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On Car Seats as Contraception

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Re: On Car Seats as Contraception

#81

Post by mattnewton »

aporetics wrote: post #65

I think rock climbing is the best thing ever. In the long run, the experience of rock climbing will spiritually reinvigorate the public. I want more people to rock climb. It’s the knots that are the problem. They take so long to tie, and every gym you go to makes you take tests to make sure you know how to tie them and then vocally double check that they are secure. Studies show that if people didn’t have to spend ti…

Thank you, I’m glad I’m not the only one; this seems like insanity to compare forecasted potential birth numbers with actual child fatalities. Could car seat regulations be erring on the side of over-zealousness? Sure, but the way to show that is that the safety isn’t increased, not to say “think of the potentially born!”

Re: On Car Seats as Contraception

#82

Post by chucksmash »

allknowingfrog wrote: post #61

This article argues that the birthrate is too low, and that car seats discourage couples from having more than two children. It doesn't seem to offer any justification for the idea that this is the right way to adjust the birthrate (versus, for example, addressing some of the challenges that stop couples from having children in the first place).

I don't take the article as saying this is THE way to adjust birthrate.

They're just highlighting a case where a) they believe regulation is depressing fertility rates and b) the author presents the regulation as not very effective at improving safety outcomes. So the justification for making the change is:

> It is often said that governments can do little to increase the birth rate.

> I find this implausible. We do lots of things as the government that decrease the birth rate. We could Stop It. Or do the opposite.

The article advocates that loosening car seat restrictions for older children is a way the government could improve fertility rates just by ceasing an action it is currently taking ("Stopping It").

Re: On Car Seats as Contraception

#83

Post by germinalphrase »

abracadaniel wrote: post #33

They argue against car seat requirements by pointing out that they don't work as well for older kids, but it's precisely the lack of requirements that result in booster seats not performing as well. No one makes any that standout as better, because they aren't required to. Likely, you aren't going to get better performance without using a 5 point harness, but the market for something like that would be far to small t…

Automakers could simple install three additional carseat anchors in the rear seats.

Re: On Car Seats as Contraception

#84

Post by forty »

https://www.cdc.gov/transportationsafety/child_passenger_saf...

  Car seat use reduces the risk for injury in a crash by 71–82% for children, when compared with seat belt use alone.
  Booster seat use reduces the risk for serious injury by 45% for children age 4–8, when compared with seat belt use alone.
Seems like reasonable benefits to me.

Re: On Car Seats as Contraception

#85

Post by Moto7451 »

This is an odd hobby horse. I’m neutral on a birth rate increase but this smacks of treating symptoms of economic stress.

If you’re in a situation as a society where your income as real purchase power is rising then the solution to this problem is to buy another car (which people do anyway) or outsource your transport. At one point the author mentions some people dislike minivans. If avoiding minivans and SUVs is the reason to avoid a third child, I doubt their heart was in it. Most of the top ten vehicles sold this year are large, expensive, SUVs and Trucks.

That’s not the situation we’re in as a country.

Housing is a larger expense and more broadly felt problem than car seats. There are some comparable increases in birth rate linked to decreases in home prices i the linked NBER paper.

Real Wages are flat for most.

Is that car seat really the deal breaker if the rest of expenses for a third child can’t be covered?

https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g39628015/best-selling-car...

https://www.nber.org/papers/w17485

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/08/07/for-most-us...

https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/09041...

https://money.com/child-care-costs-declining-birth-rate/

Re: On Car Seats as Contraception

#86

Post by SketchySeaBeast »

mattnewton wrote: post #81
aporetics wrote: post #65

I think rock climbing is the best thing ever. In the long run, the experience of rock climbing will spiritually reinvigorate the public. I want more people to rock climb. It’s the knots that are the problem. They take so long to tie, and every gym you go to makes you take tests to make sure you know how to tie them and then vocally double check that they are secure. Studies show that if people didn’t have to spend ti…

Thank you, I’m glad I’m not the only one; this seems like insanity to compare forecasted potential birth numbers with actual child fatalities. Could car seat regulations be erring on the side of over-zealousness? Sure, but the way to show that is that the safety isn’t increased, not to say “think of the potentially born!”

I wonder if you could run this same analysis with condoms and argue that the increased STDs are worth the increased birth rate.

