'Dual Income No kids,' China aims to stay child-free

According to Chinese news sources, the country's population has shrunk for three straight years, with the United Nations predicting it could fall from 1.4 billion today to 633 million by 2100.

As specified by AFP, there were just 9.54 million births reported in China in 2024—half the number as in 2016—while concerns about the shrinking and aging population have been growing as couples choose to buck traditional Chinese norms.

News sources shared some insights that most of the couples in China remain child-free, resisting pressure from their parents and society to produce offspring, even as China strives to boost its flagging birth rate.

People took the decision since a decade ago, when China scrapped its stringent one-child policy and implemented a two-child policy in January 2016, as the nation is dealing with a looming demographic crisis.

Few couples, who refer to themselves as DINKs, “Dual Income No Kids,” have either completely sworn against the decision or are putting it off for the next few years.

According to them, the bold decision has been amid concerns related to high child-rearing costs and career concerns.

They explained that to initiate a family, they would need to have a decent income and “some savings” to afford them, and without these conditions met, these couples wouldn’t even consider having kids.

The term "DINK" has also gone viral on Chinese social media, including Xiaohongshu, where its hashtag has received more than 731 million views, sparking differing views on the subject.

Changing perspectives towards life

As one of the biggest drastic changes in history, Chinese authorities have rolled out pronatalist incentives after ending its one-child policy—which had been in place for more than three decades to address poverty and overpopulation.

As per Chinese state media reports from July 2025, the country’s top leaders have pledged more childcare relief, including subsidies to parents to the tune of $500 per year for every child under the age of 3.

Beijing also slapped a value-added tax VAT on protection means and other contraceptives in January, but experts say China still faces significant hurdles in boosting its birth rate.

"The number of people choosing not to marry or not to have children is increasing, and fertility intentions among the younger generation are weak," He Yafu, an independent Chinese demographer, told AFP.

Cultural constraints have limited the long-term effectiveness of China's pronatalist measures, said Pan Wang, an associate professor at Australia's University of New South Wales.

"The one-child policy fundamentally reshaped family norms and also people's lifestyles, because many people, especially the one-child generation, were used to and often preferred smaller family sizes," said Wang. 

“No time, no money”: Rising living costs and economic uncertainty

The rising living costs in China and economic uncertainty also continue to deter childbearing.

Even some financially good couples in Beijing, expressed that they have decided to wait for the "economy to stabilize" before they have children.

“Looking at things in China right now, the main reason (why young couples are not having children) is still that the economy is somewhat weak,” said one of the couples.

Despite a relaxation in family planning laws and the government encouraging people to have more children, demographer He Yafu fears that if China's fertility rate of around 1.0 persists in the long term, the most obvious consequences will be a continued decline in population size and rapid population aging.

He also stressed that “this situation will increase the future burden of elderly care, weaken China's overall national strength, and drag on economic development.”