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The Toxic Reality of a Post-Familial Society

aaronrenn.substack.com

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Re: The Toxic Reality of a Post-Familial Society

#21

Post by MilStdJunkie »

Whew, boy. There's a ton of loaded phrases in this piece . . which, well, I'll let others do the googling. Anyway. Ideologies (Evangelicals, Feminists, Transsexuals, Insert-Your-Evil-Genius-Here) don't shunt people's life decisions around willy nilly like this. Money does. People don't have kids in industrialized countries because children rapidly transform from a net investment to a net burden. Thus, ideal industrialized states have political policy to skim improved industrial productivity into incentives for childbirth[1]. This typically doesn't happen, so kids don't happen either.

This isn't a new phenomenon; urban areas eat birthrates, and you can see it in records from as long ago as the 14th century. Industrialization turns urbanization up to 11.

[1] Or a rational immigration / naturalization policy, but that's another subject, and it's not really tenable for some cultures.

Re: The Toxic Reality of a Post-Familial Society

#22

Post by ertian »

pm90 wrote: post #4
nostrademons wrote: post #2

The article makes an interesting case for the possibility that South Korea's military dictatorship intentionally created low-fertility policies that can't be reversed. But reading the description of what's going on, I can't help be reminded of John B. Calhoun's work on the "behavioral sink" [1], where he basically created a utopia where rats had everything they needed for survival, they multiplied exponentially, but…

I don’t believe its density as much as costs and impact on lifestyle. Make daycare, child health services and great schools universally available and cheap/free. Make it feasible and safe to get kids around dense cities quickly (excellent transit options). I suspect under these circumstances more people would be open to the idea of children. As it stands today, having children places an unbearably high social and fin…

This might be affecting the number of children a couple has (probably is, in fact), but I doubt people factor it in to their decision to have a kid or not. I had absolutely no idea what day care or diapers cost before I had a kid. It's hard for me to picture a young couple approaching it that way.

Re: The Toxic Reality of a Post-Familial Society

#24

Post by the_only_law »

kevviiinn wrote: post #15
ericmay wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just for future readers being "liberal" does not necessarily mean that one is "collectivist". The OP, like many others, confuses governmental, economic, and philosophical ideals so that they can make a political point - one that does not contain much in the way of substance. In the way of examples, neoliberalism [1] comes to mind. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism

To add to this, liberalism and neo liberalism aren't on the left of the political spectrum. These political ideologies are fairly solidly right or centre-right

I gave up when I saw people on this site using “neoliberal” as a slur for current US progressives.

Yeah.. I know the term has been basically meaningless for a while, but still.

Re: The Toxic Reality of a Post-Familial Society

#25

Post by DogTweezers »

Zetice wrote: post #20
tptacek wrote: post #14

This is a take from a gender-essentialist who ardently believes fixed roles for men and women are established by the bible. Their other publication: https://americanreformer.org/

I try not to partake in tinfoil hattery, but this getting the upvotes that it did, in the time that it did, given the content, and compared to the demographic of the platform, might alarm some folks who care about the integrity of submissions on HN. Maybe that's nobody, maybe I'm paranoid, maybe I'm not following HN guidelines. IDK.

[flagged]

Re: The Toxic Reality of a Post-Familial Society

#26

Post by kevviiinn »

the_only_law wrote: post #24
kevviiinn wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add to this, liberalism and neo liberalism aren't on the left of the political spectrum. These political ideologies are fairly solidly right or centre-right

I gave up when I saw people on this site using “neoliberal” as a slur for current US progressives. Yeah.. I know the term has been basically meaningless for a while, but still.

