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Car Seats as Contraception

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Re: Car Seats as Contraception

#101

Post by fxtentacle »

mullingitover wrote: post #2

> We show that laws mandating use of child car safety seats significantly reduce birth rates, as many cars cannot fit three child seats in the back seat. Wouldn't the real cause of the depressed birthrates be the requirement to own a car in order to have children? If you aren't a slave to your vehicle there's no problem with the available space for car seats.

"Wouldn't the real cause of the depressed birthrates be the requirement to own a car in order to have children?"

Yes. The one-time setup costs for "properly" raising kids are probably around $30k. All the kids stuff is extra expensive (in the west) and for the kids seats you need a large car (in the west) and there's social stigma against kids sharing a room (in the west), so you also need a larger apartment.

Re: Car Seats as Contraception

#102

Post by fxtentacle »

While I believe this article to be correct, Germany is an interesting counter-example:

Germany first introduced mandatory child car seat laws on April 1, 1993. [1]

That year, fertility was at 1.28 kids per woman. Since then, it has increased to 1.62.

[1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kindersitz

https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/deu/ger...

Re: Car Seats as Contraception

#103

Post by cucumber3732842 »

rickdeckard wrote: post #93
bradley13 wrote: post #78

Wow, talk about the law of unintended effects! Without going into the specifics of car seats, I do think we overemphasize safety. The article mentions saving 57 children. How much are 57 lives worth? The answer is not infinite - a life has a numeric value, ask any insurance company. Every safety regulation ought to pass a cold-blooded cost/benefit analysis. Few of them do.

> Every safety regulation ought to pass a cold-blooded cost/benefit analysis. Few of them do. I think that's the already the ultimate test for any regulation to pass, as it's up against a huge industry trying to prevent costs of compliance. Of course, the calculation is not to put a price on a human and then compare this against the cost provided by e.g. a car-company. When you've lost someone in a car-accident it's…

>I think that's the already the ultimate test for any regulation to pass, as it's up against a huge industry trying to prevent costs of compliance.

I think it mostly cancels out since the pro regulation side is inevitably bolstered by those who'll sell more shit if alternative goods get worse for the money and those who make a buck on the compliance process.

>When you've lost someone in a car-accident it's not much condolence to know that e.g. an airbag could have saved him/her but "back in 2026 it was deregulated because the car-companies have proven that there's no economic benefit to include them"

What if it turns out that at the societal level that letting airbags, abs, traction control, etc, etc, etc, be optional is actually better because it puts more people into cheaper newer cars that benefit from other safety engineering even if they don't have airbags and all the expensive electronic stuff?

This sort of stuff wherein one tries to anchor the discussion around whole lives (or some other easy to measure thing that makes for good appeals to emotion) and hand wave away anything else is a huge part of the problem.

Re: Car Seats as Contraception

#104

Post by cucumber3732842 »

computably wrote: post #83
bradley13 wrote: post #78

Wow, talk about the law of unintended effects! Without going into the specifics of car seats, I do think we overemphasize safety. The article mentions saving 57 children. How much are 57 lives worth? The answer is not infinite - a life has a numeric value, ask any insurance company. Every safety regulation ought to pass a cold-blooded cost/benefit analysis. Few of them do.

> Without going into the specifics of car seats, I do think we overemphasize safety. The article mentions saving 57 children. How much are 57 lives worth? The answer is not infinite - a life has a numeric value, ask any insurance company. Sure, the value of 57 lives isn't infinite, but this particular comparison is a totally absurd one to make. Births and deaths are completely morally independent, it's not as if thos…

>Actually I'm pretty sure that is in fact how safety regulations work.

Of course the number "check out". Industry regulations are typically ghost written by some combination of industry groups, lobbying groups and academia. Who funds those? The industry either being regulated or industry that stands to benefit if some other industry is regulated.

80-100yr ago if you were inclined to screech about fire safety you'd have been citing numbers funded by the.... wait for it.... asbestos industry.

>hence we have democracy.

Democracy is a system for ensuring stable-ish power transfers by giving the people some semblance of control over the process and little more.

Re: Car Seats as Contraception

#105

Post by Markoff »

yread wrote: post #97
reeredfdfdf wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess that's how it is in America. If you are lucky enough to live in the Nordics, you pay far, far less, sometimes nothing at all. I don't think anywhere near 3000 a month for 3 kids is normal in most of other EU either. So, over here car seats may be a much bigger factor than daycare costs.

