.
MANN: Under a program proposed by Trump and passed by the Republican-controlled Congress, the U.S. government will invest a thousand dollars for each baby born to American citizens during his term in office. And that's just one proposal. Conservatives have embraced a whole range of pronatalist ideas which advocate for having more babies with urgency. Here's Elon Musk speaking on Bill Maher's HBO show.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "REAL TIME WITH BILL MAHER")
ELON MUSK: I just think we should be - I think be cautious about civilizational decline with - and we have plummeting birth rates most places.
MCCAMMON: But in our reporting, we found many progressive-leaning groups have stayed mostly silent on the policy debate around birth rate decline.
MANN: Many mainstream academics have also shied away from talking about this issue, at least publicly.
MCCAMMON: And some told us point blank they fear even talking about fertility decline could validate more extreme ideas. Ruth Braunstein is a sociologist at Johns Hopkins University who studies right-wing movements.
RUTH BRAUNSTEIN: Because once we start talking about things as a crisis, it justifies all manner of emergency measures that often involves controlling people.
MCCAMMON: Braunstein does think shrinking families could affect everything from pension systems to the social fabric of communities. But for many on the left, Braunstein says hearing government officials talk about trying to increase birth rates raises fears about the prospect of coerced reproduction.
MANN: One of the defining documents of modern feminism is "The Handmaid's Tale" - the dystopian novel by Margaret Atwood made into a television series where women are forced to bear children to counter low birth rates.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "THE HANDMAID'S TALE")
ANN DOWD: (As Aunt Lydia) You girls will serve the leaders and their barren wives. You will bear children for them.
MCCAMMON: Many groups on the right have proposed limits on reproductive rights, including bans on abortion. Others on the far right have voiced opposition to contraception or called for limits on divorce.
MANN: Braunstein thinks the debate over fertility rates in the U.S. is also being shaped by conservative fears about diversity and immigration.
BRAUNSTEIN: We are now no longer a majority white Christian nation, and in some period of time we will no longer be a majority white population. And so that's one piece of the demographic change that I hear a lot about.
MCCAMMON: Many people we spoke to on the political left in the U.S. and in other countries told us this coding of low birth rates as a right-wing concern means progressives have stayed on the sidelines of the conversation for too long.
MARTINA YOPO DIAZ: It's a problem that has been avoided by feminists.
MANN: Martina Yopo Diaz is a sociologist at the Catholic University of Santiago in Chile, who describes herself as a progressive. She thinks it's long overdue for researchers like herself to face this demographic reality and come up with their own solutions and policy ideas.
YOPO DIAZ: From a very feminist perspective, everyone has the right not to have children, but also people have the right to have children and to parent in safe and sustainable environments.
MCCAMMON: But getting more feminists and other progressives, as well as academics, to engage the policy debate over birth rates may not be easy.
ALICE EVANS: These things are all, you know, a tricky minefield.
MANN: Alice Evans is a researcher at King's College London who studies women's issues. She's working currently as a visiting professor at Stanford University. Evans thinks the debate over falling birth rates is being skewed by what she calls a troubling silence from many progressives.
EVANS: If progressives don't want to talk about it and self-censor, etc., then no one is going to talk about things that might impact progressives.
MANN: Evans thinks there are important ideas on the left that might make it easier for women to choose more children - boosting gender equity, for example, so that women carry less of the burden of parenting or expanding economic support for low-income families that want kids. She says progressives would need to offer incentives and aid big enough to offset the significant costs of parenting.
EVANS: It could be in the form of housing. It could be in terms of, you know, bonuses on your pension. It could be a tax rebate. That benefit would need to be large enough to sort of say, OK, fine, I'll make this big, costly investment.
MCCAMMON: Leslie Root, a researcher at the University of Colorado Boulder, thinks there is growing awareness on the political left that declining birth rates are a real challenge and that many families need help in the form of left-leaning policies like guaranteed paid parental leave.
LESLIE ROOT: Across the ideological spectrum, people have identified that maybe this is - these are winning policies - right? - that these are things that people want, that people maybe aren't able to have the children that they want to have.
MANN: We asked Emma Brennan and Lauren Wright, the couple in Baltimore, about this policy debate over shrinking families. They say affordability is one of their biggest concerns.
WRIGHT: Hearing what some of our friends pay for day care...
BRENNAN: It's insane.
WRIGHT: ...Is wild.
BRENNAN: Universal pre-K would be awesome.
MCCAMMON: They are planning now for their first child - a personal choice that's scary but joyous.
BRENNAN: I never really envisioned, like, having a baby with somebody until I met Lauren, and I was like, oh, this is the person I want to do it with.
WRIGHT: I actually have a wonderful life that would be - it would be wonderful to bring a child into.
MANN: As their family grows, Brennan and Wright say they want to hear more ideas that might make life easier and less costly for people like them who want to have children. I'm Brian Mann.
MCCAMMON: And I'm Sarah McCammon, NPR News.
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