Jim PenmanCEO, Jim's Group · CEO and Founder of Australia's largest franchise, Jim's Group

Why Baby Bonuses fail? #birthrates #birthrate

8 Apr 2026 · 1 min

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In this short monologue, Jim Penman argues that cash incentives such as baby bonuses are ineffective at reversing declining birth rates because people's underlying priorities and cultural attitudes toward marriage and children have fundamentally shifted. He cites post‑war Japan as evidence: despite having far less wealth in the 1950s, Japanese families had high fertility, whereas modern prosperity coincides with lower birth rates. Penman contends that even if governments offer money, it cannot persuade people who are less interested in marriage or children, and that propaganda or bribery cannot reverse this trend.

Chapters

No amount of money will change somebody's priorities. If you like kids, you'll want kids regardless. Back when Japanese fertility was very high, which is in the post-war period, after like the 1950s, people had a fraction of the wealth they have today and they still had multiple children. As it's become more prosperous, the birth rate has shrunk. Even though people say it is, and that's hard for government to think, they say, you ask people what, they say, oh, money. Okay, we'll give you money. But it doesn't work. And that's because there's a fundamental change in character. You can't even meet it with propaganda. You can't bribe them. You can't do anything. People are simply less interested in marriage. They're less interested in children than they used to be. They don't enjoy marriage as much as they used to. They don't enjoy children as much as they used to. That's the fundamental change.