Almost 30% of women do not have children due to difficulties in finding a stable partner
According to a study published by the UAB Centre for Demographic Studies, almost 30% of women aged 40 and older do not have children, and in most cases unwillingly, due to not finding a stable partner or having a stable income. Researchers analyse in this study whether this infertility is desired and why there is a gap between the number of desired children and children actually born.
Spain is currently the country with the second highest permanent infertility rate, second only to Japan.
The study “Trajectòries de parella i ocupació associades a la infecunditat a Espanya”, by researchers from the UAB Centre for Demographic Studies (CED) Mariona Lozano, Sergi Vidal and Alícia Adserà, which was published today in the journal Perspectives Demogràfiques, explores how infertility levels in Spain among women aged 40 and older vary depending on their partner and employment status. The analysis reveals that the lack of children is due to a variety of interconnected family and professional factors, but that having or not having a partner weighs more than whether or not they are employed.
The study was conducted by the CED's Gender and Inequality research group and is based on the latest data from the fertility survey conducted by the Spanish National Statistics Institute in 2018. The group also analysed data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the percentage of childless women born in 1935, 1955 and 1975.
The results revealed that 28% of women born between 1962 and 1978 did not have children at the time of the survey. Nevertheless, this percentage varied depending on the sentimental and professional status and educational level of the person. The probability of not having children was more than 50% among those who did not have a partner, particularly among university graduates, whose percentage rose to over 80%. In contrast, the proportion of women who married earlier and did not have children was less than 20%.
For researcher Mariona Lozano, "infertility is highest among women who did not undergo the typical trajectory of marrying young, particularly when they have been single most of their lives or if they have gone through a divorce". For the author of this study, the data shows that "the most important thing in becoming a mother is having a stable partner; it is even more determining than having a stable job".
The CED study also points to education levels as factors that widen the gap. Women with higher education levels tend to experience less stability in their sentimental relations, which contributes to a greater probability of not having children.
This could be due to the difficulty in find an adequate partner or the preference of having children when married as a form of commitment. Employment, although with less influence than sentimental status, also has an effect: those with a strong tie to the labour market, particularly those who did not marry or have remained single, are more prone to not having children.
Second highest infertility rate in the world
Researchers highlight that, until the end of the 1990s, the amount of women in Spain who did not have children was not as prevalent as in other nearby and OECD-member countries. Sooner or later, women in Spain became mothers. The study however points out that in more recent generations the proportion of childless women has increased considerably.
The percentage of childless women in Spain has more than doubled among those born in 1975 when compared to those born in 1955, and Spain is currently the country with the second highest permanent infertility rate, second only to Japan.
According to the authors of the study, "it is not possible to know whether not having children is voluntary or not, but we do know that there is a gap between the number of desired children and the number of children who actually exist". The number of desired children per woman has not changed much since the 1990s in Spain and continues to be relatively high: it is consistently maintained at around two children. In contrast, reality points to the number of real children being 1.12 per woman in Spain, almost one less than the number of children desired.
STUDY: “Trajectòries de parella i ocupació associades a la infecunditat a Espanya”, Perspectives Demogràfiques, May 2025. Mariona Lozano, Sergi Vidal and Alícia Adserà. Centre for Demographic Studies. Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB).