Amid the social and political panic about falling birthrates, why not ask new mothers what they think?

Mothers with young children carry an expectation to ‘do it all’: to work, manage the household and raise children. Photograph: Natalia Lebedinskaia/Getty Images

It seems as though every week brings another news story on declining global birthrates. A number of political leaders have been panicking for a while, of course, instructing citizens to reproduce in tones so beguiling, who could possibly resist? JD Vance: “I want more babies”; Jacob Rees-Mogg: “We need more babies”. While in France this year, a government direct-mailing campaign urged 29-year-olds to have a baby before it’s too late.

People are busily scratching their heads and trying to work out why this is happening. The trend is described as a catastrophe for civilisation, with leaders drumming up incentives and policies in response, from medals (Russia) and a €1,000 birth bonus (Italy) to expanding access to IVF (the US, with Donald Trump crowing – and if you’re eating you may want to skip the rest of this sentence – he’ll be known as the “fertilisation president”).