Heard a discussion on the radio tonight about Australia's declining birth rate and possible measures to aid recovery. Financial incentives were mentioned, and while this may provide temporary improvement it doesn't address what's causing the problem to begin with. This isn't an Australia only problem, all western countries are experiencing the same issues. Will our populations level off at some point?... That may or may not be the case. The problem appears systemic in nature, as our governments and society becomes more and more top heavy. Increasing legislative bloat adds to the issue as our systems become more and more expensive to run and maintain. The main things your average citizen wants in order of importance:

1) A comfortable place to live
2) Our preference of Food
3) A reliable means of personal transport
4) Recreational activities,
All affected by cost increases.

Marxism/communism isn't the answer, these systems just move all the power to the government (make our systems top heavy to the extreme). Fewer and fewer small businesses cause value to be increasingly syphoned further and further up the pyramid towards the larger players in the markets and away from the local communities benefiting from the goods and services.
The effects of globalisation will eventually affect the non-western countries as well, which is likely to cause a peak in world population followed by decline. Eventually policy will have to be sustainable not only from an environmental perspective, but from a human needs perspective.
We should not go down the path of increasing authoritarianism as the answer to the problem of disquiet caused by reduced quality of living standards. I feel that world governments will eventually find the balancing point between effective policy and serving the human needs of their citizens.