Mexico's Shrinking FamiliesFebruary 20, 2009 at 8:29 AM EST
JALPA, Mexico — Forty years ago, Ramiro Viramontes slept on palm frond
mats on a crowded floor with his six brothers and sisters. Unable to find
jobs when they grew up, most left Mexico for the United States.
Mexican families sent millions of illegal workers to the United States in
the late 20th century as the country's population grew faster than its
ability to create jobs.
But now, Mexicans are having many fewer children due to government
birth-control campaigns and changing lifestyles. That is causing a deep
demographic shift that could turn back the immigration tide.
The average Mexican family went from having seven children in 1960 to two
in 2008. Families in Mexico are now slightly smaller than Hispanic families
in the United States.
Mr. Viramontes, 48, an electrician, is a father of just two.
“We didn't want our kids to go through what we went through. We didn't
want them to be tempted to leave,” said Mr. Viramontes, whose siblings
are scattered from California to Massachusetts.
Some 11.4 million people left Mexico between 1970 and 2006, Mexican
government demographers say. Almost all went north, in probably the largest
wave of immigrants ever from one country to the United States.
The number of people leaving each year appears to have peaked at around
600,000 in 2001, according to researchers at the government's National
Population Council, or Conapo.
Fewer have left each year since then, with about 440,000 Mexicans
emigrating in 2006. Researchers say the number should keep falling as
Mexican population growth slows.
“We have already seen the peak,” said Paula Leite, head of demographic
research for migration studies at Conapo.
Some experts say the U.S. economic downturn and tighter policing have
further stemmed the flow of illegal migrants in the last two years, and
also persuaded some Mexicans already in the United States to return home.
Many Mexicans crossed deserts on foot or swam across the Rio Grande to seek
jobs in hotels and restaurants, on farms, and in construction. The influx
profoundly changed America.
Hispanics are the largest U.S. minority group with growing influence in
politics and business. Nearly one in 10 people in the United States claim
Mexican heritage.
U.S. authorities are building a 1,072-kilometre fence along the border to
stop more coming but some researchers say that kind of measure might be
overkill.
“It's like building a dike for a flood that might not be there,” said
Dowell Myers, a professor of urban planning and demography at the
University of Southern California in Los Angeles.
Mr. Viramontes and his wife decided to have a small family to provide more
for fewer mouths. Indeed, their son went to college and then opened an
Internet cafe in town.
They were guided by a government birth control program launched in the
1970s that told families that having lots of children would keep them poor.
Millions heeded the campaign, despite opposition from the influential Roman
Catholic Church.
In Jalpa, a ranching town in central Mexico that has lost much of its
population to the United States, public health clinics distributed condoms
and birth control pills. Doctors also suggested women use intrauterine
devices, or IUDs.
“As soon as a child was born, the doctors wanted to put the device in my
wife,” said Mr. Viramontes.
Jalpa town councilman Jesus Guerrero, 65, remembers his grandparents' 50th
wedding anniversary party where nearly 100 grandchildren gathered. Mr.
Guerrero himself has only three.
“Small families live better,” Mr. Guerrero said, echoing a government
slogan that most people in Jalpa seem to have memorized.
Across the developing world, birth rates fell during the late 20th century
as economies grew, health care improved and women gained better access to
jobs and birth control.
Mexican families shrank faster than most. Annual population growth fell
from 3.35 per cent in 1960 to less than 1 per cent in 2008. Smaller numbers
are entering the work force every year
Still, no matter how small Mexican families get, some workers will still
cross the border to seek higher U.S. salaries. Mexico's minimum wage is
less than $4 a day compared to the U.S federal minimum wage of $6.55 an
hour.
“The demographic change will mean less pressure on people to leave but
they're still going to need good jobs in Mexico,” said Philip Martin, a
professor specializing in immigration, farm labour and economic development
at the University of California, Davis.
Any decline in immigration from Mexico will be slow because leaving for
America is so customary in towns like Jalpa that many teenagers hardly look
for work before shipping out.
Nearly everyone has kin in the United States, making it easier to settle
and find a job. Hundreds of thousands could still cross the border every
year for years to come, demographers say.
Anselmo Munoz, 50, who runs a vegetable stall in Jalpa's market, says he
looks after the homes of his 10 brothers and sisters who live in the United
States.
His uncle is a “coyote,” or migrant smuggler. Of his three kids, one
has settled in town, and two are still in school.
“I hope they stay,” he said.
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