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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

#171

Post by gmoot »

bradlys wrote: post #147
UncleMeat wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah it is absolutely baffling to me that the discussion of teen pregnancy never seems to come up in these "oh no birth rates are down" discussions. Like, you told us that a substantial portion of these births were bad for society (and I generally agree) and now you are freaking out that the number of births went down?

Most people aren’t aware - especially in educated UMC circles like this one - how much the birth rate relied on teenage moms. The birthrate for educated folks has been below replacement for a long time. Teenage moms probably aren’t in their mind cause they were raised among other UMC folks and it just doesn’t happen there. The US has been below replacement overall for even longer. We’ve relied on immigration for 50+…

Where can I find information on how much of the birthrate decline is due to unwed teenage mothers?

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

#172

Post by toomuchtodo »

gmoot wrote: post #171
bradlys wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people aren’t aware - especially in educated UMC circles like this one - how much the birth rate relied on teenage moms. The birthrate for educated folks has been below replacement for a long time. Teenage moms probably aren’t in their mind cause they were raised among other UMC folks and it just doesn’t happen there. The US has been below replacement overall for even longer. We’ve relied on immigration for 50+…

Where can I find information on how much of the birthrate decline is due to unwed teenage mothers?

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/nchs_press_releases/2023/...

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2019/08/02/why-is-th...

https://www.guttmacher.org/gpr/2014/09/what-behind-declines-...

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhsr/nhsr104.pdf

Teen marriage rates (15-17) are alread exceptionally low. One would expect as laws are enacted at the state level to raise the minimum marriage age to 18, these declines should continue.

https://www.jahonline.org/article/S1054-139X(21)00341-4/full...

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2016/11/01/child-mar...

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

#173

Post by gmoot »

spacemadness wrote: post #163
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…

Could it be perhaps that they need to be established first and feel like talking less risks because the future feels uncertain like the essay suggests? “People don’t want to take risks” seems like half an answer and isn’t finding root cause. When things feel crazy, people control what they can, establish routines, and perhaps take less risks.

Just the other day my wife and I were marveling that people in our neighborhood groups are requiring pet sitters to be insured and bonded.

The future has always been uncertain. The modern world focusses on risk mitigation to an astonishing degree compared to generations even in the relatively recent past. A lot of that has produced good results. But personally I suspect that we're overly focussed on safety to a degree that inhibits human flourishing.

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

#174

Post by spicyusername »

sanderjd wrote: post #108
spicyusername wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

    when you give people the choice, they just aren't going to choose very many.

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

#175

Post by gmoot »

alabastervlog wrote: post #29
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…

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.

Children used to be your retirement plan.

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

#176

Post by gmoot »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #172
gmoot wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where can I find information on how much of the birthrate decline is due to unwed teenage mothers?

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/nchs_press_releases/2023/... https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2019/08/02/why-is-th... https://www.guttmacher.org/gpr/2014/09/what-behind-declines-... https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhsr/nhsr104.pdf Teen marriage rates (15-17) are alread exceptionally low. One would expect as laws are enacted at the state level to raise the minimum marriage age to 18, these declines should cont…

I don't dispute that the teen birth rate is much lower now. I'm trying to estimate out the counterfactual "what would the US birth rate be if teen pregnancy was (say) the same as 2 decades ago" ? Currently it's 1.66.

But the back-of-napkin math is hard for me to figure out from the given "births per 1,000" women per different age group.

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

#177

Post by spacemadness »

gmoot wrote: post #173
spacemadness wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could it be perhaps that they need to be established first and feel like talking less risks because the future feels uncertain like the essay suggests? “People don’t want to take risks” seems like half an answer and isn’t finding root cause. When things feel crazy, people control what they can, establish routines, and perhaps take less risks.

Just the other day my wife and I were marveling that people in our neighborhood groups are requiring pet sitters to be insured and bonded. The future has always been uncertain. The modern world focusses on risk mitigation to an astonishing degree compared to generations even in the relatively recent past. A lot of that has produced good results. But personally I suspect that we're overly focussed on safety to a degre…

Just saying people need to chill out there has always been risk isn't really going to cause that to happen as there's no information there really. It's still useful to look at the reasons for the perception of increased risk if that's the right thing to focus on at all.

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

#179

Post by tsimionescu »

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?

College is quite cheap in many, many parts of the world where birth rates are still quite low - specifically in most of Europe, but also in Japan, Korea, at least compared to the USA.

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

#180

Post by spacemadness »

kaibee wrote: post #83
hectorchu wrote: post #2

This post argues that collapsing birth rates aren’t just about housing or money — they’re a rational response to the sense that the future is unstable, meaningless, or even dangerous. It introduces the concept of “temporal inflation” — the idea that just like money loses value in hyperinflation, time loses value when people can’t trust the future. Would love to hear if this resonates with others.

> Yes, kids are expensive. But countries like Korea and Singapore are pouring money into incentives and still seeing fertility drop to record lows. This is what you're missing. They are not. When the Titanic hit the iceberg, you could have gone from 0 people bailing water on the ship with buckets to the whole complement of crew and passengers (if you had enough buckets). You could talk about how there's now thousands…

Exactly. "Pouring money" is what, a one-time $2000 payment? How is that going to get anywhere near balancing what you've already described. Unfortunately most politicians seem very out of touch and are just there to keep the status quo.
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