This topic needs to be discussed at length.
The European birth rate is around 1.
The replacement rate is around 2.2.
The Muslim birth rate in Europe is around 5.
You’re thinking of (total) FERTILITY rate, not birth rate.
According to the
CIA World Factbook, the European Union fertility rate is 1.5; Spain and Italy are both at 1.3 (near the bottom end, but the low award goes to Lithuania with 1.22), the U.K. at 1.66 and France at 1.98. And I seriously doubt the Muslim fertility rate is 5.0 across these countries; a number that high isn’t even attained in many North African or Middle Eastern countries! Though there may be many large Muslim families, and the fact that their birth rate is higher is still worrisome.
By comparison, the U.S. fertility rate is 2.10 and Canada 1.57.
Some say that taxes in Socialist Europe are so high that people cannot afford to have a family.
We need to discuss this much further.
Well, it depends on the “Socialist European” country. Most European countries aren’t true socialist states, but welfare states. Some essentially pay families to have children with a payment being issued each month ($491 for 3 children in France in the link). Also, I’ve noticed there are sometimes discounts for “families numerosas” in Spain (on plane tickets and attraction passes, if I remember correctly).
I think the low fertility rate is best explained by a combination of factors: 1) a high average home leaving and marriage age in certain countries (a large percentage of 30+ year old males in Italy live with their parents, and it seems like most European countries have later average marriage ages than in the U.S.), 2) housing / finance issues, 3) a more negative attitude to daycare, 4) etc.