3000 eur/month/kid is in the Netherlands. You do get state support (~50% so it's still expensive) if both parents work enough hours.

that's crazy, state kindergarten cost like 50-60EUR here in Czechia, private ones start around 400EUR

Re: Car Seats as Contraception

#107

Post by rickdeckard »

cucumber3732842 wrote: post #103
rickdeckard wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Every safety regulation ought to pass a cold-blooded cost/benefit analysis. Few of them do. I think that's the already the ultimate test for any regulation to pass, as it's up against a huge industry trying to prevent costs of compliance. Of course, the calculation is not to put a price on a human and then compare this against the cost provided by e.g. a car-company. When you've lost someone in a car-accident it's…

>I think that's the already the ultimate test for any regulation to pass, as it's up against a huge industry trying to prevent costs of compliance. I think it mostly cancels out since the pro regulation side is inevitably bolstered by those who'll sell more shit if alternative goods get worse for the money and those who make a buck on the compliance process. >When you've lost someone in a car-accident it's not much c…

I agree, that's exactly the societal question:

The core purpose of regulation is to create better lives for society as a whole.

Human lives being lost is usually considered negative for a society, but just a number in economics for insurances, car-companies, etc.

It's an annoying hindrance for companies to be forced into contributing to the well-being of society, they prefer to decide on that by themselves.

Meanwhile, governments suck at communication with their citizens, and their message is drowned by companies who do marketing every day. So the growing assumption also fueled by companies is that we could have much better stuff if the market wouldn't be regulated.

And yeah, there is surely regulation which should be reviewed, but I don't believe this should be done by putting a price on a human life.

I don't think we would have bike helmets on the street and seatbelts in cars if they wouldn't have been required by regulation, driving down the cost of development and production and making them available for everybody. Even vice-versa: If I'm involved in a car-accident, I would also want the OTHER party to have a seatbelt or a helmet.

Looking how "disruptive companies" find ways to do stupid shit because it's not properly regulated (e.g. skipping mechanical door-handles in car-backseats, creating "digital markets" without equal competition,...) tells me that ESPECIALLY these days empowering regulators to make good decisions and communicate better on them would be more important than having "cheaper newer cars".

But that's just my view...

Re: Car Seats as Contraception

#108

Post by yread »

Markoff wrote: post #105
yread wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

3000 eur/month/kid is in the Netherlands. You do get state support (~50% so it's still expensive) if both parents work enough hours.

that's crazy, state kindergarten cost like 50-60EUR here in Czechia, private ones start around 400EUR

Jo, holt zemský ráj to napohled

Re: Car Seats as Contraception

#109

Post by manwe150 »

namibj wrote: post #75
sgerenser wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My child moved to front facing at around 2 or maybe 2.5 at the oldest (had to go back and lock at old pictures to confirm, she’s 12 now). Parents who obsess over things like keeping their kid rear facing until 5 or in a booster seat until 12 are just neurotic, IMHO. They’re probably the same ones who won’t let them ride their bikes around the neighborhood unsupervised or walk/ride the bus to or from school.

Ehhhhh, what's your problem with booster seats? Those are just to get the shoulders into the design zone as needed for the typical 3-point seat belt. It's based on size (shoulder height measured in sitting position) not age. I think some 5-point seat belts allow a much wider design zone so won't need boosters by the time the children outgrow the front-facing bucket seat.

Kids want to get out of them into adult seats as soon as they can. Actual comfort not relevant.

Re: Car Seats as Contraception

#110

Post by justonceokay »

throwway120385 wrote: post #7
mullingitover wrote: post #2

> We show that laws mandating use of child car safety seats significantly reduce birth rates, as many cars cannot fit three child seats in the back seat. Wouldn't the real cause of the depressed birthrates be the requirement to own a car in order to have children? If you aren't a slave to your vehicle there's no problem with the available space for car seats.

If you aren't a slave to your car, you likely live in a walkable area where the cost of a 4-bedroom apartment or house is going to be pretty high. I'm not saying you can't raise kids in a 2 or 3 bedroom apartment, and when I lived in apartments many families had kids in a 1-bedroom apartment, but it's very tight and many people would consider it a significant hardship for both the kids and the parents. I would also a…

Only on very modern times would you feel the need to have that many bedrooms for 3 kids. Of course that’s because you can’t banish the kids from the house until sunset anymore
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