Increasing the mean Age at Childbearing as a Potential Leverage to Contrast Demographic Decline and Population Aging

The aim of this paper is to analyse the potential effects of the increase in the mean age at childbearing in countries with very low fertility rates and a very high level of population aging. Such potential effects have been studied in terms of stable populations. Results for Greece, Italy, and Spain show that a delay in childbearing of one and two years for all women and an increasing mean age at childbearing can contrast both population decline and aging with increasing effects as mean age rises. Thus, increasing the mean age at childbearing is a leverage to be considered by policy makers in low fertility countries with highly critical demographic contexts.