The replacement rate isn’t static. It depends on both how many people exist and how many people are having babies and how many babies they’re having. If the total number of babies per year stays constant, then whether it’s below or above the replacement rate depends on the size of the population. So for a hyper simplified example, if 100 babies are born per yer, that’s below replacement for a population of 110, but above replacement for a population of 90, but overall the population size will trend towards 100. Obviously real life is way more complicated, but even if the birth rate is low now, it’s far more likely we’re just moving towards a different population size, not a population of zero