(Bloomberg Business) — Last week, Italy got some dire news: A mere 509,000 babies were born in 2014, which was 5,000 fewer than in 2013. It marked the fewest births in the country’s century-and-a-half history as a unified nation.
After the figures were released, Health Minister Beatrice Lorenzin said it best. “A country without births is a country that is dead,” she said Feb. 12 during a visit to a Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. plant.
See also: Five myths about the falling U.S. birth rate.
This means more trouble for an economy that’s been in a funk for as long as anyone can remember. Thanks in part to their Mediterranean diet, Italians live past 80. Without children to grow up and pay for the health care and pensions of their aging parents and grandparents, the debt-addled government is stuck with a mounting bill. And collecting enough revenue to meet these obligations (think tax increases) is especially tricky in already-flailing economies.