“Lower birthrates in the south will mean weaker growth and productivity, holding the birthrate down and producing more fiscal problems.”<br />Over time, he added, “it suggests that the already divergent economic performance between Northern<br />and Southern Europe may become structural rather than cyclical.”<br />The lower birthrates have been aggravated by fiscal pressures that constrained countries from offering robust family support programs.<br />After Economic Crisis, Low Birthrates Challenge Southern Europe -<br />By LIZ ALDERMANAPRIL 16, 2017<br />ATHENS — As a longtime fertility doctor, Minas Mastrominas has helped couples in Greece give birth to thousands of bouncing babies.<br />But the financial crisis “hit Europe when birthrates in many countries had just started to rise again,”<br />said Michaela Kreyenfeld of the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock, Germany.<br />Without significant improvement, the region is trending toward some of the lowest birthrates in the world, which will accelerate stress on pension<br />and welfare systems and crimp growth as a shrinking work force competes with the rest of Europe and the world.<br />As couples grapple with a longer-than-expected stretch of low growth, high unemployment, precarious jobs<br />and financial strain, they are increasingly deciding to have just one child — or none.<br />In Tempi, a verdant region in central Greece, many primary schools<br />and kindergartens have closed since 2012 as parents had fewer children and young Greeks left the country, said Xanthi Zisaki, a municipal councilor.