Re: On Car Seats as Contraception

#87

Post by parksy »

It's fascinating how deeply automobiles affect every aspect of our lives to the point where seatbelt vs safety seat even matters. To consider a world without significant car commuting each day seems insane to most people because it's what we grew up with and take for granted, as our population grows and new suburbs expand outwards we just need more roads and more cars. What are the alternatives? A different approach to society and urban planning that minimised commute distance between essential locations within cohorts would surely result in far fewer road fatalities but it does seem like few people are willing to make the lifestyle changes needed.

Re: On Car Seats as Contraception

#88

Post by dragonwriter »

giantg2 wrote: post #42
throw003away wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Especially considering that many people are likely breaking the laws (not just car seats, but supervision, etc), with no ill effects Car accidents are the #1 cause of death of kids in Mexico. People have 0 literacy about car seats there. > I was riding without a booster seat well before age 8 and we'd occasionally ride with a friend's family in a station wagon or SUV with the add-on cargo seats. This story could ha…

"Car accidents are the #1 cause of death of kids in Mexico. People have 0 literacy about car seats there." There are other traffic differences as well. We can't tie all of it just to the car seat. Even with car seats (and other measures not in MX), it's still a leading cause in the US. "This story could have been very different if your car was hit and you were disabled because of, I don't know, something totally prev…

> There are other traffic differences as well. We can't tie all of it just to the car seat. Even with car seats (and other measures not in MX), it's still a leading cause in the US.

In the US, the absolute number (not just the rates) of child deaths as vehicle passengers have dropped almost monotically since 1989, to less than half by 2019 what they were in 1989.

> the article thinks 90% of the issues would be covered at age 4,

details vary by state, but beyond age 4, most states only require boosters (to deal with shoulder belt height) which do not have the bulk or other issues of safety seats, not actual safety seats. (In some states, this is actually earlier than age 4.) So, while abandoning rules isn't going to have much benefit on fertility, if the burden of safety seats is the source of the problem you are trying to address.

Re: On Car Seats as Contraception

#89

Post by strangattractor »

DiggyJohnson wrote: post #37
superchroma wrote: post #2

Quoted post unavailable.

There is so much vitriol in this statement. The declining birthrate is not as obviously a good thing as you make it out to be, and not everyone shares your cynicism on the state and fate of humanity. Comments like these don’t add much value, but sure do inject a lot of negativity into these discussions of family and society.

Binary thinking. The question is not whether there are downsides to a declining birthrate (there are) but whether there are even larger downsides to over population (pollution, resource depletion, destruction of other species). Musk's solution is simply find another planet to trash. You simply choose to fiddle as the Earth burns - literally.

Re: On Car Seats as Contraception

#90

Post by giantg2 »

SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #76
giantg2 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and so is the fact that we don't all ride rear facing, or that we have cars at all. The point is to draw a line somewhere that makes sense. The Overton window has been shifting an a rapidly increasing pace for child "safety" laws in the past two decades or so. If we make it an absolute about "Even one child", then we ignore promoting net benefit and can end up with detrimental effects, which is essentially the p…

I don't disagree there's some medium there, but I think we can both agree that despite the Overton window shifting we probably won't consider riding in the bed of a pickup acceptable child safety. As I understand it the rear facing childseats are only required until the age of two. If you can only fit one in the back of your truck, doesn't that mean that really you just need to stagger out your children if you want t…

"we probably won't consider riding in the bed of a pickup acceptable child safety."

On a private road (my example) at low speeds "As I understand it the rear facing childseats are only required until the age of two. If you can only fit one in the back of your truck, doesn't that mean that really you just need to stagger out your children if you want to have multiple?"

Which is covered in the article and goes over the inconvenience and how that leads to lower birth rates. For example, as those kids get older and are spaced out you have a logistical issue due to different age groups meaning different friend groups and different sports teams.

If you're responding to my comment about everyone being rear facing in the prior comment, my point is that being rear facing is safer even for adults yet we don't enforce that in car design. Thus the laws are largely not based on safety but on society's views of what is safe enough. With fewer laws, those determinations are left up to the individual. With more laws, society is making that determination and imposing it via force (criminal laws), removing the person's discretion. I think this ignores edge cases, and leads to more people feeling ostracized, powerless over their own life, and oppressed by the masses.

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