It just shows how powerful propaganda is, it's redefining terms

Re: The Toxic Reality of a Post-Familial Society

#27

Post by bluGill »

pm90 wrote: post #4
nostrademons wrote: post #2

The article makes an interesting case for the possibility that South Korea's military dictatorship intentionally created low-fertility policies that can't be reversed. But reading the description of what's going on, I can't help be reminded of John B. Calhoun's work on the "behavioral sink" [1], where he basically created a utopia where rats had everything they needed for survival, they multiplied exponentially, but…

I don’t believe its density as much as costs and impact on lifestyle. Make daycare, child health services and great schools universally available and cheap/free. Make it feasible and safe to get kids around dense cities quickly (excellent transit options). I suspect under these circumstances more people would be open to the idea of children. As it stands today, having children places an unbearably high social and fin…

> As it stands today, having children places an unbearably high social and financial strain on people. Suburbs have been just one solution to the problem but there are others.

Yet Suburbs are the only ones I see that work. If you are thinking about having kids in the US move to the suburbs soon. Cities are not setup for you. Schools in the city are considered bad for a reason. Even if you can afford private schools, the parks are more sculpre gardens instead of swing sets. Everyone talks about the theator scene in the cities, but most of the shows wouldn't interest a child (most are not X rated). Many cities lack cheap places to eat - $40/person isn't too bad for one person, but when you have a few kids with you that price is not affordable often. How many places don't allow kids at all - not many in the suburbs, but somewhat common in the city. In the suburb you just buy a bigger car and everyone gets around - the big car won't fit in the city well, and your other options is paying a lot more on public transit because odds are there isn't a family pass, so the big car is probably cheaper.

The above is US specific (probably Canada too). I know there are a number of people from not US reading this who will tell me how it works in their city. I hope city residents read those replies and make changes before they need them.

Re: The Toxic Reality of a Post-Familial Society

#28

Post by pphysch »

the_only_law wrote: post #24
kevviiinn wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add to this, liberalism and neo liberalism aren't on the left of the political spectrum. These political ideologies are fairly solidly right or centre-right

I gave up when I saw people on this site using “neoliberal” as a slur for current US progressives. Yeah.. I know the term has been basically meaningless for a while, but still.

The Progressive Caucus is clearly a wing of the Democratic Party, which is neoliberal. They occasionally challenge the party line, but never successfully. That's what primaries are for.

That said, there are many American progressive movements that are not neoliberal. Just not in power.

Re: The Toxic Reality of a Post-Familial Society

#29

Post by ericmay »

pphysch wrote: post #10
ericmay wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just for future readers being "liberal" does not necessarily mean that one is "collectivist". The OP, like many others, confuses governmental, economic, and philosophical ideals so that they can make a political point - one that does not contain much in the way of substance. In the way of examples, neoliberalism [1] comes to mind. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism

I mean philosophically liberal in the original meaning of the term. In that sense, it is tightly linked with individualism. This has nothing to do with current American politics.

Then this comment doesn't make any sense

> > The DPRK is probably the most collectivist (least individualistic) large society on the planet, so much so that it terrifies bleeding heart liberals.

Re: The Toxic Reality of a Post-Familial Society

#30

Post by wing-_-nuts »

badloginagain wrote: post #18

Peter Zeihan's take is that urbanization leads to less children because there's less space, you don't need the free labor kids provides on the farm, and children are very expensive in the city. This is coupled with the speed of urbanization for countries that industrialized after the second world war- the later you industrialize, the faster that industrialization happens, the more stark the transition to a childless…

Zeihan is a smart guy, but he tends to take his limited expertise and expand it into areas where he doesn't have a strong foundation. I think his ideas on demographics are a bit too deterministic. Demographics don't enter a state where they 'can't' recover. Behavior responds to incentives. The reason why birth rates are plummeting in the developed world is that costs to have kids are soaring. If there was real investment in child care (think, what france and sweden have done, but on steroids), and if higher ed and other costs were mostly covered, people would feel able to have more kids.

Now how do we pay for all that? Dunno. That question is above my pay grade, but I think we'd undoubtedly have to cut spending on other priorities and raise taxes. I think that'd probably be worth it to claw out of a demographic decline.

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