In the midst of the debate about the sustainability of pensions in Spain, it was announced yesterday that 2021 marked another historic low in the number of births. A total of 336,811 were recorded last year, according to the INE’s Natural Population Movement report, the lowest number on record since data became available in 1941. This is undoubtedly the worst possible scenario for pension profitability.
This number of births represents a decrease of 1.3% compared to the numbers registered in 2020 (about 4,500 fewer children) and continues the downward trend recorded by the INE over the last decade, which was only interrupted in 2014.
The report notes that in the last ten years, since 2011, the number of births has fallen by 28.6%, without a doubt the worst news imaginable to continue with the generational renewal that will mean the so-called baby boomer population, gradually go into retirement.
Of the autonomous communities, only five recorded increases in births over the past year: Aragón, where they increased by 3.9%; in Navarre, where they increased by 1.5%; in the Balearic Islands and Murcia with a plus of 0.6% and in Asturias with a plus of 0.2%.
Squaring the circle comes from deaths, which fell by 8.7% in 2021 compared to those in 2020, the most tragic year of the Covid-19 pandemic. A total of 450,687 people died, around 43,000 fewer than in 2020.
Last year there were more deaths than births in Spain, which corresponds to a negative vegetative balance of 113,023. As the report notes, this difference between births and deaths is the second most negative on record, in 1941, ie 80 years ago. In 2020, it will only be surpassed by 151,812 people.
The average number of children per woman remains at 1.19, the same as in 2020. This is the lowest value since 1996, but this number rises to 1.48 children per woman if one analyzes the statistics of Murcia, while those of the Canary Islands and Asturias this average does not exceed one.
Another piece of information that the snapshot of current trends in couples in Spain shows is that it is taking longer and longer to become parents, a decision that will only be made once stable employment and economic independence are achieved that allow them access enable to an apartment. Living conditions that are increasingly achieved with increasing age. One in ten births was to a mother over 40, up five points from a decade ago.
The average age of maternity in Spain reached a new high in 2021 at 32.6 years compared to 28.5 years in 1985. However, in the first four months of 2022, births to mothers aged 45 and over in Spain increased by 32.7%: 1,253, compared to 944 in the same period in 2021. Life expectancy also increased by 0.73 years to 83, 1, with an average of 85.8 years for women (0.77 more) and 80.2 years for men (0.65).