Kathleen Mogelgaard, President and CEO of the Population Institute, was featured on an episode of Bloomberg News’ Big Take Asia podcast, released on October 14th, 2025, to share her thoughts on cash incentives to address low fertility rates—and whether incentivizing childbearing is necessary or appropriate in today’s world.  

To Mogelgaard, the decision making around whether and when to have children is deeply personal and depends on different factors. And it’s not always about money alone. “A big part of it is economic but there are also a number of personal decisions about timing, about spacing, about the kinds of relationships we have in our lives, about whether or not that’s the kind of future we see for ourselves and our families,” said Mogelgaard. 

Although women have been having far fewer babies on average compared to previous generations, the world’s population is still growing overall. The United Nations says only around 60 countries are seeing their populations decline, but the population in more than 120 other countries, including the United States, is still growing and appears on track to keep growing for the next 30 years. Mogelgaard sees it this way: We are not living in a period of demographic decline, but demographic diversity.