Basement Fertility • Hacker News Board

Re: Basement Fertility

#201

Post by sokoloff » Tue, Jun 28, 2022, 9:11 AM UTC

imtringued wrote: post #180

sokoloff wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The end of human suffering also represents the end of the (IMO vastly greater) aggregated joy of being alive as a human.

What's the point of aggregated joy if only a few select elites have it? Why even give birth to humans that are most likely not wanted in this world?

Most everyone experiences joy at many points in life. Joy comes from family, friends, accomplishment/mastery, personal growth, learning, and sometimes just from having a great day. It’s not like you need a yacht to find some joy.

Re: Basement Fertility

#202

Post by hef19898 » Tue, Jun 28, 2022, 9:44 AM UTC

iSnow wrote: post #192

rossdavidh wrote: post #7

It would have been good to see an x-y plot of living with parents vs. fertility. Eyeballing the maps he showed, I don't see a great correlation. Scandinavia has mediocre fertility compared to the rest of Europe, but the lowest percentage living with their parents. Other nations like Greece do satisfy his hypothesis, but a real test would be to plot those two percentages on an x-y plot and see how well they correlate…

And you can't discount the possibility that it's not housing that's depressing fertility but the economic situation of young couples. Scandinavia is comparatively rich and has great social benefits. Italy, Greece, Spain are all countries that suffered under the last financial crisis and unemployment is high, esp. for younger adults. So, maybe we just see wealth as a the root cause at play

Over-simplifying things, the more prosperous a society is, the less children are born. Doesn't seem to be too far left field to assume more young people are living with their parents in less-prosperous societies.

Re: Basement Fertility

#203

Post by Terry_Roll » Tue, Jun 28, 2022, 9:46 AM UTC

As people become more educated, the minimum standard and availability of utilities also becomes a factor, like access to the internet. Building anywhere in unlimited numbers wont work if there is no net access. Since the 90's when looking at property, internet access has been a factor in the decision making process, especially so with Covid and the work from home routine.

Now a days, its having a property which exceeds todays low quality building standards, isnt n housing estate slave box on some brown field site that will keep health professionals busy the longer someone lives on the site in a country where the politicians are too stupid to hide their criminal association, which pretty much rules out everywhere except Antartica!

Re: Basement Fertility

#204

Post by hef19898 » Tue, Jun 28, 2022, 9:48 AM UTC

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #195

iSnow wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Berlin as a yardstick is very problematic. The western part used to be an economic backwater and for a long time after reunification, the city hardly attracted people to live there. It's only in the last 15y that Berlin has been growing like crazy. In general, capital cities in Europe are extremely expensive, no matter whether we are talking about well-regulated Berlin or less-regulated Rome.

Not exactly all capital cities. Renting (and buying) in Bucharest is very cheap for tech workers, while renting in Berlin and Rome and expensive even for tech workers. And the issue with Berlin isn't that renting is expensive, it's that you can't find anything decent at all. Properties disappear off websites within minutes due to over demand, and then, once you finally manage find something, you have to do a visit wi…

Compare Berlin to Munich. That salaries in Berlin, and Munich for that matter, didn't increase at the same rate as rents is a more serious problem. That and that historically a lot of people in Munich lived in rented apartments. And those long-term residents, especially older people, are now priced out.

Re: Basement Fertility

#205

Post by hef19898 » Tue, Jun 28, 2022, 9:51 AM UTC

phpisthebest wrote: post #123

watwut wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The property acquired before marriage is yours after divorce. The split part are properties acquired during marriage, unless you have prenup that says otherwise for some reason. That has zero to do with whether it is safe to move into in-laws house when you are entering vulnerable period of pregnancy and being primary caregiver for small kids. Because both severely limit your economic options even in best conditions.

>The property acquired before marriage is yours after divorce That is generally only true until kids are in the picture, then the famous "what is best for the child" over rules all

Examples please where property was split because of that. Child support obviously takes real estate property into account, but the actual ownership? Not sure where this happens, but than I'm no family law expert and there are so many different countries that it actually just might happen.

Re: Basement Fertility

#206

Post by gpderetta » Tue, Jun 28, 2022, 9:54 AM UTC

gamblor956 wrote: post #185

watwut wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The property acquired before marriage is yours after divorce. The split part are properties acquired during marriage, unless you have prenup that says otherwise for some reason. That has zero to do with whether it is safe to move into in-laws house when you are entering vulnerable period of pregnancy and being primary caregiver for small kids. Because both severely limit your economic options even in best conditions.

