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The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

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Re: The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

#101

Post by kaibee »

kspacewalk2 wrote: post #70
drooopy wrote: post #21

Lack of affordable housing, job insecurity and the looming threat of AI and automation, unaffordable healthcare, unaffordable higher education, inflation, trade/culture/cold/proxy wars, societal unrest and thanks to social media the prospect of a global trend towards the collapse of democratic institutions and a march towards authoritarianism. Sure, let me just bring a couple of new humans into the world—people I’m l…

Your life, and the world around you, is objectively better than it would have been in the 1930s, when birth rates didn't fall. So while you may see this as a valid reason/excuse for yourself not to have kids, it doesn't explain broader fertility declines.

> So while you may see this as a valid reason/excuse for yourself not to have kids, it doesn't explain broader fertility declines.

C'mon you have the whole answer right here.

Its a prisoners dilemma. People aren't stupid. For any one individual, it makes sense to wait and defer having kids until they're more economically secure. They know that. So what happens when _everyone_ is under that same incentive structure? Well, some people eventually pull the trigger and just yolo it, if they _really_ wanted kids. They probably aren't as economically secure as they wanted to be, but make the personal sacrifices to do it anyway. But you probably also have a lot of people/couples who are depressed that they didn't reach the position they expected to and depressed people generally don't want to have kids.

Re: The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

#102

Post by sanderjd »

le-mark wrote: post #56
steveBK123 wrote: post #18

I think we very rapidly went from a world with high child mortality rates, no access to birth control and children being at least moderately useful on the farm or doing some other work quite young to a world where having children is both a choice and very very expensive. This happened depending on where you live in the course of 1-3 generations. We are still grappling with how you incentivize and promote parenthood w…

> We are still grappling with how you incentivize and promote parenthood when the future costs of each child are 6 figues. Six figures? False because poor people have been having children forever and continue too.

Two points:

1. In rich countries (like the US, where I live), some of the cost of children is subsidized for poor people.

2. Middle class parents are very unlikely to raise their children at the same cost as poor parents. If they can afford better things for their kids, they will. There is enormous social (even moral) pressure on parents to make sacrifices for their kids.

Note that I think both of these things are good things. But the upshot is that, in pure economic terms, the short term cost of kids for society and for parents is high. Long term, they are a great investment, but even this is more true for society at large than for parents directly.

But if parents were only thinking about children in pure economic terms, birth rates would be even lower than they are. There are other really good reasons to have kids. But I think a lot of young people don't see or hear about that, or don't believe parents when they say it.

There was a great article from Cartoons Hate Her[0] where she made the point that one thing you can do to increase the odds your children will want to have children is to "make parenting look fun". The way I would say this is that you want to make sure kids aren't only aware of the not-fun parts (when their parents are mad and frustrated, it's obvious), but also the times when you're really enjoying having them around.

I think this applies at the society level too. Parenting does suck, but it's also awesome. We don't need to lie about the sucky parts, but we should make sure that's not all we're showing young people.

0: https://www.cartoonshateher.com/p/how-to-have-grandchildren

Re: The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

#103

Post by alabastervlog »

steveBK123 wrote: post #94
alabastervlog wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worse: the costs are front-loaded and (all but) must come early-ish in your life. The opportunity cost—the shadow, if you will, that the cost of children casts on your future retirement savings—is enormous . It’s way larger than the nominal cost. Big ouch.

I feel like the costs are U-shaped.. 0-5 childcare, then 18-22 college right?

Kinda. I dunno, I had a job and went to a cheap college.

Re: The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

#104

Post by kaibee »

steveBK123 wrote: post #94
alabastervlog wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worse: the costs are front-loaded and (all but) must come early-ish in your life. The opportunity cost—the shadow, if you will, that the cost of children casts on your future retirement savings—is enormous . It’s way larger than the nominal cost. Big ouch.

I feel like the costs are U-shaped.. 0-5 childcare, then 18-22 college right?

6-17, the time to actually raise them.

It ain't like just because the kid 7 you can leave them at home while both parents go to work.

Re: The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

#105

Post by dinfinity »

Tade0 wrote: post #85

I don't think it's that and it's more about how conscious a decision it is nowadays. It's not the future - it's the attitude towards it. Teen pregnancies are at an all time low everywhere in the developed world and it's not just thanks to the availability of contraception, but also a generational shift in attitudes towards risk taking. Overall people are having children later and therefore fewer because they feel tha…

> We've become too cautious for our own good.

