In the year 1726 they arrived from the Canary Islands the first 13 families to found Montevideo, Uruguay. The Spanish Crown encouraged their arrival with the aim of establishing an effective population and thus safeguarding their interests against the Portuguese.
The story goes that these pioneers In exchange for their settlement, they received ranch lots and heads of cattle.
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Almost 300 years later, Uruguayan legislator Conrado Rodríguez recalled that episode, comparing it with the objective of his proposal, which is halfway to crystallizing: the creation of a Commission of Experts in Population Policy that allows to face the low birth rate.
The initiative is included in the Accountability and It already has sanction from the House of Representatives.
#Uruguay It will study how to reverse the low birth rate and analyze whether it promotes a new wave of migration. Given the forecast of a decline in the population, the government promotes a commission that will study public policies to reverse the trend. https://t.co/ffaAevDvfY
— CarlosSanchezBerzain (@Csanchezberzain) September 4, 2023
Its members would have the task of analyzing the challenge, especially in light of what will be the results of the last national population census, which is still open.
This commission should examine the impacts of current demographic dynamics and policies intended to avoid or reduce its components or negative impacts.
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It would also be in charge of analyzing the experiences that may have been successful at the international level to, finally, make recommendations to the authorities, which may be translated into laws.
The commission would be under the orbit of the Planning and Budget Office (OPP).
In dialogue with El País, Rodríguez stated that it will be necessary to discuss what changes occurred at a cultural and social level, if public policies aimed at caring for children are sufficient and if that affects the decision of families when it comes to having children.
Also, he continued, consider what economic factors determine this decisionor if a policy is necessary to facilitate a new “migratory wave” and if it should be the State that carries it out.
The Colorado representative recalled that the recent discussion of the law that reformed the pension system made clear the problem facing Uruguay, whose impact goes beyond the sustainability of social security.
The government accompanied that law with a study that indicated that the population will decrease towards the end of this century to 2.7 million by the year 2100.
A phenomenon explained in part by a serious drop in births, which the country has been dragging for more than 25 years. In 1996 there were 59,000, while in 2021 there were 34,600.
In economic terms, Rodríguez pointed out, this means that fewer assets will have to finance more liabilities, at the same time that a A smaller population decreases the possibilities of investment and growth.
“Uruguay must seriously draw up a long-term road map, which implies dealing with this issue through a true State policy,” said the deputy.
“It will be the first time in a long time that tools are studied to promote population growth that boosts the sustainability of the country,” he concluded.
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In an interview published by El País last Sunday, the director of the National Statistics Institute (INE), Diego Aboal, advanced the first general conclusion that the national population census that is still being developed will have.
“We will not be more than 3.5 million,” he assured. This implies that Uruguay Today it would have about 100,000 fewer inhabitants than the 2018 estimate indicated.
In any case, the director of the INE is not surprised by the result because he sees a “global trend” downward in the population. But he noticed that while hehe population of Latin America would begin to decrease in 2060, Uruguay already started that path in 2020.
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Given this scenario, Aboal supports Rodríguez’s proposal. “Surely, there is no more important issue for Uruguay in the coming decades than thinking about what this demographic transition implies for public policies,” he said.
Already in 2018, Parliament discussed the population and demographic challenge facing Uruguay and possible policies to address it.
In June of that year and at a special event dedicated to the subject, the sociologist Ignacio Pardo assured that there was a “strong and almost total” consensus that “purely natalist” measures, where you pay to have more children, do not have significant results.
Pardo gave Spain as an example, which granted a “baby check” of 2,500 euros for each birth and whose benefit was ended up withdrawn in 2011.
“The conclusion was reached that it hardly touched fertility trends at all,” said the expert.
At that event, demographer Wanda Cabella summarized the “three basic obsessions” of Uruguay. “We are old, we are few and we will be fewer,” she said at the time.
They propose increasing deductions per child
The nationalist deputy Rodrigo Goñi is working on a bill for the “protection of maternity and early childhood” whose direct beneficiaries would be pregnant women and mothers and fathers of young children.
One of the chapters of the initiative refers to a series of financial supports in the medium and long term.
For example, the increase to 40 Tax Benefit Bases (BPC) -equivalent today to $226,000- the amount of deductions authorized for education, food, housing and health expenses, per child, for taxpayers with minor children.
The amount could be doubled in the cases of children with severe disabilities, or those declared incapable. If materialized, these benefits should be provided for in the next five-year Budget law, which will be drawn up by the next government during its first year in office, in 2025,
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The proposal of the nationalist deputy It also includes a series of facilities for women who work or studyfor those who are pregnant or have small children who will be added to the extension of subsidies or maternity or paternity leave.
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