You're being downvoted by people who aren't lawyers, but you're absolutely correct. A house that was sole property before the marriage, remains sole property after the marriage, even if the other spouse is added to the deed. The other spouse only takes a "equitable interest" to the extent that marital resources, or their own separate resources, are invested in the house. This is the case in community property (like C…

That's certainly not the case in UK for example.

Re: Basement Fertility

#207

Post by imtringued » Tue, Jun 28, 2022, 10:40 AM UTC

mikkergp wrote: post #11

Is there a version of economic thought that doesn't necessitate constant population growth? Why is low fertility rate seen as a bad thing? Often engineering is argued in terms of tradeoffs or meeting certain requirements. Rather than follow economic theories that depend on growth, can we develop economic theories that adapt to the trends of the population rather than the other way around(Musks' need for cheap labor n…

It is called Freiwirtschaft.

They mayor Unterguggenberger implemented a demurrage currency during the great depression in Wörgl and it solved the unemployment and budget deficit problem without inflation.

Re: Basement Fertility

#208

Post by phpisthebest » Tue, Jun 28, 2022, 10:42 AM UTC

gumby wrote: post #159

phpisthebest wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CA has a nexus of software engineers, and dot com capital Not Civil, Mechanical, or other engineers. Also venture capital has no interest in fighting 1000's environmental lawsuits and 10,000's of pointless regulations designed to stop any construction or development that would improve CA

> CA has a nexus of software engineers, and dot com capital > Not Civil, Mechanical, or other engineers. What on earth makes you think that? All sorts of hardware is designed and developed here. It has the largest aerospace sector of any state. A lot of automotive design is done in the LA basin for the auto majors. And that’s just off the top of my head. I’m in SV and even up here though we lost most of the defense m…

Top 10 States for Aerospace are Florida, Michigan, Ohio, Utah, Virginia, Georgia, New York, and Texas.

>> A lot of automotive design is done in the LA basin for the auto majors.

Source...

>when I need parts machined there are still plenty of local machine shops etc.

There are plenty of machine shops in my town, I would not proclaim my town to be a mecca of engineering.

> I’ve brought in welders from the Central Valley when local ones were too busy.

Ok, and?

Re: Basement Fertility

#209

Post by gspr » Tue, Jun 28, 2022, 10:44 AM UTC

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #189

gspr wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If I were a woman, there is no way I would entertain the idea of having kids without my name on the title or lease of the house. There's lots of prosperous countries where renting is very common, is well-regulated, and not some great risk (Germany and Switzerland spring to mind). I, too, live in a country where owning is the norm. That turns the rental market into (mostly) shabby flats for the very lowest income br…

Sorry, but no. The well regulated rental market in Germany has had the consequence of a housing unit shortage. Try renting anything in well regulated Berlin. It's like trying to find an PS5/ RTX 3080 during the scalpocalipse. Similar in well regulated Stockholm. Renting is very popular in Germany because buying is out of reach for most due to how expensive it is, therefore those who aren't well off have no other choi…

Sorry, I definitely did not mean regulated in the sense of "rent control". I meant regulated in the sense of "guaranteeing certain rights for the tenants". I'm aware of the massive housing squeeze in big German cities, and you make a great point — I just wanted to underscore that it's not at heart a rent v buy issue.

Re: Basement Fertility

#210

Post by phpisthebest » Tue, Jun 28, 2022, 10:45 AM UTC

yucky wrote: post #154

phpisthebest wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

few things impact this 1. Force to sell due to medicare or other end of life expenses (you can not have any assets if you need full time nursing care paid for by medicare) 2. the "Reverse mortgage" people fall for. 3. Baby Boomers, a Single Asset split 5-8 ways does not go far 4. the houses owned really were not that good. My Grandparents owned their home, bought it right after WWII, the house was a small 2 bed 1 bat…

>the houses owned really were not that good. My Grandparents owned their home, bought it right after WWII, the house was a small 2 bed 1 bath they raised 4 kids in... It is still in the family but it is out-dated by modern standards. Young people complain how much more expensive homes are now, and then can't be bothered to accept a starter home.. "I just can't understand why I can't afford this 3,600 sq foot home nea…

Some of that is local zoning laws that prohibit the kind of small affordable "starter" homes from being built

Things like Minimum Lot size, out right restriction on size of home, and other "building codes" that have nothing to do with the safety or long term viability of a construction project

It is unlikely the development my grandparents home is in would get zoning approval should a developer seek to build a similar neighborhood today. The lots sizes would be too small, the homes would be too small, and various other things would be non-compliant with modern building codes which does not mean it would be unsafe.