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America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

theatlantic.com

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Re: America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

#151

Post by hahamrfunnyguy »

dpeck wrote: post #88
tathougies wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So my moms parents had three children and my dads five. So not huge families but large. They grew up in a city in a third world country and frankly their childhood was a lot more dangerous than your imagined paranoia. Also your ideas of children are way off. We have a seven month old and we read to her, take her to the library, go to space talks, etc. Actually we do a lot more intellectual stuff now. My wife has take…

| Parks exist in most urban areas and are perfect for kids to play in. Minus the used needles and other debris that litter many of them. It’s a sad state that that’s the best place people with drug problems can go, but it seems they don’t have anywhere else to go. It’s just not where I want to bring my kid to hangout.

Where do you live that you're seeing "used needles littering many of them"? This was something that I often heard talked about by teachers and parents, but I only ever recall seeing ONE used needle laying around when I was a kid and it wasn't at a park - it was on the campus of an Ivy League college!

The vast majority of the parks I've been to in the US have been clean and well kept up, even ones in the higher-crime areas of town.

Re: America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

#152

Post by thrwayxyz »

rayiner wrote: post #147
CptFribble wrote: post #141

The less advanced a society, the less options for adults with gainful employment. Making babies is one option pretty much always available, so when you introduce more options it makes sense that making babies would get pushed back among all the other options, right? So why are we continually surprised that non-agricultural societies have declining birthrates? I feel like we should have all gotten used to this by now.

It’s not quite so simple. Both men and women state the ideal number of children they want to have as about 2.7: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/13/upshot/american-fertility... . Our society doesn’t just introduce more alternatives to having kids, it introduces more factors that get in the way or having kids. We’ve structured our society around this extended adolescence, where young people aren’t even really done with…

That sounds like a problem for women. Men can happily have children in their 70s as the current president has shown.

Re: America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

#153

Post by toasterlovin »

dmitrygr wrote: post #132
refurb wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solved by extremely harsh penalties including execution. Not exactly aligned with Western countries of human rights.

If you find a country with fewer needles on the streets and fewer people using drugs, we are happy to listen to their policies and how they accomplished it

Singapore, being a city state ruled by a benevolent dictator, is not comparable to nation states with normal political systems.

Period.

Re: America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

#154

Post by thrwayxyz »

ggm wrote: post #37

See that column of "white college grad, no kids" -what do you think happens demographically to that column in 10/15 years time? Sure, some people move on. But, also, some people stay and have kids. Come back in 50 years and say if this was a glitch in a trend or not Demographics is sometimes a story which is only really told in hindsight.

The white category in the US has always been shrinking and childless. The only way that it isn't 5% or less or the population is that every generation another group get a added as white. Be they Irish, Swedes, Germans, Poles, Jews, Ukranians or currently Asians.

Re: America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

#155

Post by rayiner »

velp wrote: post #137
dmitrygr wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Singapore solved this problem, and we should probably follow their example > Singapore's top diplomat in the UK, Michael Teo, defended Singapore's harsh drug laws by pointing to the country's lower rates for drug use. "8.2% of the UK population are cannabis abusers; in Singapore, it is 0.005%. For ecstasy, the figures are 1.8% for the UK and 0.003% for Singapore; and for opiates—such as heroin, opium, and morphine -…

So did Portugal [0], except they didn't resort to draconian rule-of-law policies and instead took a more compassionate approach. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/dec/05/portugals-radic...

Portugal didn’t solve the drug problem. Portugal has stratospherically high rates of drug use before it’s change in policy. At one point fully 1% of the population was addicted to heroin. That has come down, but drug use rates are still much higher than in China, Japan, and Singapore.

Re: America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

#156

Post by snickerbockers »

raducu wrote: post #16

Unpopular opinion I've held since before I became a parent: childless people should pay more taxes.

That's a regressive tax that punishes people who are unable to have children due to health problems, sexual identity, living conditions, or even failure to get laid. People who do have children should be taxed more instead because they're more successful, and they're the ones who benefit from higher taxes anyways due to publicly-funded education and social programs.

Re: America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

#157

Post by souprock »

1stcity3rdcoast wrote: post #143
souprock wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, I'll try to imagine it. I'll assume you don't mean living like Trump did, in a personally owned tower with lots of servants including chefs and drivers. Note that I actually do have 12 kids. Imagining... I herd my 12 kids down from my far-too-small apartment. My wife and I go in separate elevator cars so that we can fit. We'll go enjoy a trendy restaurant because we're city people and we do that. We walk along to…

Literally nothing you described is unique to a city. Have a lovely cynical life!

Much of it is unique to an urban city: the existence of a subway, the need to use one because there is no parking, the apartment (including kitchen) being small, the cost of food, the use of elevators, the people in tents.

Much of the rest is in your statement of what to imagine: using a restaurant, not being in traffic.

Re: America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

#158

Post by rolltiide »

georgeburdell wrote: post #47
tathougies wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah seriously. We're Catholic (the crazy kind who eschew birth control and have tons of babies). We live in the SF area and are moving to Portland and plan on buying in the city. We have lots of friends in SF who have large enough families (3 - 8 kids). These are not super wealthy people. Well, I mean, they save their money and spend wisely so they have enough. They are not hotshot doctors, lawyers, or software engi…

Not sure subjugating women to be home makers is going to win a lot support for your point. The problem is that there is no support in the U.S. for working couples who choose to move away from family for economic opportunity.

people fought for choice, the trend of vilifying a choice and infantilizing woman who made a choice is ironic

Re: America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

#159

Post by rolltiide »

hanoz wrote: post #85
georgeburdell wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure subjugating women to be home makers is going to win a lot support for your point. The problem is that there is no support in the U.S. for working couples who choose to move away from family for economic opportunity.

How about subjugating them to be wage earners, just to keep the banker/rentier class in clover?

no the plan is:

> create choices

> shame women for making the choice that already existed and you didn't have a hand in creating

Re: America’s urban rebirth is missing actual births

#160

Post by souprock »

leetcrew wrote: post #146
souprock wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, I'll try to imagine it. I'll assume you don't mean living like Trump did, in a personally owned tower with lots of servants including chefs and drivers. Note that I actually do have 12 kids. Imagining... I herd my 12 kids down from my far-too-small apartment. My wife and I go in separate elevator cars so that we can fit. We'll go enjoy a trendy restaurant because we're city people and we do that. We walk along to…

how do you go on errands with your kids in the suburbs? did you buy a used schoolbus? also, your oldest children must be somewhere between 15 and 20. assuming they haven't moved out yet, are they totally incapable of helping your shepherd their youngest siblings?

I nearly did buy a short used schoolbus. I ended up with a Ford E350 with 15 seats in 5 rows.

The oldest kids can help herd the younger ones, but I have the responsibility. I still have to check. Failure causes serious trouble.

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