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No one wants to have kids anymore

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Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#31

Post by nix23 »

midnitewarrior wrote: post #11
32gbsd wrote: post #3

As well written and funny as the article is it still finds itself in a tunnel vision scenario because if the population is rising continuously and no one wants to have kids anymore then where are all these extra kids coming from?

The developing world. Lack of birth control + poverty + lower cost of raising children has our population exploding in all the places that haven't developed yet.

You forgot the most important point, security when your old, if you have 10 children's the "burden" to provide money/time to the parents is smaller per child.

If the state is not providing "insurance" the family has to.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#32

Post by acc19401 »

fyffhfrj wrote: post #10
chiefalchemist wrote: post #5

I think it cliche to believe it's strictly a financial decision. In fact, in the West (afaik) the middle and upper class have a lower birth rates than those below them. Not to get subjective and fuzzy but children are a symbol of hope and promise. Any reasonable adult who is considering children has to ask themselve how to answer when the child asks, "Why? Why did you bring me into *this* world?" Who has a good answe…

Considering that it's the poorer people having more children it seems like the obvious answer is that most children are unplanned or the product of dim people with a figure it out later attitude.

I believe it’s hope relative to your personal circumstance that drives hopes for the next generation.

Do I think the next generation will have a better life than I had?

That’s easier to answer yes to if you started with little because the baseline is low.

For the squeezed middle in countries that have stopped developing? Probably not given the current trajectory

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#33

Post by somehnacct3757 »

Kid-having emerges. This (western biased) article is blaming the victim.

An entire generation bled dry by student loans for useless degrees, unable to buy homes that their elders view as retirement funds. A thousand and one more entertaining things to do online which don't risk creating 18-year bundles of debt. And absolutely no idea how to break the cycle for your offspring.

Pick one thing to fix and spend your life addressing it and maybe you'll have it solved in time for when the population reaches 9 billion.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#34

Post by kneebonian »

nicodjimenez wrote: post #29

The only solution is to ban condoms. Will solve so many problems. Btw this article neglects to mention a very important feedback loop: less babies equals less economic growth, which equals less babies because it’s too expensive, which in turn leads to less economic growth and so on. Collapsing birth rates are a serious problem! You won’t notice until the country becomes a depopulated wasteland and then it will be too…

Great talk about that here https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Wi_nFz1CJSI

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#35

Post by safog »

midnitewarrior wrote: post #11
32gbsd wrote: post #3

As well written and funny as the article is it still finds itself in a tunnel vision scenario because if the population is rising continuously and no one wants to have kids anymore then where are all these extra kids coming from?

The developing world. Lack of birth control + poverty + lower cost of raising children has our population exploding in all the places that haven't developed yet.

China and India both have declining fertility rates as well. It seems like fertility is incompatible with economic development.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#36

Post by thr0wawayf00 »

> But deep down I get it. Babies are a huge opportunity cost. Financially speaking, they are like winning the lottery but backwards. You can't even think of having one without cancelling your subscription to a good night's sleep. And if you take into account inflation, economic recession, and the rest of the news cycle's highlight reel, even a one-child family can seem to have one too many mouths to fish Lego pieces out of.

Every time I visit family for the holidays, I see this in real-time and it reaffirms my decision to not have children. I have an incredibly comfortable lifestyle saving for retirement, traveling and buying real estate. The moment I become responsible for another human, that all goes away.

Saving for college? Yeah right, state schools are gonna cost $100k per year by the time my kid would going off to school. Retirement? Inflation is already killing my parents' retirement so I've got to bank that I'm still probably not saving enough right now anyway.

More power to people who want that in life, but I can't tell you how many coworkers or family members I've met that had kids and just seemed like shells of themselves afterwards.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#37

Post by [deleted] »

dmm wrote: post #26
Victerius wrote: post #2

> Don't fool yourself; we're not overpopulating ourselves to global economic and environmental meltdown; Yes we are. Yes. We. Are. Let it happen. I'll start panicking if the human population is still decreasing at 100 million. But for now, we are still growing.

Even if you believe that the earth is overpopulated and think a shrinking population is good, you still need to consider the sustainability of that population change. Birth rates below replacement means that the proportion of elderly increases every year, forever. This means an every increasing proportion of resources has to be transferred from the working to non-working population. It will become harder and harder f…

[deleted]

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#38

Post by js8 »

I have decided not to have kids, at least partly because I believe Earth is already overpopulated for the living standard that humans deserve.

Occasionally, someone asks the idiotic question, what if everybody made the same decision? Well, if they truly did, I would have made a different choice.

All these projections about (white) replacement are fundamentally flawed because they assume that the reasons for the decision won't change with the demographics.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#39

Post by antiterra »

nemo44x wrote: post #23
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Population growth is both more kids being born, and people living longer. We're now in the people living longer stage. Hans Rosling did a simple demonstration of this with boxes over a decade ago. https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_global_population_gro... edit: better illustration of the point, still Hans with Boxes here: https://youtu.be/2LyzBoHo5EI?t=203

It’s also survival rates of the babies being born. People don’t realize how many babies died back in the day.

That can still be filed under ‘people living longer,’ no?

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#40

Post by wildrhythms »

dmm wrote: post #26
Victerius wrote: post #2

> Don't fool yourself; we're not overpopulating ourselves to global economic and environmental meltdown; Yes we are. Yes. We. Are. Let it happen. I'll start panicking if the human population is still decreasing at 100 million. But for now, we are still growing.

Even if you believe that the earth is overpopulated and think a shrinking population is good, you still need to consider the sustainability of that population change. Birth rates below replacement means that the proportion of elderly increases every year, forever. This means an every increasing proportion of resources has to be transferred from the working to non-working population. It will become harder and harder f…

I don't forsee climate change being addressed under today's economic system of 'build wealth and support themselves', so I'm not sure what kind of world you envision.
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