Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate • Hacker News Board

Re: Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate

#341

Post by Gatsky » Thu, Aug 25, 2022, 6:40 AM UTC

decafninja wrote: post #106

My wife and I are Korean-American, albeit with many ties to our country of origin. Something I've noticed is that many couples that do want a child have a very difficult time conceiving. People are having kids at a later age on average, but even younger couples seem to have a hard time. Various gynecological disorders seem to be very common too - fibroids, endometriosis, adenomyosis, amongst others, all of which affe…

Increasing age of women at attempted conception probably explains most of this I think.

SK has the oldest first time mums in the world: https://photius.com/rankings/2020/population/mothers_mean_ag...

Re: Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate

#342

Post by Dalewyn » Thu, Aug 25, 2022, 6:42 AM UTC

Thorrez wrote: post #323

Dalewyn wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The basis for how "healthy" sperm is is implied to be how mobile it is, and in an environment where sperm are competing to reach the egg first, being more mobile is absolutely a trait that will be evolutionarily selected for because less mobile ("less healthy") sperm will conceive less. But in an environment where that doesn't matter anymore, it's only natural that sperm "health" will consequently deterioriate. Natur…

If health has no effect on conception success, I don't see any reason to be worried about declining health. I agree that in-vitro and artificial insemination could remove an important feedback mechanism for sperm evolution, and that would be a cause for worry.

My understanding is that it is starting to (presumably anyway) have an effect on conception, because a sperm that can't move is a sperm that can't fertilize an egg, and there aren't competing superior sperm to make up for the shortfall.

Which by itself is fine, really. Sperm that fails to reach an egg means the genes that made that sperm do not "deserve" to reproduce. However, if people want to make a fuss over low birth rates, and this is one factor behind it, it's going to get attention.

Re: Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate

#343

Post by jxramos » Thu, Aug 25, 2022, 6:42 AM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #293

So my dad spent his career working on US family planning efforts abroad. (We came here from Bangladesh because of my dad's work at a US public health company.) And the results have been positive in many ways: the fertility is down from 7 when my dad was born to 2 today. At the same time, the whole shtick was kind of "there's too many Asians!" I can't help but think that these efforts condemned these countries to long…

That odd one out deal I picked up on too in my experience. It really awoke in me a perception of the whole sense of family friendly vs adult oriented. I realized I had been on an adult only train for decades never contemplating the absence of children as being anything abnormal. I just assumed for the most part they were around just not in the venues or circles I mingled with. Eventually I realized they’re mostly absent never having been born. That was a pretty stark realization I think that hit me when Kaiser released some document about “Children, California’s Most Precious Resource”. The adult oriented world I realized was a diversion into all sorts of endeavors unrelated to continuing the species. There’s a saying I heard like in the last 2 years let’s say—-a place that isn’t crying is dying. Ie no cries of children being heard that group of individuals will be no more in say 60 years.

Re: Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate

#344

Post by simonjgreen » Thu, Aug 25, 2022, 6:43 AM UTC

nunb wrote: post #298

decafninja wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure why you're being downvoted. I'm Korean born, but spent most of my life in the US. My wife is a much more recent immigrant so she is a product of the Korean education system as well as the Korean corporate world and all that entails. We have some friends that have adopted, so are aware of the potential issues. Most of them seem perfectly fine, but one had some initial problems with the child adjusting to his…

Probably because it comes through as tall claims based on anecdata? But I've lived in Europe, America, Asia, ME & Australia (also visited every SEA country) and the prevalence of male feminization & rich-people obesity (esp central adiposity) in certain regions is quite staggering. And almost every single person I know personally with difficulty conceiving (various races, various countries, various diagnoses includin…

Downvotes: I'm so glad you asked, as I often wonder the same on "you're being downvotes because" comments. Eventually a post goes grey, but prior to that I have not been able to spot an indicator of downvotes happening. And I do have the downvote button.

Re: Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate

#345

Post by ookblah » Thu, Aug 25, 2022, 6:44 AM UTC

yomkippur wrote: post #238

ckylee wrote: post #188

Korean politics is blaming feminism for this phenomenon, but it's really a mix of all the issues in the comments, as well as sexual crime injustices (bare minimal sentencing for sex crimes) and women afraid of bringing a child into such society. It's just a natural evolutionary reaction.

yeah this is a bad take that people on r/korea are pushing which consist drum roll please....mostly white men/women who keep this echo chamber narrative going...so that they think that korean women are going to flock to westerners more (?) its bizarre to me as somebody who has many Korean friends who just crack up when I translate that subreddit for them. first feminism in korea is toxic. they are female version of i…

just want to add that you do a dis-service for calling out feminism in korea without providing some context. decades of treating women basically as second class citizens or worse with no outlet "created" this environment. there's an equally large incel base in korea and we can argue to death who "started" it first, but history has shown it's usually the men heh.

this doesn't excuse or condone the toxicity, but this brand of feminism didn't just rise up out of nowhere.

agree w/ everything else u said, and part of it (part of, not all) here is women realized they can just live as a single or have their careers and not worry about the bullshit in-law drama and what have you.

