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What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

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Re: What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

#721

Post by toomuchtodo »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #647
ceejayoz wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, at a certain point, not replacing enough people means the species goes extinct over time. That doesn't mean humanity going down to (random number) 1B people via gradual birthrate declines is automatically (nor rapidly ) going to lead to that, if we have enough automation to handle it, and if we have a plan to stop the process at some point.

The electrical grid collapses in a couple weeks if not for constant maintenance by thousands of individuals. Many parts of our technology society are like that, it will be interesting to see how the system decays. Automation would need some breakthrough as profound as life itself to be useful without the millions of people behind the scenes making automation possible.

Based on unemployment rates, wages, and profits, we have a long way to go before labor for infrastructure maintenance is so scarce it cannot be maintained.

Re: What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

#722

Post by numpad0 »

Aeolun wrote: post #539
UncleMeat wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Abortions are not the primary reason why teen pregnancy is way down. There's actual data, you know. Fewer teen pregnancies is a reason why birth rates in the US are declining. But it isn't driven by abortion. And it is insane to me that I'm now seeing this "oh actually teen pregnancy wasn't so bad" thing pop up all over the place.

> actually teen pregnancy wasn't so bad I mean, it was a thing for most of human history. There’s a reason biology makes you capable of having children at a young age. Isn’t it kinda bizarre that we think it’s weird?

I don't understand why population studies people don't even mention this: we're technically wild animals, competing for survival. In absence of a specific and effective imperative stipulating population must grow, we must subconsciously modify societal frameworks exactly to impede reproduction.

It's crazy that the threshold for kids/adults is right in the middle of fertile age and no one ever questions that.

Re: What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

#723

Post by vjulian »

al_borland wrote: post #676
vjulian wrote: post #477

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sex was great back then? For women? Gays? Who? The point you make is backward-looking. I suggest we as a culture look forward instead.

What do you mean by “great”? It was successful in reproduction. That’s what we’re talking about here. People were having families and raising children that went out to have families and raise children. Gay couples can’t have children (outside of adoption or surrogacy), so I’m not sure how that is relevant to the topic at hand. Gay couples will not be helping with the next baby boom. We made a change in the culture, f…

That you’re focusing on “reproduction” and factoring out the pleasure of sex is a vestige of religion and speaks to the very heart of the problem.

Re: What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

#724

Post by toomuchtodo »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #648
toomuchtodo wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m absolutely telling people not to have kids into a macro that just wants economic slavery to pay back debt of all sorts incurred (sovereign, demographic). Labor was cheap because of a population boom with a root cause of women not empowered. Now empowered, they are having less children (family planning, not having unwanted or unaffordable children). Suboptimal economic systems can change, and they should. Can you…

This is like going along with the crowd in China when they started killing off all their young girls leading to this current population imbalance. The right solution is to go where no one else is at the moment and have large families.

No one is stopping couples from having big families (except their economics perhaps), but no one should help them either. There are 8 billion people on Earth, headed to 10 billion. We are currently unwilling to spend what it takes and reconfigure socioeconomic systems to provide quality of life for the humans here now. Fix this and then an argument to have more kids is potentially palatable. But "spit more expensive [time and fiat] kids into the torment nexus?" Neither a rational nor empathetic argument imho.

Re: What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

#725

Post by vjulian »

ta8645 wrote: post #500
vjulian wrote: post #477

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sex was great back then? For women? Gays? Who? The point you make is backward-looking. I suggest we as a culture look forward instead.

> Sex was great back then? Yes, obviously; there was a much higher reproductive rate. It seems like you're talking about enjoyment or something else, but that really wasn't the focus of this thread.

I find it interesting you suggest that pleasure be separated from reproduction in a thread about encouraging reproduction.

Re: What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

#726

Post by jalapenos »

crtified wrote: post #178

My anecdotal experience, which illustrates how changing societal norms may be contributing. Around 1960, my grandmother scandalously fell pregnant with my mother in her late teens. The child was adopted out - well, not out - in. To her own grandmother, to be raised as a "younger sister" to her own mother. Around 1980, my mother scandalously fell pregnant with me, in her late teens. Despite family disapproval, the chi…

Congratulations on not having been killed

Shame you didn't ensure the same for your own kid

Re: What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

#727

Post by arvinsim »

dividefuel wrote: post #207
PakistaniDenzel wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No - being a mom and having to work full time sucks. Being a full time mom probably isn't that bad.

If you read forums of new parents (e.g. parenting subreddits), the common consensus is that being a stay at home parent is far harder than a job.

As a daily Reddit user, I can definitely say to take anything from subreddits with a grain of salt.

Re: What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

#728

Post by salawat »

d0gsg0w00f wrote: post #507
groby_b wrote: post #418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US sees about 20K teen pregnancy abortions. That's probably not why the number of births is way down. Number of births in the US are ~3.6M right now. We also have 1M abortions per year. That's - if abortions were the sole problem - 4.6M births / 330M people. Except... It was 4.3M births / 177M people in 1960. Double the current rate. It dropped off sharply right after the 1960s. Not coincidentally right when the…

No telling what contraceptives have contributed. We didn't really use contraceptives and we had three "oopses". Those three oopses are pretty awesome. Nothing like a kid to help you get your head out of your ass. Probably why people report feeling happier, because you can't think about the stupid stuff you used to worry about.

>Nothing like a kid to help you get your head out of your ass. Probably why people report feeling happier, because you can't think about the stupid stuff you used to worry about.

Not all of those things were stupid, and not in need of being worried about and worked on. Though childless myself, I try to remind those who are currently rearing the next gen all those problems they "don't have time to worry about" are still there. Do your children a favor and maybe worry about problems bigger than you still. You, as opposed to me (the childless), have a materialized interest in the future. I get odd looks because I spend an awful amount of time worrying over everyone else's futures even to the detriment of my own; but if y'all aren't looking forward for them, someone else has to.

Re: What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

#729

Post by jalapenos »

swat535 wrote: post #338
crtified wrote: post #178

My anecdotal experience, which illustrates how changing societal norms may be contributing. Around 1960, my grandmother scandalously fell pregnant with my mother in her late teens. The child was adopted out - well, not out - in. To her own grandmother, to be raised as a "younger sister" to her own mother. Around 1980, my mother scandalously fell pregnant with me, in her late teens. Despite family disapproval, the chi…

I think the uncomfortable truth that many are reluctant to admit is that religion and societal norms (as you highlighted above) played a major role in this. I'm not discounting other facts such as the housing crisis or cost of living but I fear that while those are important, they are secondary. Women were often forced to carry a child due to outside pressure and had no recourse. However since the introduction of saf…

[flagged]

Re: What caused the 'baby boom'? What would it take to have another?

#730

Post by tghccxs »

ryandrake wrote: post #480
IAmBroom wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can also hire a nanny. Yes, or just have your servants watch them. Most families in the US can't afford a nanny. Daycare is already stretching it. > It's also not the end of the world to take a couple years off work. It's a hurdle, but not the end of the road. Many people do it. Mostly women, and that helps keep the gender pay gap going.

OP's comment was so wild, I can't believe it was anything but disguised sarcasm. > Have a parent stay at home and not work > Hire a nanny > Move (presumably farther away from your job) closer to your (assumed idle) parents so they can help > Take a couple of years off of work These options are available to a vanishingly small percentage of working people, at least in the USA. OP must know this, so why even mentions t…

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