7 Billion Humans | Empty Nests in the Aging Developed World: Russian Women Paid to Have 2nd Child | Empty Moscow Maternity, Russia

Russian Women Paid to Have 2nd Child | Empty Moscow Maternity, Russia

Yulia Smirnova waits to be released at the Moscow Planning Center and Reproduction Maternity Home. Yulia made the decision to have a second child based on the fact that she would get “mother’s capital” which would help her move with her husband and daughter out of the one room they share in her mother-in-law’s apartment. Once she had the child she loved it so much she wondered why the money was the main motivation—she was so happy to have her second child.

At the Maternity Home about 8,000 babies, or about 20 per day, are born every year. This is the most of any maternity hospital in Russia. In 2009, 117,000 babies were delivered in all of Moscow and a total of 1,800,000 were born in Russia, which is only 27,000 more than deaths that year. Russia is basically at the replacement rate, but there are not as many parents so the state has instituted a number of incentive policies including free housing for immigrants and a one-time payment of over $10,000 for a woman to have either a second, third or fourth baby.

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