Here's a sobering report from the AP. I certainly noticed this trend in Italy. I was truly surprised if I saw a family with more than two kids. I could probably count on my hands the number of times I saw Italian couples with three or four children. More common was to see a married pair well into their forties with one very well-dressed tot. The excerpts from the article betray the mortal consequences of a contraception-hooked, abortion lovin' culture.
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"Long life and low birthrates have conspired to change family life, which long had been the one institution Italians could count on while history rolled past, with its parade of conquerors and short-lived governments."
"Italy's demographics — and Europe's as a whole — give new meaning to the term "Old World." Twenty-four of the world's 25 oldest countries are in Europe, noted a joint report by the European Commission and AARP, a U.S. lobby for the elderly. Japan's population, with 27 percent of it older than 60 in 2005, is a shade grayer than Italy's 26 percent."
"Italy, home to the Vatican and predominantly Catholic, legalized abortion in 1978, and Italians upheld the law in a 1981 referendum, despite fierce opposition by the Vatican to abortion. And Italians have long tended to ignore Vatican teaching forbidding contraception."
*** "While decisions to have one or no children might make for easier lifestyles when young, a generation or two later the choice means fewer children and grandchildren to help the aged."
*** "In 1950, Italy had five adult children for every elderly parent. Now five has shrunk to a a statistical 1.5 and by 2050 there won't even be one adult child for every elderly person, said Antonio Golini, a demographer at Rome's La Sapienza University."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070707/ap_on_re_eu/aging_italy
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