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Thanks, that was what I was wondering.
Having kids today would scare the crap out of me. When I had mine and still today most women dont get any paid maternity leave and forget being home for 12 months. I took 6 weeks with mine. Two weeks built up sick and personal days and 4 weeks unpaid. At least I had family to help with child care and daycare was not outrageous.
My daughter has a 3.5 yo and a 6 mo. She and her husband both got 4 months paid leave for both kids. That was great, but by no means anywhere close to standard in the US. Their barrier to a 3rd is daycare. In the HCOL area they live in, they pay just shy of 5K per month for daycare. That’s a LOT of money even for 2 people with generous incomes. They’re not going to move because that’s where the good jobs are for their careers and excellent public schools for their kids. It’s definitely a barrier to expanding their family when daycare cost is more than having 2 kids in a public university.
You know what occurs to me sometimes?.....
I wonder if we will see an "Expansion of The Stupids". Sounds cold, but here's my thinking:
In the first 80,000 years stupid people simply did not live long. They died for natural reasons and died sooner than others because they could not fend for themselves and could not develop the problem solving skills needed.
Then technology extended all lives. Stupid people lived in air conditioned homes and received the same health care as the rest of the population. They still die early, usually from their own actions, but not so early that they do not reproduce. In fact, because they are stupid, those people have children early and often. Intelligent people are busy planning their lives while stupid people are doing whatever nature compels them to do.
In 2017, the birth rate was highest among families that made less than $10,000 per year. It was lowest for those making more than $200,000. See for yourself.
Some of this is explained by acknowledging that young new families will make less than older families. But the chart still points the finger....
We're getting dumber. For the first time in human history we are moving backward.
The movie "Idiocracy" appears to have more truth in it than most think.
In my own extended family, the most financially successful and educated have few or no children. The less accomplished have more.
Article in today's WaPo notes that the TFR in the USA declined from 2.1 births per woman in 2007 to 1.64 in 2020. The authors ruled out the temporary effects of the Great Recession for the decline. The WaPo author (Charles Lane) suggests that the birth of the iPhone and wide availability of Facebook gave rise to new ways for people to interact with one another, or, as he stated: "forever changed how human beings relate with one another. We are just beginning to understand this development’s effect on mental health, education, religious observance, community cohesion — everything. Why wouldn’t it also affect people’s willingness to have children?"
So, what can I deduce from Mr. Lane's words? Due to social media and smart phones, people are having vastly reduced face to face personal interactions, they don't get to know people that way any more, at least not well enough to get into relationships that can lead to marriage and children. The males are off playing video games and the females are obsessing over 'likes' and body image, none of which leads to a strong, healthy self-image that gives rise to confidence in their future. So they stay in their cocoon. More is at work, the unending dialogue over student loan debt, the cost of living, the lack of health care and child care, the evaporation of job security, etc, a perfect storm of negative inputs causing a foreboding atmosphere of doom with "almost 60% of teen girls reporting feelings of persistent sadness or hopelessness." Not a recipe for happily seeking the Ozzie and Harriet lifestyle of living happily ever after in beautiful White suburbs.
The WaPo article highlighted a study from the Aspen Economic Strategy Group, found here, and titled "The Causes and Consequences of Declining U.S. Fertility."
Excerpt from page one of the Aspen report:
"The decline in births is widespread across demographic groups and it does not merely reflect a delay to older ages. Rather, more recent cohorts of women are having fewer children over the entirety of their childbearing years. We are unable to identify any period-specific social, economic, or policy changes that can statistically explain much of the decline. We conjecture instead that the sustained decline in the US fertility rate more likely reflects shifted priorities across recent cohorts of young adults."
So, what can I deduce from Aspen's report? I'm not inclined to so easily dismiss the effects of the Great Recession; it was deep, hard, scarring and had a long slow recovery. People who lived through the Great Depression were emotionally scarred for life, and some never recovered. If the TFR decline is widespread across demographic groups it means that something ubiquitous is at work, so I lean towards agreeing with the WaPo author, that the widespread adoption of social media is replacing personal contact and the formation of healthy coupling.
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Well, you can find ancient Greek texts that say, essentially: "These kids anymore - what's the world coming to?!". So I get that. But kids today do remind me of the "Mouse Utopia" experiment, their life is so soft they don't develop any toughness at all. The boys don't display what I thought of as "typical guy behaviors" and likewise the girls don't do girly things.
