Spain’s Pet Boom: Dogs Replace Children Amid Low Birth Rates

Spain has 11 million dogs but fewer children

One figure captures the phenomenon better than any survey: 11 million dogs live in Spain. The number itself is less striking than the context. This country, which has turned pets into family members—with car seats, hotel spots, and mall access—also records one of the world’s lowest birth rates. The coincidence invites reflection and debate.

The discussion has been brewing for some time. A recent message summarized it with blunt honesty that served as a trigger: What drives someone to share 60 square meters with an animal that costs money, makes messes, and causes disturbance? Phrased this way, it’s provocative. But beneath lies a serious issue: the dog has ceased to be a household accessory and, in many cases, has become the household itself.

Dogs as substitutes for children

The most common diagnosis points to a shift in the family model. Previously, a dog was the finishing touch to a home with two children. Now, there are couples with two dogs and no kids. The prevailing explanation is both economic and emotional: a dog is infinitely cheaper and less complex to raise than a child. It doesn’t demand private schooling, doesn’t move out at thirty, and won’t insist on studying abroad.

This thesis has supporters and critics. Some view it as generational surrender: eternally infantilized people replacing the natural desire for offspring with a pet. Others see it as a rational decision in a country where raising a child has become a luxury. Both interpretations coexist in the same paragraph, without anyone daring to close the debate.

What admits little dispute is the cost. Veterinarians send four-figure bills for routine check-ups, even without surgeries involved. And when the animal ages, the bill rises. On the cost-benefit scale, some argue, the pet loses out. Others respond that the balance isn’t measured in euros.

The problem isn’t the dog, it’s the owner

Here, consensus is broad, even among those who dislike animals. The problem isn’t the dog. It’s the uncivil owner who leaves feces on the sidewalk, allows the animal to urinate on neighbors’ wheels, or keeps it barking all day in a courtyard adjacent to other homes. Many neighborhood streets smell of urine, especially when rain stirs up what no one cleaned.

Nuance matters. There are civilized owners who minimize disturbances, pick up waste, train their pets, and keep them quiet. They are few. The proportion cited in conversations is damning: nine out of ten, it is said, deserve more than just a neighborly complaint. The figure is hyperbolic, but it accurately measures accumulated anger.

Complaints don’t distinguish between city and town. In towns, people live in apartments and terraced houses, wall-to-wall, and dogs are heard just the same. Hunting kennels with four or five dogs function as improvised shelters that bark at all hours. The countryside is not the refuge some imagine.

Eleven million dogs and an uncomfortable question

The figure of eleven million dogs in Spain appears repeatedly in conversation, almost always accompanied by the same question: Can everyone fit in the same elevator? In 60-square-meter apartments, coexistence becomes tense. It’s not the same having a dog on a ten-hectare plot versus a fourth-floor apartment without a terrace.

From this stems the harshest argument: a dog has no place in an apartment. Keeping one in a house with a garden, while it remains an animal rather than a relative, is acceptable. Confining it in a city apartment is, for this school of thought, a degeneration. The word “degeneration” appears often. Along with it, the accusation that society has normalized something previously unthinkable.

On the opposite side, the defense is simple: a well-trained dog is wonderful company, replaces no one, and provides what no human can. Those who keep one in an apartment, walk it, care for it, and train it bother no one. Ultimately, the debate isn’t about animals. It’s about neighborliness.

From sofa to hotel: the expansion of the dog as customer

The phenomenon has changed the geography of leisure. Dogs enter bars, restaurants, shopping centers, hardware stores, department stores, and hotels. What was once an exception is now the norm. And those who protest are the odd ones out. The most repeated complaint: after a dog slept in a bed, a guest sleeps there unaware of what came before.

Some call for an anti-smoking law for dogs: banning entry to all establishments where smoking is prohibited, leaving no discretion to individual bar owners. The proposal has sanitary logic but little political viability. No one wants to confront an electorate that treats its pets like children.

And there lies the knot. The dog has shifted from animal to relative, from companion to customer, from pet to user with rights. The initial question—what leads someone to live with a dog—has a different answer today than twenty years ago. It is no longer a choice. It is a social norm. And those who don’t trinc it step in the mess.