<p>BRUSSELS - The European Commission is warning that dramatic demographic changes will have serious consequences for the European social and economic model. </p>
<p>Better health, increased life expectancy and lower fertility rates will lead to dramatic demographic changes within the bloc, the European Union (EU) executive warned in its 'Green Paper on Demographic Change.</p>
<p>The new report is designed to kick start a Europe-wide debate over how to cope with the dramatic fallout from the bloc’s ageing and dwindling population. </p>
<p>In 2003 the EU fertility rate fell to 1.48 children per woman, well below the 2.1 children per woman level needed to maintain the population. </p>
<p>The paper predicts that this trend will continue for the foreseeable future. It says that the EU population will fall from 469.5 million in 2025 to 468.7 million in 2030. </p>
<p>By contrast, the U.S. population is set to increase by 25.6 percent between 2000 and 2025. </p>
<p>The Commission blames the impending crisis on changes in society which are constraining family choices - late access to employment, job instability, expensive housing and lack of child-rearing incentives through family benefits, parental leave, childcare and equal pay. </p>
<p>Modern Europe has never had economic growth without births, the Commission said in a statement Thursday. Incentives of this kind can have a positive impact on the birth rate and increase employment, especially female employment, as certain countries have shown. </p>
<p>It adds that the changes have major implications for prosperity, living standards and relations between the generations.</p>