Germany offers baby bonuses to revive sagging birthrate

BERLIN — When her water broke early on New Year's Eve, Julia Gotschlich was mainly thinking about the imminent birth of her second child. But she couldn't help worrying about family finances, too.
She and her husband stood to lose out on more than $13,200 if the baby arrived before midnight, when Germany's generous new family benefits took effect — part of a government effort to raise one of the lowest birthrates in Europe.
Births in Germany dropped 4 percent in 2005 from the previous year, according to figures from the Federal Statistics Agency, to around 690,000. That's the lowest since World War II and lagging even 1946, when 922,000 babies were born even as the country lay in ruins.