Will the Greeks die out?
Greece has announced drastic measures, including tax breaks and other financial incentives, to address a population decline that is on course to make it the oldest nation in Europe.
The prime minister said the €1.6bn (£1.4bn) relief package had been dictated by one of the biggest challenges facing the Mediterranean nation : a demographic crisis of unprecedented scale.
“We know that the cost of living is one thing if you don’t have a child and another if you have two or three children,” Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Sunday after announcing the policies. “So, as a state we should find a way to reward our citizens who make the choice [of having children].”
The Guardian
Since the Myceneans about 1450 BC wrote their Greek language in Linear B letters, Greek culture has dominated the Mediterranean East. 3500 years later, the Greek population is rapidly shrinking and, for the first time in its long history, in danger of slowly disappearing.
Why are the modern Greeks showing Europe’s lowest birth rate? Economic reasons, as Prime Minister Mitsotakis’ government suspects? Or has it become fashionable to pursue a childless, hedonistic lifestyle? Are the Greeks only spearheading other Europeans’ future? Who knows.
By offering his Greeks a welfare package intended to relieve suspected economic pressures resulting in empty cradles, Mitsotakis hopes to reverse the trend. While pro-natalistic benefits do not harm anybody (except discriminating against singles), their success rate is rather doubtful.
People are funny: a government’s drive to boost fertility might provoke a suspicion among the populace: the government wants us to sacrifice our childless (or single child) happiness only to obtain more future taxpayers!
As in the similar case of Russia’s desperate effort to boost its birth rate, the Greek problem is that the government has developed a natalistic policy without consulting the experts, the demographers.
The result could simply be a waste of money without a lasting impact on fertility because a short term rise of the birth rate might mean only some anticipated births but no long term fertility increase.
Legal and illegal immigration can be trusted to compensate for any Western European decline of birth rates. Greece will continue to be fully populated with the only difference that the average skin color will become somewhat darker.
Heinrich von Loesch