Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Population Bust

foreignaffairs.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 182 posts

Re: The Population Bust

#131

Post by NeedMoreTea »

ryacko wrote: post #92
dumbfoundded wrote: post #89

I'd recommend "The Accidental Superpower" - Peter Zeihan. To summarize, he views the world economy as entirely enabled by the US Navy. The protection and projection of this naval forced has allowed an unparalleled level of relatively free global trade. With the population bust, he predicts the US will turn inwards. The world economy will fragment. Less rigid economies will collapse. Global investment will all but dry…

I find it unlikely that piracy and government navies imposing tolls on shipping lanes will return without a US Navy. The Petrodollar is dependent on the US Navy, but that is it. Very few militaries have modernized, until recently, if the Falklands War occurred again, the British and the Argentines would be largely using the same weapons and equipment (partly from deliveries of the F-35), the greatest pressure on tyra…

There is essentially nothing of the Falkland's era still in use by British forces. Let's see: rifles, uniforms, destroyers, frigates, aircraft carriers, aircraft, helicopters, missile systems all replaced since then, mainly 21st century. Significant lessons - both in the UK and US - were taken from the frigates hit in the Falklands. Ship design, weapon fit, and uniform materials were changed as a result.

Only thing I can think of from the 80s, is some of the minesweepers, and those were commissioned after the Falklands.

Re: The Population Bust

#132

Post by yters »

Zanni wrote: post #122
yters wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the point of automating everything if there are no more people? I think ultimately people are the source of happiness for people. Material things are just an intermediary in the happiness exchange. So, if we get rid of people to replace them with material things we will become less happy. Plus, it isn't obvious that all the important stuff can be automated.

I find my joy in people is inversely related to their quantity. If I'm hiking a sparsely populated trail, then anyone I meet is worth a conversation. If I'm on a crowded subway, I do my best to shut everyone out. At a minimum, I think joy is conserved. But I suspect it would actually increase if there were fewer people (up to a point).

As counter anecdata, my perception is people who come from large families and populous regions that are neighborly are much happier and friendlier than those who keep to themselves or ignore those around them.

Re: The Population Bust

#133

Post by ggm »

Robotbeat wrote: post #85
darkerside wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you think wealth means

Quality of life and human agency.

Current economic wealth is implicitly dependent on asymmetric relationships! It's not win win by design. Without the assymetrical relationship wealth doesn't exist.

The other one is predicated in equity but if we talk about it a bunch of suck holes go full Ayn Rand on things.

Re: The Population Bust

#134

Post by theworld572 »

Causality1 wrote: post #11
mandelbrotwurst wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you want there to be more Americans? Is there some advantage to more people living in the geographical region? Are you hoping that it will allow certain aspects of the culture to spread / persist? If the latter, would it be as good to cultivate those things at home and allow them to spread on their own merit? Or do you prefer for more people to exist under the national banner for its own sake?

All of the above. More Americans puts us in a better position to compete against China and India, and we can't expect our technological superiority to give us an edge forever. My view is of course biased, but I sincerely believe the world would be a crueler place were Chinese culture and military power to replace American cultural popularity and military power.

So I guess you want immigrants but not Chinese immigrants then? Otherwise they would bring their cruel culture to America?

Re: The Population Bust

#135

Post by topmonk »

crooked-v wrote: post #112
WalterBright wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the enslavement of women as a means of replenishment for your armies What society has ever done that?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rape_of_the_Sabine_Women

We're they raping in order to replenish their armies? The claim is rather far fetched.

Re: The Population Bust

#136

Post by topmonk »

bane wrote: post #78
reidacdc wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless I'm missing something, the Gompertz function you refer to has an implicit model that the organism's population stabilizes because of Malthusian constraints, a lack of some kind of resource. But birth rates have been declining in first-world countries for a long time in the absence of this kind of constraint, and the Foreign Affairs article specifically notes that both Malthus and Paul Ehrlich's "Population Bom…

It's often observed that as societies grow richer, their birthrate plummets. The paradox is that in order to tap into those riches people have to work more, which may be one of the explanations for why the population tends to decline in those countries. Thus the constraint may just be "time to make babies".

Children used to be a way to support oneself in retirement. The more children you had, the better chance that at least one or two would be around in adulthood to take care of you.

Affluence means you have the means to take care of yourself, so therefore don't need to spend the effort of raising kids for this reason.

Re: The Population Bust

#138

Post by lotsofpulp »

topmonk wrote: post #136
bane wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's often observed that as societies grow richer, their birthrate plummets. The paradox is that in order to tap into those riches people have to work more, which may be one of the explanations for why the population tends to decline in those countries. Thus the constraint may just be "time to make babies".

Children used to be a way to support oneself in retirement. The more children you had, the better chance that at least one or two would be around in adulthood to take care of you. Affluence means you have the means to take care of yourself, so therefore don't need to spend the effort of raising kids for this reason.

In the US, I would say affluence actually allows you to have children, if you want to provide them with life in a good school district and a single family home in a suburb close to burgeoning city. You have to borrow student loans, then work to save for a down payment, then save for childbirth and health expenses. Now you have structural costs of student loan debt repayment, mortgage debt repayment, daycare, property tax, retirement savings debt, and possible vehicle debt repayment. And now you’ve advanced in age, and you can only have 2 kids.

Re: The Population Bust

#139

Post by lotsofpulp »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #96
lotsofpulp wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Productivity increases due to automation go to the owners of capital. Many individual’s productivity is not going up, therefore they are worth less.

> Productivity increases due to automation go to the owners of capital. That is only true if there is a monopoly on automation, which there generally isn't. In which case the productivity increases go into lower prices, which result in greater demand for whatever is still scarce. That can be capital owners (e.g. land), but it can also be skilled labor or literally anything else which is in demand and people choose to…

Whatever the reasoning, data shows wealth and income gaps increasing, and the ones with capital are the on the winning side.

Re: The Population Bust

#140

Post by oska »

0xfaded wrote: post #9
Causality1 wrote: post #2

This phenomena is why I'm strongly pro-immigration. Speaking as an American, I want there to be more Americans. We're not making them ourselves so we need to import. The more we import now, the better since the current population is both younger and more numerous than it will be in a few decades when we'd actually need the imported population. Doing it now means the Americanization of the immigrants will be more comp…

I'm Australian, have lived in the US, and now live in Denmark. I'm also pro immigration, both for skilled and unskilled workers. However Non-Western (as defined by the Danish Ministry of Statistics) has been financially costly for the welfare state, and the assumption that unskilled immigrant descendents will (as a whole) outperform their parents has not been realized. There's blame on both sides. Denmark doesn't do…

> I truly believe people should be free to move wherever to realise their maximum potential.

Why? Why not improve their local environment to better help them "realise their maximum potential"? (I put your words in quotes because it's not a phrasing I like very much).

Why create a world where people have to move to have better opportunities rather than creating a world where there are better opportunities in increasingly more places?

Post reply on HN