Latin America’s generational shift: What’s causing record-low birth rates across the region?

By Manuela Castro, Alessandra Freitas, CNN

(CNN) — Along Vespucio Sur Avenue, one of the main strips of Santiago, Chile, a massive real estate billboard advertises a new housing complex: “Green areas, barbecue space, pet-friendly sector.” The growing focus on spaces for pets as a major real estate selling point for couples has spread across the region, and the same sign could be seen in Bogotá, Rio de Janeiro, or any other major Latin American city.

In one of the most upscale neighborhoods of Mexico City, a nail salon sells gel manicures at a similar price to what its neighboring pet grooming business offers for a “premium petunia bath.” The price points might have turned heads years ago, but now it just makes sense. Dogs have become increasingly central to family life. In the city of Buenos Aires, Argentina, there are already more dogs than children; the same is true in Quito, Ecuador.

The growing humanization of pets in households across Latin America and the Caribbean is perhaps the most tangible symptom of a new generational change. Motherhood is no longer a presumed role, and birth rates are falling at an unprecedented pace.

The data comes from the latest Demographic Observatory by ECLAC (the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean), focused on declining fertility. Latin America now averages 1.8 children per woman, below the replacement level of 2.1 needed to sustain a stable population. Compare that to the 1950s, when Latin American women had an average of 5.8 children.

Simone Cecchini, director of the Latin American and Caribbean Demographic Center at ECLAC, told CNN the change has been much faster than in Europe. “It even exceeded what the United Nations projected two decades ago.”

“According to our estimates, the total population of Latin America and the Caribbean will grow until 2053 and, from then on, will begin to decline on average,” Cecchini says. Some countries and territories are already experiencing this – Cuba and Uruguay have declining populations, as do several Caribbean islands.

Teen pregnancies

Every morning, on her way to the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, sociologist Martina Yopo Díaz looks at the Vespucio Sur housing billboard as symptomatic of how “children, and reproduction in a broader sense, are occupying an increasingly marginal place in the life projects of younger generations.”

In demography, a fertility rate below 1.3 children per woman is considered ultra-low. Chile’s rate has fallen to 1.1 children per woman, the lowest in Latin America and among the lowest in the world, according to ECLAC data. Costa Rica (1.32), Uruguay (1.39) and Argentina (1.5) are not far behind, while several Caribbean countries are also at ultra-low levels.

While Yopo Díaz describes it as a “multi-causal phenomenon,” a key change has been a decline in teenage pregnancies.

“In Chile, teenage pregnancy rates have dropped by nearly 80% over the past decade, a public health achievement linked to policies promoting reproductive autonomy and greater access to contraception,” she explains.

Similar trends have occurred across Latin America. According to ECLAC, there were 70 live births per 1,000 women aged 15 to 19 in 2014. That figure dropped to around 50 in 2024.

Even so, teen pregnancy rates in Latin America and the Caribbean remain higher than in any other region of the world except Africa.

Link to inequality

In a region marked by inequality, the decline in birth rates does not affect all groups equally. According to Cecchini, studies show that lower-income women tend to have more children than they would like, while higher-income women tend to have fewer than they want.

Motherhood can also widen the gap between the two groups because it is more likely to be a barrier to employment for women from lower-income families, who are less likely to be able to afford childcare.

Education also plays a role, with more educated women tending to have fewer children. According to Our World in Data, Mexican women had an average of 3.4 children and 6.4 years of schooling in 1990; by 2020, they had 1.9 children and more than 10 years of schooling. Similar trends can be seen in Colombia, Brazil, and elsewhere.

As Cecchini puts it, “Women’s participation in the work force, gender inequality, and fertility form a very complex knot.”

Can the trend be reversed?

Experts tend to be cautious. Globally, countries that have implemented pro-natalist policies – bonuses, generous parental leave – have achieved, at best, modest or temporary increases.

“In Europe, what we’ve seen is that these policies often bring forward the age at which women have children,” says Cecchini.

This is not insignificant, as delaying parenthood tends to affect the number of children a mother has. However, as Yopo Díaz points out, “there are people who will not want to have children, regardless of policies.”

What policymakers can do, she argues, is make things easier for those people who do want to be parents but feel they lack the money, time, or stability.

Rather than fixate on the question of how many children are being born, she suggests focusing on building a society in which “the decision to have children is not a burden for one particular group, especially for women.”

Aging populations

Falling birth rates coupled with rising life expectancies result in aging populations, which in turn strain economic growth, healthcare and benefit systems as a smaller pool of working age people are required to support, through taxes, a growing pool of retirees.

It’s a shift that is visible in everyday life.

In Chile, Yopo Díaz says, there is increasing discussion about the closure of maternity wards due to lower demand. In Argentina, headlines report school closures due to declining enrollment.

A report by Argentinos por la Educación estimates that by 2030, school enrollment could drop by 27% nationwide; in Uruguay, official figures show 15% fewer students aged 3 to 17 compared to three decades ago with projections heading downward. At the regional level, data from UNESCO and the International Institute for Educational Planning indicate that between 2015 and 2023 there were 1.2 million fewer births, and that by 2030 there will be 11.5 million fewer school-age children and teenagers than in 2020.

Where some see a problem, others see an opportunity. While some experts fear aging societies are storing up economic problems, others say there could be unexpected boons. For instance, they say, if there are fewer children, governments and families could invest more per student.

Still, most experts agree that if societies are to design effective policies then the complexity of the situation must be acknowledged.

There is no single reason for declining fertility, they say, but a mesh of overlapping layers – health and education policies, economic disparities, new gender expectations, and a cultural climate in which “having children” is no longer a mandatory box to check.

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