Editing One-child policy (section)

=== Fertility reduction ===
[[File:China Pop Pyramid Forecast.gif|thumb|The progression of China's [[population pyramid]], [[International Futures]]]]
{{Further|Demographics of China|Demographic transition}}

The [[total fertility rate]] in China continued its fall from 2.8 births per woman in 1979 (already a sharp reduction from more than five births per woman in the early 1970s) to 1.5 by the mid-1990s. Some scholars claim that this decline is similar to that observed in other places that had no one-child restrictions, such as [[Thailand]] as well as the Indian states of [[Kerala]] and [[Tamil Nadu]], a claim designed to support the argument that China's fertility might have fallen to such levels anyway without draconian fertility restrictions.<ref name="Wang Judge" /><ref name="Sen Cooperation">{{Cite web |last=Sen |first=Amartya |title=Population Policy: Authoritarianism versus Cooperation |url=http://www.abep.nepo.unicamp.br/docs/PopPobreza/AmartyaSen.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160623233814/http://www.abep.nepo.unicamp.br/docs/PopPobreza/AmartyaSen.pdf |archive-date=23 June 2016 |publisher=Universidade de Campinas |place=[[Brazil|BR]]}}</ref><ref name="Sen Reality">{{Cite web |last=Sen |first=Amartya |date=Jun 2012 |title=Population: Delusion and Reality |url=http://richardrguzman.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Sen-Population.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190418035052/http://richardrguzman.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Sen-Population.pdf |archive-date=18 April 2019 |access-date=22 July 2015 |publisher=Richard R Guzmán}}</ref><ref name="Yong Development">{{Cite journal |last=Cai |first=Yong |date=Sep 2010 |title=China's Below-Replacement Fertility: Government Policy or Socioeconomic Development? |url=http://courses.arch.vt.edu/courses/wdunaway/gia5524/china10.pdf |url-status=dead |journal=[[Population and Development Review]] |volume=36 |issue=3 |pages=419–40 |doi=10.1111/j.1728-4457.2010.00341.x |pmid=20882701 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150722161857/http://courses.arch.vt.edu/courses/wdunaway/gia5524/china10.pdf |archive-date=22 July 2015}}</ref>

According to a 2017 study in the ''[[Journal of Economic Perspectives]]'', "the one-child policy accelerated the already-occurring drop in fertility for a few years, but in the longer term, economic development played a more fundamental role in leading to and maintaining China's low fertility level".<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |last=Zhang |first=Junsen |date=1 February 2017 |title=The Evolution of China's One-Child Policy and Its Effects on Family Outcomes |journal=[[Journal of Economic Perspectives]] |volume=31 |issue=1 |pages=141–160 |doi=10.1257/jep.31.1.141 |issn=0895-3309 |doi-access=free}}</ref> However, a more recent study found that China's fertility decline to very low levels by the mid-1990s was far more impressive given its lower level of socio-economic development at that time;<ref name="GoodkindBIllion">{{Cite journal |last=Goodkind |first=Daniel |date=2018 |title=If Science Had Come First: A Billion Person Fable for the Ages |journal=[[Demography (journal)|Demography]] |publisher=[[Duke University Press]] |volume=55 |issue=2 |pages=743–768 |doi=10.1007/s13524-018-0661-z |pmid=29623609 |s2cid=4615529 |doi-access=free}}</ref> even after taking rapid economic development into account, China's fertility restrictions likely averted over 500 million births between 1970 and 2015, with the portion caused by one-child restrictions possibly totaling 400 million.<ref name="Daniel Goodkind 2017">{{Cite journal |last=Goodkind |first=Daniel |date=2017 |title=The Astonishing Population Averted by China's Birth Restrictions: Estimates, Nightmares, and Reprogrammed Ambitions |journal=[[Demography (journal)|Demography]] |volume=54 |issue=4 |pages=1375–1399 |doi=10.1007/s13524-017-0595-x |pmid=28762036 |s2cid=13656899 |doi-access=free}}</ref> Fertility restrictions also had unintended consequences such as a deficit of 40 million female babies, most of which was due to [[sex-selective abortion]],<ref name="Goodkind2015">{{Cite journal |last=Goodkind |first=Daniel |date=2015 |title=The claim that China's fertility restrictions contributed to the use of prenatal sex selection: A sceptical reappraisal. |journal=Population Studies |volume=69 |issue=3 |pages=269–273 |doi=10.1080/00324728.2015.1103565 |pmid=26585182 |s2cid=31384445}}</ref> and the accelerated aging of China's population.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Li |first1=Shiyu |last2=Lin |first2=Shuanglin |date=2016 |title=Population aging and China's social security reforms |journal=[[Journal of Policy Modeling]] |volume=38 |pages=65–95 |doi=10.1016/j.jpolmod.2015.10.001}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Nie |first=Jing-Bao |date=7 November 2016 |title=Erosion of Eldercare in China: a Socio-Ethical Inquiry in Aging, Elderly Suicide and the Government's Responsibilities in the Context of the One-Child Policy |journal=Ageing International |volume=41 |issue=4 |pages=350–365 |doi=10.1007/s12126-016-9261-7 |s2cid=151888371}}</ref>