Fascinating that Lithuania’s most sparsely populated County (Utena) also has the country’s lowest fertility rate. The TFR of Utena County is just 0.95.  We normally associate low TFR with urban areas but in Lithuania it is almost the opposite as Vilnus has higher TFR (~1.09).

Israel is a religiously & ethnically based nation state. Cannot really be applied elsewhere as rest of developed world does not use this model. Modiin Illit & similar towns/cities culture could not be more different from other western cities. Seoul unlikely to become pious.

https://x.com/morebirths/status/1989394248895270912

Within Israel TFR strength does not extend to non Jewish fertility rates. All minorities to be below replacement in decade or so, because they aren’t part of the national religion or culture. Druze are on 1.66 TFR, Christians 1.61, Muslims 2.75 (without Bedouin likely sub 2.5).

Muslim TFR in Israel is in fact basically the same as that in neighboring Jordan or Syria. Druze seems to be similar to Lebanon & lower than that of their coreligionists in Syria.

Jewish TFR in Israel on the other hand is 3.06. The demographic secret sauce of Israel is being an ultra nationalist state built on religious & ethnic grounds. Don’t see Italy, South Korea, Germany, Japan, Australia, Colombia, Brazil, or pretty much any other country emulating.

This is because emulation would require a country to re-embrace the Nation State, State Religion, & Nationalism, & political elites in basically every county will not go for that.

However, creating ethnically based Nation States is clearly something many younger Europeans seem at least nominally interested in. It is possible that after the current Boomer/Xer political elites fade from the scene such a transformation will occur.

But until it does I don’t think there are many demographic lessons to be gleaned from Israel for the west.

Romania needs massive growth just to avoid substantial natural decline. Even if TFR stabilized at 1.8 would not be enough to avoid significant decline! Should be a lesson to countries that short-mid term benefits of mass emigration of people far outweighed by long term costs.

Romania will not be able to recover from the exodus from the 1990s to early 2010s. Just like Albania, Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, & many others never will either.

Over time the permanent emigrants from Eastern Europe will be replaced by immigrants from outside Europe. This is the only solution policymakers ever come to.

As Europe ages faster in the late 2020s and 2030s the gap between wage growth and pension growth will become yawning everywhere.

Situation in Italy and Spain to go from very bad to catastrophic.

Portland, Oregon has the lowest birth rate amongst major US cities at only 27 live births per 1,000 women aged 15 to 50.  Seattle is a close second at approximately 31 live births per 1,000 women aged 15 to 50.

While Age Specific Fertility Rates are not available for Washington State or Oregon for 2024, for 2023 the former had a TFR of just 1.47 and the latter 1.35.  Both states witnessed steeper falls in 2024.

https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/data/seattle-fertility-rate-drops-to-2nd-lowest-among-major-u-s-cities/

To me it is simply astounding that Mexican, Argentine, Russian, Salvadorian, Filipino, Honduran, British, Venezuelan, & Bolivian born women all have a fertility rate below 1.0 in Spain.

Massive fall in births in many countries with very large populations (above 100 million) has confounded UN projections. Philippines tried to limit births for years & after 2020 they finally plummeted off a cliff. Ditto Egypt & Mexico. All 20% or more below UN projected births.

https://x.com/annatar_i/status/1986369976119488597

All significant Chinese populations in Asia have a fertility rate at or below 1.10. China(1.3 billion plus ethnic Chinese) TFR ~1.0-1.1, Taiwan (~22 million ethnic Chinese)TFR ~0.75, Thailand (Thai Chinese population ~10 million) TFR ~0.95, Malaysia (Chinese ~6.5M) TFR ~0.70, Singapore Chinese (population ~3.5-4 million) TFR ~0.8.

While Poland’s nightmare trajectory will be a bit better than thought this year (births likely to be down 5-6% rather than 10%+ as it seemed in the first half of 2025) & it will avoid 1.0 TFR, 1.05 is not great & as this chart clearly shows it’s never been worse.

US electorate changing quickly & dramatically. By 2030 will see a tidal shift as Boomers & Silent Gen voters go from more than a third of electorate this year to well under a quarter less than 5 years from now.  Millennials & Zoomers will make up majority of 2030 electorate.

🇫🇷 👶 Births decline accelerating in last large European country with a fertility rate ⬆️ 1.5. While not falling as dramatically as most other countries they are on track to be on ~1.57 this year. Other large European countries UK (~1.4), Germany (~1.3), Spain & Italy (~1.13) much lower.

Taiwan may be the 2nd most demographically cooked country on earth. The arrival of millions of mainlanders following nationalist defeat saw a brief explosion in the fertility rate & a massive cohort from the mid 1950s to mid 1960s then TFR dropped like a rock. Births were ~400,000 a year from 1955 to 1966, brief rally when those baby boomers had kids from 1978-1982, the 1990s saw ~330,000 births a year. Less than 261,000 births since 2001. Gen Alpha micro with just an average of under 200,000 births a year.

🇧🇾 👶 Belarus has entered the early Moldovan stage of their demographic death spiral. Emigration growing at an alarming rate, TFR ultra low at ~1.10, & natural decline sky high. Will be lucky if they are above 8 million by 2050. Births likely to not hit 100,000 again this century.

Retirements are set to continue soaring in the United States(& indeed everywhere in the developed world). By 2030 there is projected to be around 4.75M retirements as only ~3.25M enter the labor force. If immigration policy remains restrictive there’ll also be fast wage growth.

These are the retirements of US born baby boomers as well as boomers who immigrated to the US. The immigration boom since 1965 brought in ~10 million baby boomers from the 1970s-1990s. They are also retiring between now to the 2030s.

According to UN, births across Europe were ~12.2 million in 1950. Births may fall to half that or~6.1 million in 2025.  Last year UN put European births at 6,345,922. Unclear what % of 2024 births to citizens vs immigrants but almost certainly a far higher share than in 1950.

The labor shortfalls that Europe & developed East Asia will be facing entering the 2030s and throughout the 2040s will be unprecedented in global history. AI promises a lot but so far looks like it’s better at replacing mid-high end jobs than low skilled ones. That’s not great.

I’ve seen the agricultural robots & if those as well as construction, hospitality, and logistics robots take huge leaps forward in capability by 2030 so of course much low skilled immigrant jobs should be AI replaceable. Thus immigration demand would soften considerably.

The countries with the largest projected shortfalls are Taiwan, Germany, South Korea, Italy, Japan, Spain, & China.

🇪🇸 👶 Spanish births appear to be leveling off in terribly low territory. The country is likely to have around 320-322,000 births in 2025 with around 75% of those to mothers of Spanish nationality. TFR of Spaniard national mothers ~1.0-1.05.