Kids on a farm were free labor. You had as many of them as you could. They improved your quality of life.
Kids in a city condo are a destructive house pet that drains your time and money for at least 18 years usually with zero financial payoff.
People aren't dumb, so they had fewer of them.
A liability, not an asset.
You only have them if you have money to burn and either intrinsically value the luxury or want to signal your social status to your peers.
this is quite cynical and disingenuous, given birth rates are highest among low income demographics.
India's fertility rate is now below replacement level. 65% of the country's population still lives in rural areas.
Could consolidation and mechanization have reduced the need for labor on farms? (I don't know how advanced farming in India is, but that's been the pattern in developed countries) Or changing laws or opinions on using child labor on farms?
0: https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/indicators...
Countries that still have “largely rural” populations are generally also urbanizing, in many cases more rapidly than those that no longer have largely rural populations.
In any case, “urbanization” is, to the extent that it is part of the explanation, sill only part of the explanation, there are a lot of other factors (social safety nets being a big one, along with evolution in social expectations of minimum levels of necessary support for children, etc.) While these things may all very loosely correlate with each other, they don’t move in lockstep.
You might be living on a farm right now, but if you had an inkling that you will eventually move out to the city, you probably don't want to take on an expensive project - like having kids.
Back in 1850s, if you were a farmer, you likely thought that you'll die a farmer. But today, if you're on a farm, you still get to see what's happening in the cities, often in real-time. And maybe you think that you'll eventually move there too, and skip having kids.
Delaying gratification and optimizing for abstract goals are signs of intelligence.
A child is almost completely helpless to travel and roam in a modern suburb until they turn 16 and get their drivers license and access to a car. A suburban home is an island of isolation that keeps a child locked under its parents control and gives very little opportunity for a child to develop a strong sense of independence in the real world.
From experience, most of that shuttling is done for extracurricular activities the parents want for their children. i.e. music lessons, non-school sport leagues, additional lessons, etc.
Self induced demand.
> And the distances are too large.
What kinds of "too large" are you referencing? I recall biking some 10 miles to get to activities in the summer. Highways, yeah, those are out. But stroads often have shoulders and/or sidewalks (which are largely unused by pedestrians). Not really a problem for biking.
Sidewalks are illegal for cycling, and even if a stroad had a shoulder, the vehicle speeds make it far too dangerous for a not-yet-fully-mentally-developed child to cycle along. And even within the suburb, vehicle speeds are often 60-70 kmph and drivers are often inattentive. Cycling on roads within suburbs in all but the most limited sense is not safe for children.
It just takes one wayward glance at your mobile phone for me to be attending the funeral of my son. Cars and bikes don't mix.
Nothing of today's suburban spaces prevents this same kind of access.