Of course for me, as I have said before, the "married with children" lifestyle just never appealed. And I never had much trouble finding ladies to date who were onboard with the Child Free Manifesto. And for me personally, regardless if I had fathered 10 kids or none, the impact on TFR nationwide or even worldwide would be trivial. Although the impact on my own quality of life would have been YUUGE! And frankly awful.
Article in today's WaPo notes that the TFR in the USA declined from 2.1 births per woman in 2007 to 1.64 in 2020. The authors ruled out the temporary effects of the Great Recession for the decline. The WaPo author (Charles Lane) suggests that the birth of the iPhone and wide availability of Facebook gave rise to new ways for people to interact with one another, or, as he stated: "forever changed how human beings relate with one another. We are just beginning to understand this development’s effect on mental health, education, religious observance, community cohesion — everything. Why wouldn’t it also affect people’s willingness to have children?"
Facebook emerged in about 2007-2008 to a wider audience. The iPhone was released in 2007. I think they are too new to have affected the birthrate.
I would pin the decline in the national birthrate more on the decline in both immigration from Latin America, which peaked during the housing bubble, and declining birth rates of those immigrants both here and abroad.
Seriously 14-15, no. Just because you may be able to conceive easier at a younger age does not mean you should. What about all the "the human brain isnt mature until age 25". You really think immature people should be procreating? We are already seeing a problem with young parents abandoning their offspring for someone else to raise, if they dont kill them first.
I tend to agree with your wife.
Yep maybe we need to campaign men to take a more active role in parenting and work on mandated maternity/paternity leave, flexible hours and affordable/available childcare.
Good grief!!! I wasn't trying to imply that women of today should start making babies at age 14. I was just pointing out that fertility begins at a young age and tends to wear out by age 40 at the latest.
Furthermore, I was trying to say, apparently without much success, that as we have become ever more technological & as women have become ever more emancipated and free to run their lives as they see fit, they have been moving farther and farther away from where our primitive ancestors were in terms of when they had babies.
Thus, our bodies aren't really adapted to have healthy babies at age 45, and indeed women begin to lose interest, somehow, in having babies some time in their mid-30s. I suspect this is Nature's way of preventing lots of birth defects creeping into the population.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GraniteStater
The issue of Israel gets very complicated because you have increasing percentages of ultra Orthodox Jewish that have very high birth rates, that become a larger contingent over time- influencing more changes at the government level. Here in the US at the state level we have the case of Kiryas Joel, NY and Monroe, NY. There are big problems with the two towns battling it out over zoning as one town has exponential growth rate with 60% of the population under age 18, whereas the other has less than 25% of the population under age 18. The former now has a population density of 20,000 people per square mile in Rockland County, NY.
Yes, the Haredim of Israel (equivalent to the Chassidim/ultra-Orthodox of the U.S.) have huge birth rates. I've been told that the women don't stop having babies until the rabbi tells them to. One recent projection I read about says the Jewish population of Israel will be 40% Haredim by late this century.
However, even among secular Jews in Israel, that is people who don't even go to services, the birth rates are higher than in the West. It appears related to the Zionist pioneering spirit of the early settlers that has been conveyed down to the present, the urgent need to populate the land.
At one time, it was predicted that the Arabs would come to outnumber the Jews, but the trends are now that the Jewish majority is going to increase (probably mainly due to the haredim having 10-12 kids each) even as the Israeli Arab population becomes more affluent and thus have smaller families, as per other populations in the West & east Asia.
I seem to recall this has been discussed much earlier in this thread.
But Israel is the stand-out, for sure. Nearly every other Western or east Asian modern country is shrinking.
... Declining populations --- If they wait until they see it slap 'em in the face, then they will have probably waited too long for recovery mode to kick in; transition will be a longer process. However, change is slow, so hopefully the decline in population will be slow enough, that people will see the signs soon enough to act on it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Listener2307
You know what occurs to me sometimes?.....
I wonder if we will see an "Expansion of The Stupids". Sounds cold, but here's my thinking:
In the first 80,000 years stupid people simply did not live long. They died for natural reasons and died sooner than others because they could not fend for themselves and could not develop the problem solving skills needed.
