[spacebanana7]

The base case is to have no parental leave, not 100% of your current salary.

Historically that was the default when people had very positive fertility. In Israel & the US where fertility is higher there's even less generous setups than Sweden & Germany.

I suspect if you give people enough money they'll probably start having kids, but it's a very high number. Hungary is currently spending 5% of its GDP on fertility policies with little success [1]. Last year Poland's increase in its child benefit program alone cost 0.7-0.8% of GDP [2].

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/04/baby-bonuses-f... [2] https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/poland-approves-child-b...

[mcntsh]

Well most people are struggling as it is, so obviously the prospect of increasing your responsibilities and also reducing your income doesn't seem worth it...

If governments were serious about falling birth rates they would invest in their people and give them reasons to have kids rather than saying "f- you" and just importing the workforce from poor countries instead.