Depends on what you expect for the future. A lot of those children have a hard time thinking of what kind of job they'll be able to do. Most of them seem to land on "influencer" or something.

I know it is contentious, but there is a very real chance that a large part of humanity will cease to be able to add significant (economic) value in the somewhat near future. You may not believe that, but if it is true then adding to that number of people is not a good thing.

More humans != more better.

Re: The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

#106

Post by poisonborz »

kspacewalk2 wrote: post #70
drooopy wrote: post #21

Lack of affordable housing, job insecurity and the looming threat of AI and automation, unaffordable healthcare, unaffordable higher education, inflation, trade/culture/cold/proxy wars, societal unrest and thanks to social media the prospect of a global trend towards the collapse of democratic institutions and a march towards authoritarianism. Sure, let me just bring a couple of new humans into the world—people I’m l…

Your life, and the world around you, is objectively better than it would have been in the 1930s, when birth rates didn't fall. So while you may see this as a valid reason/excuse for yourself not to have kids, it doesn't explain broader fertility declines.

Higher living standards also raise expectations. Young people of today would view the 1930s as barbaric.

Re: The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

#107

Post by xnx »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #55
BLenkomo wrote: post #39

We are enough people on the planet. Why does this read like we have to have kids? I'm completly fine not having kids surprise \o/

It's how society will break down without a younger generation in quantity that is paying for social security, earning taxes for society, etc.

Humans are pretty clever, so we'll figure it out. Humans are also pretty lazy, so we won't figure it out until we have to.

Re: The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

#108

Post by sanderjd »

spicyusername wrote: post #71
gwd wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Birth control was available to the Baby Boomers's parents, and the result was... a baby boom. My two grandmothers had 7 and 5 children respectively in spite of the availability of birth control.

The percentage of the population taking birth control has increased significantly since that time. Cultural shifts, in this case due to the availability of birth control, take time to materialize.

You've just moved the problem to explaining why "the percentage of the population taking birth control has increased significantly since that time".

Your initial claim was that it was the availability of birth control. That is, that birth control was the cause. But this new claim is that it is the choice to use birth control. That is, choosing to use birth control is now an effect, which must have some other cause.

Re: The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

#109

Post by Tade0 »

rdm_blackhole wrote: post #95
Tade0 wrote: post #85

I don't think it's that and it's more about how conscious a decision it is nowadays. It's not the future - it's the attitude towards it. Teen pregnancies are at an all time low everywhere in the developed world and it's not just thanks to the availability of contraception, but also a generational shift in attitudes towards risk taking. Overall people are having children later and therefore fewer because they feel tha…

I disagree with you. It is good to be cautious when thinking about having kids. Having a child is not like picking up a new hobby that you can give up the next month because you got bored of it, it's taking on the responsibility for another human being for the next 20 years. This is a very important decision that will change your life and should not be taken it lightly. The fact that the previous generation were "yol…

I'm not arguing that.

But it never occur to me that e.g. being a homeowner should be a prerequisite. My parents weren't and neither most everyone else's in my generation. I was still renting when my first child was born.

Also to me people give undue importance to things like climbing the corporate ladder. Most don't get far enough for the pay to finally match the responsibility, as there's simply too few positions to take and competition is fierce.

I don't think I can name a single person in my extended social circle who either is or reports directly to a C-level who got there without already being promoted once or twice in their twenties. If it didn't happen by the time a person is around 30, there's going to be someone younger and snappier vying for the same role.

Re: The Future Is Too Expensive – A New Theory on Collapsing Birth Rates

#110

Post by sanderjd »

nisa wrote: post #41

I'm in my 40ies and in Germany and basically from my friends and surroundings I've realized the only people that have children are academics / people with established careers where both partners earn very well and have stable jobs or people on welfare where at least all necessities are covered. What's missing is people in-between, people with limited contracts, people without money in the family and people working a…

Yeah, I do wonder if a survey question getting at "how concerned am I about the risk that I won't be able to find good work in 15 years" would be pretty well correlated with fertility rate decline. Most things I see look at current economic conditions, but I think you're right that it's the perception of future earning potential, a decade or two out, that is most stressful to parents of young children.
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