Then technology extended all lives. Stupid people lived in air conditioned homes and received the same health care as the rest of the population. They still die early, usually from their own actions, but not so early that they do not reproduce. In fact, because they are stupid, those people have children early and often. Intelligent people are busy planning their lives while stupid people are doing whatever nature compels them to do.
In 2017, the birth rate was highest among families that made less than $10,000 per year. It was lowest for those making more than $200,000. See for yourself.
Some of this is explained by acknowledging that young new families will make less than older families. But the chart still points the finger....
We're getting dumber. For the first time in human history we are moving backward.
lol, tell me how you really feel Darwinism is a thing, 'only the strong survive in nature'.
Underdeveloped countries TFR are better than developed countries. And yes poor folks have more babies than career minded college folks. Seen it in my research. However, I came to a different conclusion than yours.
If the top dawg, stays top dawg the underlings can't move up to the top dawg position. Developed countries might struggle more (w/sluggish to none population growth) than the underdeveloped and if they can't hang tight, they may will wash out ... rich successful folks don't live forever and if they don't replace themselves, well there you go.
The population that isn't getting noticed are the hunter-gathers living in places like the Amazon. They live hidden away from the rest of the world. The rest of the world's problems are not theirs. They learned how to hide from the rest of the world 1000s of years ago and that is how they have survived.
The first, you say 80,000 years and I'm thinking more like 10,000 years, but disease is what took those folks out. (see ancient civilizations and math) Women in child birth would loose many pregnancies. A person was considered old if they reached the age of 40. Yes, there was a lot more manual labor, not because they were not smart, but because they hadn't developed the machinery, that later civilizations used their math to create. Knowledge was passed down for 1,000s of years, but not through an education system, but through each other. Today we horde knowledge and we don't care what or how the other guy is doing.
We're living longer today, because of medical science and babies have a greater survival rate at birth, today. So the need to have a dozen kids to have five survive, isn't there.
However, if something like the Black Plague (medical science has to figure it out) hits a population of 10 Billion people every 100 - 150 years and the population trends today's culture continues, idk --- I see humans as the Dinosaurs of our time. Darwinism, 'only the strong survive in nature' but, there needs to be enough of 'em to do it.
lol, tell me how you really feel Darwinism is a thing, 'only the strong survive in nature'.
Underdeveloped countries TFR are better than developed countries. And yes poor folks have more babies than career minded college folks. Seen it in my research. However, I came to a different conclusion than yours.
If the top dawg, stays top dawg the underlings can't move up to the top dawg position. Developed countries might struggle more (w/sluggish to none population growth) than the underdeveloped and if they can't hang tight, they may will wash out ... rich successful folks don't live forever and if they don't replace themselves, well there you go.
The population that isn't getting noticed are the hunter-gathers living in places like the Amazon. They live hidden away from the rest of the world. The rest of the world's problems are not theirs. They learned how to hide from the rest of the world 1000s of years ago and that is how they have survived.
The first, you say 80,000 years and I'm thinking more like 10,000 years, but disease is what took those folks out. (see ancient civilizations and math) Women in child birth would loose many pregnancies. A person was considered old if they reached the age of 40. Yes, there was a lot more manual labor, not because they were not smart, but because they hadn't developed the machinery, that later civilizations used their math to create. Knowledge was passed down for 1,000s of years, but not through an education system, but through each other. Today we horde knowledge and we don't care what or how the other guy is doing.
We're living longer today, because of medical science and babies have a greater survival rate at birth, today. So the need to have a dozen kids to have five survive, isn't there.
However, if something like the Black Plague (medical science has to figure it out) hits a population of 10 Billion people every 100 - 150 years and the population trends today's culture continues, idk --- I see humans as the Dinosaurs of our time. Darwinism, 'only the strong survive in nature' but, there needs to be enough of 'em to do it.
The people(s) you are referring to are not 'hidden away.' 1/2 of my ancestry/family is in/from south america, and I have been to the amazon. I am curious as to why you have mentioned these people in your post; it seems like a non sequitur. What is your point?
Today’s so-called uncontacted people all have a history of contact, whether from past exploitation or simply seeing a plane flying overhead.
Your latter statement that 'we horde knowledge' is greatly suspect. What are you referring to? Knowledge/data has never been more available than it is now, currently.
