Russia is hardly the only country with worries about population decline -- birthrates are falling below the replacement fertility rate in nearly every industrialized country in the world. Russia, though, has faced a significantly more dramatic demographic bust than most places. Thanks to a combination of low fertility, high mortality rates, and emigration, the Russian population declined by about 4 percent in the 20 years following the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. And, this being Russia after all, discussions of the issue tend to take on a tone of bleak existential despair.
Russia's War Against Ukraine
The Slate: Did Russia really boost its birthrate by promising new mothers presents?
In 2006, Vladimir Putin described population decline as the country's \"most urgent problem.\" In 2007, the government introduced a program to pay $11,000 to mothers who have more than one child.
