Sons? Yes, as long as (many) conditions are met

Born, grow, reproduce and die.

The wheel of life turns without stopping... until someone puts on the brakes.

Where?

In the third step.

as it happened in the days of our grandmothers and even mothers.

Now women and men, before taking the step, look for certain conditions, watch over other interests and do accounts with the calculator.

Even so,

Those who procreate the most are those with a higher economic level, as is to be expected after finding out that, according to the Spanish Confederation of Housewives, Consumers and Users (Ceaccu), raising a child from birth until they are of legal age is out of the question. between

And a point: PP voters are the ones with the most children, 11 points above those of Vox.

54.7% of Spaniards between 30 and 44 years old have at least one child

This proportion drops drastically among young people between 18 and 29 years old, who barely represent 17.8%

The number of offspring is clear:

Almost half of those who have children have stopped at two.

The next figure, far from reaching the three that make up a large family, is that of the only child, with 34.9% of those surveyed.

One child, two or three, a decision directly proportional to the level of income: as is logical, people with a low economic level have less than the most favored in this field.

In fact,

women somewhat more.

But let's not go crazy either: the majority would have settled for one more and 30%, with two more.

And it is precisely the people with a low economic level who would have opted to have up to three more if they could.

70.9% of those who have children no longer consider increasing the family

Although they are a little more flexible.

The group of people between 30 and 44 years old would only consider it if the necessary work and economic conditions were met.

Apart from the money, why didn't all these people decide to continue increasing the family?

A quarter of them were prevented by family or partner conditions, and 21.7% by working conditions.

And here there is a gap, another one, of gender: while for men the main obstacles have been family conditions and health issues,

44% of those surveyed believe that motherhood is a brake on professional growth

Women have this opinion eight points higher than men.

And the youngest consider that motherhood and fatherhood are a burden for professional development.

All this leads to a bleak outlook for the country's demography, which is already represented as an

A current that began in the 2000s, when our country began to show a higher proportion of seniors than young people and, therefore, to be an aging society.

We don't even touch the viability of pensions, we get on our nerves.

Is there hope that the Spanish population will grow and the pyramid will turn around and have nothing to envy to those of Egypt?

It is not in sight, because

And so it will continue, of course, if you talk to that 18.3% of those who, having had them, acknowledge having felt that this was not the best decision!

18.3% of those who have children have ever felt that this decision was not the best

Most of these 'repentant' occasionally belong to the age group between 30 and 44 years.

Men -three points above women- are the ones who have most regretted being parents, especially the group that goes from 30 to 44 years old. Why?

For them, because it posed an economic problem;

for them, because

or hindered their professional development.

This for those who have had children.

But there is 43.8% of the general population that neither has them nor expects them.

a gossipy neighbor, a mother eager for grandchildren to spoil or a friend who has built a perfect family, the kind that lives in a semi-detached house and drives the minivan full of blond, shiny cherubs and hairstyles parted on one side.

This answer, blunt and resounding, - "I do not want to have children" - could be put in the mouth of almost two out of 10 Spaniards.

It is exactly what she thinks, and she says loud and clear, without complexes,

And it is that our way of relating has also changed: a yes, I want for life?

Not to mention, to that almost 30% who affirm that they have not had children because they do not want to, we must add another

Oh those throwaway relationships, oh that I don't tie myself to anything or anyone!

Economic

is another key factor in the decision not to have children: those hundreds of thousands of euros that we said each child costs have dissuaded 13.3% of those who do not have them, one in five people between 30 and 44 years, that is to say, that he is at a propitious age to have them.

Then it will be too late...

24.3%: is the percentage of Spaniards who would have liked to have more children, but have not decided because family or couple conditions were not met

21.7% allege working conditions, 20.7% health problems and 17.7% bring up economic conditions.

At this point there is a paradox, because

In other words, they could afford them, but other causes lead them to give them up.

And, eye to the data,

They, however, need more of a stable partner to decide to become parents.

As much as we have changed as a society, the question of what for when children?

It continues to appear in many intimate conversations, and not so intimate, sneaking into dinners with friends whose lives have followed different paths and even creating an atmosphere, shall we say, strange.

There is

not to get out of the lane: one in three people who do not have children have felt it, and it makes a greater dent in women, seven points more than in them.

Where do these comments usually come from, those looks that make someone who is not a mother or father feel guilty?

and about the remaining 30%, from the social environment.

Of course, when the pressure comes from the very core of the couple, it is the men who feel harassed by them, up to three times more than the other way around.

Happy Mother's Day!

* Population: women and men aged 18 and over.

Scope: Spain.

Information collection technique: through the Sigma Dos Panel by Trust Survey.

Questionnaire: structured.

Field date: April 8 to 12, 2022. Sample: 1,364 interviews.

The sample allows working with a margin of error of +2.3% for global data, with a confidence level of 95.5 and the worst case of dichotomous variables with two equally likely categories (p=q=0.5) .

What remains of the Spanish 'great family'?

Antonio Asencio, Director of Communication and Strategy at Sigma Dos

If Venus, Roman goddess of love and fertility, were born again from the bowels of the sea, she would see that on the shores of her beloved Mediterranean her message of fertility seems forgotten:

Much less than those in northern Europe.

The data speaks for itself: according to a recent Eurostat report, in the European Union as a whole the fertility rate fell in 2020 to 1.5 children.

But it is that Spanish women have an average of

and wait until they are 31.2 years old to become pregnant for the first time.

We are the second country in the EU with the lowest birth rate

and the highest age for new motherhood.

Only Malta surpasses us, with a slightly lower birth rate, -1.13 children per woman- while Italy is the country where the first child is expected to have the most, with 31.4 years.

Do we need a spring-new Botticelli painting to stimulate progeny?

Cultural motivations are usually invoked (wanting to enjoy life more, late emancipation, incorporation of women into the labor market).

It is true that Western countries no longer experience the direct pressure of a culture that glorified the creation of an extended family, so characteristic of the

Nothing resembles that developmentalist Spain of

that film by Fernando Palacios which, with the happy and sentimental tone of Italian neorealism imported by our cinema, narrated the vicissitudes of a family of 15 children!

in Madrid in 1962.

In case we missed the session at 'Neighborhood Cinema', let's remember an important detail: the entire family (grandfather included) depended on the father, Carlos, a multi-employee quantity surveyor superbly played by

who stood as the sole financial support of a lineage However, he managed to get ahead.

An unthinkable picture today...

Cinematic mythologies and nostalgia aside, Sigma Dos wanted to ask for Yo Dona about the causes of this apparent sluggishness in the birth rate.

Although we live in more material comfort, we have become

with our professional development and with the well-being of our children.

To the question of what stops us the most from having children, we put forward reasons related to the economy, job stability and conciliation.

Almost half of Spaniards (44%) consider that having children is a brake on professional growth.

Among women, who for obvious reasons invest

in the process, this opinion is eight points higher than that of men.

In general, and as the study concludes, those who are of an age to have children are also of an age to consolidate their professional career and this should explain why

, and that proportion falls to 17.8% among young people between the ages of 18 and 30.

two

What remains of that great Spanish family?

Little, and the reasons are multiple and complex.

Conforms to The Trust Project criteria

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• Maternity

• Mother's Day