Re: Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate

#346

Post by mirzap » Thu, Aug 25, 2022, 6:44 AM UTC

People are worried that over-population is problem, some idiots even decide not to have children. But real problem is the opposite - population collapse. How do you plan to retire if there's not enough young people to sustain ever growing older population. Rough times are ahead of us, something we haven't yet experienced.

Re: Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate

#347

Post by creakingstairs » Thu, Aug 25, 2022, 6:46 AM UTC

wkdneidbwf wrote: post #90

so, uh, in other words there's going to be a glut of affordable housing?

Yes but the house price in Seoul will remain the same-ish while all the other regions crash first. Korea already has a 50.4% of the population living in/ around Seoul and this is going to get worse as population drops off. This would mean the demand to live near Seoul might stay constant even with the absolute number of population in Korea dropping. Later though, the house price of Seoul will drop as well.

Re: Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate

#348

Post by jxramos » Thu, Aug 25, 2022, 6:48 AM UTC

Danieru wrote: post #191

anon291 wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah at our church the average is probably 4-5. There are dozens of families like this. Were planning 5-6 like you. Events with all the kids are lovely and many of the adults who grew up in this church know the other adults because they all used to be kids here once. Great community and a lovely life.

We're at 3 kids, planning for 4. I agree on the important of fellow kids at church. The older kids have an incredible time playing with our younger kids. Its such a joy to watch. Bonus is we live in Japan and get to enjoy the surplus of an aging/retiring society. Cars are cheap, houses are cheap. We got a mortgage for a new build house as two newly weds at 25 years old, no down payment as is common in this bank-depos…

What a great slogan. Say no when society suggests a silly idea. I love it. Fruitless endeavor, no thank you.

Sometimes I day dream about our kids perceptions of things in the future never having been exposed to the constant barrage of advertising conditioning them to buy buy buy and find satisfaction in material crap. I’m excited to see the sort of people they will become, there’s already great excitement at their growing virtues and strengths. Amazing stuff.

Re: Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate

#349

Post by bobthepanda » Thu, Aug 25, 2022, 6:49 AM UTC

bojangleslover wrote: post #340

FBISurveillance wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apologies for ranting but this topic resonates too much. Housing prices are 9x salary vs 4.5x salary in the 70s and it takes a while to save up. Personal data point: it took me winning an IPO lottery to start thinking about having kids for real. Having kids while earning minimal wage? Terrifying, especially in the US where getting yourself or your kid sick could bankrupt you in the blink of an eye - and if you want m…

Then why the 1. Inverse relationship between household income and fertility rate? 2. Enhanced child tax credit (US), child benefit (UK), Medicaid (kid gets sick?) 3. Insanely progressive taxes on income?

I think to some degree, what the parent says is true, but I think it has more to do with how much richer parents feel they need to pour into getting 'the best' for their child. Decent preschool and daycare is expensive. Private education is expensive, or test prep to get into good selective private schools. Tertiary education is extremely expensive, more so if you're trying to pad your kid's application with a bunch of expensive extracurriculars to get them into the Ivies and Stanfords and MITs and whatnot.

If anything the Korean system is even more intense; at least with American SATs or ACTs it's only three hours, you can retake them as many times as you want, multiple times a year, and getting into a mid-tier university for undergrad is still okay. South Korea has a university test that is eight hours long, only held once a year (so you wait a whole year to retake results) and the chaebols (the South Korean conglomerates that control the economy, like Samsung or LG) only really hire from top tier universities. South Korea has a university graduate unemployment rate of 25%, compared to the US at 4%.

Re: Korea shatters its own record for world’s lowest fertility rate

#350

Post by croes » Thu, Aug 25, 2022, 6:50 AM UTC

mirzap wrote: post #346

People are worried that over-population is problem, some idiots even decide not to have children. But real problem is the opposite - population collapse. How do you plan to retire if there's not enough young people to sustain ever growing older population. Rough times are ahead of us, something we haven't yet experienced.

>How do you plan to retire if there's not enough young people to sustain ever growing older population.

Higher efficiency, higher wages especially in social security jobs, and of course a universal social security system

How do you plan to solve the problems of a growing population? The consequences of things climate change will hit harder.