What factors affect the population growth in a developed country?

In an MEDC (more economically developed country) there are quite a few things that affect population growth. For example, more and more women have careers which means that they have children later in life which leads to less children/ woman. Because health care is very developed, infant mortality rates are low which means that people have less children because the likelihood of them surviving is much greater. However, this factor is more important in an LEDC (less economically developed country) because children are heavily relied upon to provide and income to support the parents in old age. Also, education and contraception plays an important part in the population growth of a country because in LEDC's there is little family planning available and little or no access to contraception.

In some MEDC's (for example Italy) the Birth Rate is crtically low and the population is decreasing in size. This is mainly due towards changing attitudes towards raising children. Instead of having as many children as parents afford, they chose to raise only one child and give it the best opportunities that they can (i.e. two holidays a year as opposed to one a year if they two children).

Hope this helps a bit :)