Well, you can find ancient Greek texts that say, essentially: "These kids anymore - what's the world coming to?!". So I get that. But kids today do remind me of the "Mouse Utopia" experiment, their life is so soft they don't develop any toughness at all. The boys don't display what I thought of as "typical guy behaviors" and likewise the girls don't do girly things.
Of course for me, as I have said before, the "married with children" lifestyle just never appealed. And I never had much trouble finding ladies to date who were onboard with the Child Free Manifesto. And for me personally, regardless if I had fathered 10 kids or none, the impact on TFR nationwide or even worldwide would be trivial. Although the impact on my own quality of life would have been YUUGE! And frankly awful.
Multiply this by 50 million and you have a reasonable explanation for our plummeting native population. Individually, everyone has good reasons for choosing not to procreate:
"The world's too crowded."
"Global warming."
"I don't like kids."
"It costs too much."
"It would adversely affect my lifestyle."
"Can't find a good [wife/husband]."
"I've got lots of problems & I don't want to bequeath my defective genes to my children."
"I don't want to ever grow up."
"I was abused as a child."
"None of my friends are having kids."
etc.
I live in a suburban community near an urbane eastern metropolis, and many if not most of the white, affluent, native born 30s-40s-50s cohort around me seem to have chosen not to raise families. Or, they will have at most 1-2 children. Most do not live with, or near, their parents and in-laws. Most see no issues or problems with this huge life decision.
I believe that nationwide, this is pretty much the norm nowadays. There's no real economic reason why people can't have a child or two. They just don't see the point, they'd rather enjoy their single or dink lifestyle, and, increasingly, there is no peer pressure or church/synagogue pressure to have children.
Search for "why aren't people having kids" and you will find dozens of reasons and rationales similar to the above. It's become normalized.
People immigrating here from Third World or lesser developed countries often remark, "Where are all the kids? Why aren't you having kids?" In their communities back home, kids were the norm.
To return to a "normal" replacement level of 2.1 babies per mother, modern countries will need to apply financial incentives.
The town of Nagi in western Japan has a high birth rate and has attracted attention not only from other municipalities and prefectures around the country, but from Korea and other countries as well. They achieved this by subsidizing daycare and offering free medical care to children, and offering parents subsidized housing and stipends for each child. It took about 20 years to achieve this remarkable turnaround, and now families there typically have 3-4 children. Increasingly, it is being viewed as a model for the rest of the country, but some are saying that any such policies are coming too late to make much difference.
I question their pessimism, because regions of the world have gone through many cycles of population implosion and explosion in eons past. Europe lost an estimated 30% of its population (some estimates run to 60%) during the Black Death of 1346-1353 A.D., for example. The Middle East lost one third of its population as well. Yet, in the ensuing decades, the population rebounded.
Nature seems to have a way of replenishing animal populations instinctively. After World War Two, for example, the U.S., Europe, and Russia all had very high birth rates for several years, in what was called the Baby Boom. Interestingly, however, Japan did not.
...................The town of Nagi in western Japan has a high birth rate and has attracted attention not only from other municipalities and prefectures around the country, but from Korea and other countries as well. They achieved this by subsidizing daycare and offering free medical care to children, and offering parents subsidized housing and stipends for each child. It took about 20 years to achieve this remarkable turnaround, and now families there typically have 3-4 children............
There has been a lot of talk about Nagi, but not quite as much information.
I wondered just how many children we are talking about since Nagi only has a population of 6,000, but I can't find that information. Lots of talk about 3 kids, though.
You really have to wonder just how many women of child bearing age there could be in Nagi. That would be - all things equal - about 3,000 women. Most articles feature families who moved away from the city in order to have children and one article points out there was a rise as young families moved to Nagi, but it has settled back down, now.
I have not seen a cost analysis, so Nick Eberhardt's remark about the cost effectiveness of subsidizing birth and raising of children still hangs in the air. Eberhardt (The Depopulation Bomb) feels it is too expensive to work out, long term.
The sorts of people usually featured in articles about Nagi are the reason the human race will not become extinct. It will take a very long time, but eventually the "no way would I have kids" crowd will die off and the "we always wanted more kids" crowd will simply outnumber the other groups. Then TFR goes back up, but at what point?..... I think it is many generations out and in will occur a much less populated world.
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Darwinism is a thing, 'only the strong survive in nature'.
