After WWII, soldiers around the world returned home and celebrated the end of the war by, ahem, reconnecting with their wives, creating a massive birth rate spike we now know as the baby boomer generation. Is that an oversimplification of what was actually many societal and economic factors coming together to create the perfect pregnancy storm? Yes. But who doesn’t love imagining that iconic V-J Day in Times Square moment happening worldwide?
The world is soon to see another baby boom, experts say, albeit much smaller than that of 80 years ago. And in fact, it may be an annual thing.
When you have a rare day off with your partner that isn’t a weekend day, what do you do? Apparently, many couples use it for coitus. According to data collected by the Office for National Statistics, more babies are born nine months after the May bank holiday than any other time of the year (including the Christmas holiday, if you can believe it).
A total of 1,880 births were recorded on February 23, 2024, exactly 9 months after the end of May bank holiday. For comparison, the annual daily average is 1,625. So, not thousands more babies, but still a marked increase.
People Still Get It on Most Over Christmas
In fairness to the Christmas holiday, where many people get an entire week and sometimes even two off from work, a whopping seven of the top 10 birthdays of the year fall in September—nine months after Christmas. Getting it on to the tune of sleigh bells and Christmas carols still reigns supreme.
You may think that having children home from school would deter couples from trying for more babies, but the data suggests otherwise. There’s nothing sexier than a school holiday, it seems.
Cevat Aksoy, an associate professor at King’s College London, gave a simple but entirely plausible explanation for this phenomenon.
“When people have time off, spend more time together, and face less work pressure, some couples may be more likely to conceive,” he said, per The Telegraph. “The holiday pattern does point to something important: time and stress matter.”
The post A New Baby Boom Is Coming. Here’s When It Will Happen. appeared first on VICE.
