101–110 of 173 posts
Keep building these bike lanes and 15-minute neighborhoods. So that people don't even think about having children. Make sure people have no personal space and no personal time. That's how we reduce the Earth's population!
15-minute neighborhoods with bike lanes are exactly the kinds of places good for raising kids in.
[flagged]
Or maybe societies could instead make the prospect of having children less onerous? It's not an uncommon story in America that a couple will choose to stay unmarried when having children so that the mother can qualify for benefits like childcare (which, if you haven't had children yourself, is staggeringly expensive when it's available at all). To think that the solution here is to penalize women even more is insane.
Our expanding economies and improving quality of life depend on young people and a growing population. So it brings up an interesting question. In 20 years, will countries start to compete for young people? Tax breaks, benefits, etc. Will some countries thrive while others die off completely? The proportion of young people will be a huge issue regarding military strength, innovation, etc. Could get very ugly.
If anybody was curious, the states that already had this prior to 2020 are: Maine, Vermont, and Florida Since 2020: Delaware, Hawaii, Montana, New Hampshire, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and West Virginia now also qualify. Montana is a bit of a surprise there... so is Oregon for me. Source: https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2025/older-ad...
I think it’s time to bite the bullet and raise the retirement^W elder benefits eligibility age and peg it to life expectancy at birth minus 15 years or some structure like that. It’s fine that my generation will have to eat the loss - having paid for the past one but not benefiting as much from the coming ones. Some generation has to, and better us than them. As we get better at healthcare and life, we should expect…
We should establish UBI and universal health care, not tied to age, and then the concept of "retirement age" can go away.
Without more productive capacity the extra $1.2k/mo would cause enormous inflation. Just a question of what the country is optimizing for, I suppose, but I think people would be unhappy with the result.
Sounds like the who age verification debate will just solve itself. Just wait until there aren't any more children and then we don't need to worry about protecting them.
You jest, but I'd think it really is the opposite. Hard to care too much for a child if you've got five spare ones.
Our expanding economies and improving quality of life depend on young people and a growing population. So it brings up an interesting question. In 20 years, will countries start to compete for young people? Tax breaks, benefits, etc. Will some countries thrive while others die off completely? The proportion of young people will be a huge issue regarding military strength, innovation, etc. Could get very ugly.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Gettimg mixed signals. "Modest proposal" indicates satiricsl suggestion, but the words "this is going to be flagged to hell" indicates a serious proposal that is controversial. I might overthinking it, but some clarification either way would be nice.
To be completely honest with you, it's a bit of both. I realise that this idea is somewhat obnoxious, hence the gallows humour. At the same time, I genuinely don't think we have a way out of this that does not involve reforms we today would consider obnoxious.
Keep building these bike lanes and 15-minute neighborhoods. So that people don't even think about having children. Make sure people have no personal space and no personal time. That's how we reduce the Earth's population!
15-minute neighborhoods with bike lanes are exactly the kinds of places good for raising kids in.