@orekix
Do they? That's absurd. Maybe transport is more expensive.
Tbh it's probably possible to find a decently paid position in a multinational corporation where you don't have to work.

@matrix I could work in such place but it's not in my interest.

And in the topic of multinationals, just think of what China is doing right now with Africa, it is China's China. A bunch of people working for low wages and raw materials being sent to China in exchange for meager jobs and infrastructure, it's economic development but it's hell for a lot of people.

It's like that for the farmers here, produce a lot, export cheaply but end up paying a much higher price as consumer. The end result of all this cheap food is turning the countryside life unsustainable in Europe because the small farmers over there can no longer compete so they go broke and they move to the city.

There you have Europe's low fertility rates in the last two generations explained, the rural life where people tend to have the most kids because they help with the farm are no longer having them so urbanization increases as people move into the city and since there is no affordable housing the amount of people having kids plummet, the entire replacement of Europe is an economic replacement caused by dependency on cheap food and goods from the third world countries.

@orekix
It's true that European farmers have trouble competing with farmers from the third world, however I wouldn't drag fertility rates into this as it's not just about practicality and farming has advanced so much in just the last 50 years that having more kids to help out wouldn't do that much.

@matrix Urbanization always leads to reducing fertility rates, that happens everywhere in the world. But yes I agree that technology has reduced dependency on such things in the past half century a lot, it's still more common to see people with a lot of kids in rural areas for lots of reasons and living space is usually the main one, housing is absurdly expensive in cities as of late.