Does Automation Lower Birth Rates? Apparently It Does in China
Chinese workers exposed to industrial robots had 9.4% fewer children, with manufacturing workers seeing a dramatic 28% drop
New research ("Does the rise of robotic technology reduce fertility? Longitudinal evidence from China" by Haiyang Lu, Keya Zeng, and Weiliang Hu) finds that increased exposure to industrial robots in China is associated with declining fertility rates, particularly among young adults, older workers, and those in manufacturing sectors.
Why it matters: China's birth rate plummeted to just 1.07 in 2022—well below the replacement level of 2.1—despite government efforts to boost population growth through policies like ending the one-child policy in 2016. This study suggests automation may be a significant contributor to China's demographic challenges.
By the numbers:
A one standard deviation increase in robot exposure leads to a 9.4% reduction in the number of children
The effect is strongest among those aged 16-24 (13.4% reduction) and 40-50 (11.1% reduction)
Manufacturing workers experienced a dramatic 27.7% reduction in fertility
Workers with lower to middle-skill levels saw greater fertility impacts than highly educated workers
Between the lines
The researchers identified four key mechanisms that link automation to falling fertility:
Labor market deterioration: Robot exposure reduces monthly wages by 4.3% and slightly decreases employment probability while increasing weekly working hours, creating economic uncertainty that discourages childbearing
Changing marital patterns: Automation increases cohabitation rates by 0.3%, with younger adults (25-39) becoming 1.9% less likely to marry and 1.9% more likely to remain single
Rising education levels: Young people pursue more education to remain competitive in changing job markets, with robot exposure increasing the likelihood of college education by 5.8% for those aged 16-24, delaying family formation
Shifting fertility intentions: Robot exposure reduces the "ideal number of children" people want by 6.3%, with the effect strongest among those 16-24 (10% reduction in ideal children)
The details
The study combined data from:
Four waves of the China Household Finance Survey (2013-2019)
The International Federation of Robotics database
China's fifth population census from 2000
Researchers used an instrumental variable approach to ensure causality, using robot adoption rates in nine European countries to predict China's robot adoption patterns.
The context
China has experienced simultaneous trends of rapidly declining fertility and explosive growth in industrial robots:
Between 2010 and 2020, childlessness among Chinese women tripled to 5.16%
From 2010 to 2019, China's industrial robot stock surged from about 5,200 units to nearly 783,000
By 2020, China had 246 robots per 10,000 manufacturing workers, double the global average
Local government initiatives in regions like Guangdong have actively promoted the "replacement of workers with robots"
The bottom line
As China rapidly becomes the world's leading user of industrial robots, the technology appears to be reshaping the labor market and personal life decisions regarding marriage and childbearing.
This pattern may help explain similar fertility declines across other rapidly automating Asian economies like Japan (1.3 fertility rate), Singapore (1.1), and South Korea (0.81), where approximately 70% of global industrial robot installations are now concentrated.