Stephen Shaw

No, this is about childlessness.

It's about those people, and I believe the majority of them did plan to become parents.

In fact, I'm quite certain of that.

This is about the people who probably would have wanted to become a parent, but things didn't work out.

And

That really takes us down to a much deeper understanding of why is it that many people who plan to become a parent, and I know this will resonate with many of your listeners, and to be honest with you, the people I have met who have been in this category, they often talk of grief.

So my heart goes out to any of your listeners who dreamed of a family and for whatever reason, not meeting the right partner, things not lining up, divorce, breakup,

And if you look at the data from Japan to Europe, U.S., even now Southern India is saying the same thing.

You're finding the number of people with no children who dreamed of it is the real heart of this issue.

I mean, I mean, you're exactly, you're exactly on the money.

Um, it, it, it's not only linked to it.

From data, we can take data now from about 40 different nations where we've got good data.

And all we need to know is what's the average age that a woman is having her first child.

And a little bit about, you know, how early are people starting family, how late.

But it's really that middle age thing.

And for the US right now, that's 28 years old.

For many countries, that's 30 or older for first child.

That alone predicts about 80 to 90% of birth rates.

So it's all linked to age.

And again, to me, what's quite remarkable, we're very good.