Birthgap

Stephen Shaw's independently produced documentary investigating the global fertility decline and the phenomenon of unintentional childlessness — combining demographic data with personal stories.

Birthgap addresses a demographic reality that mainstream media consistently underreports: the gap between the number of children people say they want and the number they actually have, driven by delayed partnership formation rather than purely voluntary choice. The documentary synthesizes fertility data with interviews of involuntarily childless people to produce a politically unusual argument: declining birth rates are partly a social problem, not just a lifestyle choice. Independently produced and distributed, it became influential in pro-natalist and demographic discourse.