（Singapore, 21.07.2026）Governments around the world have spent years trying to reverse falling birth rates by offering tax breaks, cash incentives and subsidised childcare. Yet despite billions of dollars in family support programmes, fertility rates in many developed economies continue to decline.
Harvard University economist and Nobel laureate Claudia Goldin says uncertainty over whether men will share the responsibilities of raising a family has become one of the biggest reasons many educated women are choosing not to have children.
In a recent research paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, Goldin argues that while women’s growing independence has changed family planning decisions, the greater obstacle today is the lack of confidence that husbands will become dependable fathers.
Goldin distinguishes between dependable “dads” and disappointing “duds,” describing the latter as men who are unwilling to share childcare and household responsibilities.
She said she began researching fertility not because she sees population decline as inherently alarming, but because she wants to better understand why many couples who hope to have children ultimately decide against parenthood.
Reliable fathers matter
According to Bloomberg, Goldin’s research focuses on college-educated women, who increasingly weigh the financial and career consequences of having children before starting a family.
Many highly educated women calculate the years, and money invested in their education, their expected lifetime earnings and the potential career setback that motherhood could bring. A key factor in that calculation is whether their partner is likely to actively participate in raising children.
The difficulty, however, is that couples cannot know with certainty how responsibilities will be divided until after they become parents. As a result, many women rely on broader social expectations and past experience when deciding whether to have children.
Goldin’s model suggests women are more likely to become mothers if they believe their partners will genuinely share household duties. If they expect to shoulder most of the childcare alone while also maintaining their careers, many conclude that having children is simply too costly.
She notes that this effect is particularly strong among university-educated women, while it appears to have less influence on women without higher education.
Goldin believes these changing family dynamics also help explain why some countries have experienced much sharper declines in fertility than others.
Countries such as Japan, Italy and Greece saw rapid economic development and expanding educational opportunities for women. However, traditional expectations within households changed much more slowly, leaving many women responsible for most childcare and housework despite pursuing full-time careers.
That imbalance, she argues, made parenthood less attractive for many couples and contributed to persistently low birth rates.
By contrast, countries including Sweden, Germany and the United States experienced more gradual social and economic changes, allowing gender roles within families to evolve alongside women’s participation in the workforce.
Goldin also warned that policies designed to reinforce traditional family roles could produce the opposite of their intended effect. If women expect to carry most domestic responsibilities after marriage, they may be even less willing to have children.
Debate continues as family roles evolve
Goldin’s conclusions have sparked debate among family policy experts.
Lyman Stone, director of the Pronatalism Initiative at the Institute for Family Studies, said modern fathers are already far more supportive of women’s careers than previous generations, yet marriage and fertility rates continue to fall.
He argued that models linking greater gender equality directly to higher birth rates have often failed to match real-world outcomes.
Richard Reeves, president of the American Institute for Boys and Men, also questioned whether Goldin’s definition of a dependable father is too narrow.
He said family arrangements vary widely, with some couples choosing one partner to focus more on earning income while the other takes on greater caregiving responsibilities. Measuring fatherhood purely through equal household participation may overlook those preferences.
Goldin acknowledged that couples may divide responsibilities differently but said career decisions often have long-term consequences.
If one parent reduces working hours to care for children while the other continues advancing professionally, the income and career gap between them can widen significantly over time, reducing the financial return on years of education.
Recent research nevertheless suggests fathers are becoming more involved in family life.
A study by Reeves’ institute found that between 2019 and 2024, college-educated fathers in the United States increased the time they spent on housework and childcare by an average of 4.4 hours per week, often giving up paid work to do so.
Although mothers still perform substantially more unpaid work than fathers, the gender gap narrowed by about one-quarter during the period. Reeves described the change as significant and said the coming decade could reveal whether greater paternal involvement eventually translates into higher birth rates among educated families.
The discussion comes as demographic trends continue reshaping household finances. A recent Visa report estimates that about US$93 trillion in assets will change hands as Baby Boomers pass wealth to younger generations over the coming decades. However, after accounting for retirement spending, taxes, charitable giving and other costs, only around US$36 trillion is expected to be inherited.
The report also found that nearly three-quarters of future heirs already belong to the wealthiest 10% of US households, suggesting the transfer will reinforce existing wealth rather than narrow inequality.
As younger generations continue facing higher living costs, expensive housing and growing career pressures, economists say financial support alone may not be enough to encourage parenthood. For many educated couples, confidence that family responsibilities will be shared could become an equally important factor in deciding whether to have children.
