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Global financial crisis: Australians were sub-prime in bed too
Nov 3, 2010, 6:42 GMT
Sydney - Money worries brought on by the global financial crisis meant fewer babies in Australia, research released Wednesday showed.
Bureau of Statistics figures tracked the fertility rate dropping in 2009 to 1.90 babies per reproductive woman from 1.96 a year earlier.
'I think we could attribute all of it to the GFC (global financial crisis),' Adelaide University's Rob Norman said.
He speculated that couples were put off by worries about job security and paying off debt as the international credit crisis sideswiped the economy.
The fertility rate peaked at 3.5 in the 1950s before bottoming out at 1.7 in 2000. A booming economy and a government bounty on babies helped fill more cots from 2001 onwards.
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