Can the rich world escape its baby crisis?

A South Korean woman who is now becoming fertile will have on average just 0.7 children during her childbearing years if she follows the example of her older peers. Since 2006 the country’s government has spent around $270bn, or just over 1% of GDP a year, on baby-making incentives, such as tax breaks for parents, maternity care and even state-sponsored dating. When birth rates first began to fall, few could have imagined how much harder it would be to get women to have more children, rather than fewer. Officials would love just some of the “missing” births back.