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The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

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Re: The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

#761

Post by triceratops »

fullstop wrote: post #290
Aurornis wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a period of behind effectively a stay at home dad and I disagree with this completely. Being a stay at home parent doesn’t literally mean you have to stay at home . Take the kids and leave the house. Go on adventures. I met so many people randomly during that time. It was vastly more social than sitting in an office or working from home alone.

Did you struggle with dirty looks at the park? I wasn't a SAHP but I'd spend time with my kids at a park nearby and people would give me dirty looks for playing with my kids if my wife wasn't present.

This sounds made-up.

Re: The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

#762

Post by queuebert »

r00fus wrote: post #619
queuebert wrote: post #16

Why do we obsess over growing everything all the time?

Capitalist systems (even used in moderation by China) based on Keynesian economics relies on constant growth.

Why can't you have a steady state? Is it just undesirable, or actually mathematically impossible?

Re: The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

#763

Post by _bohm »

eightysixfour wrote: post #646
_bohm wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's clear that the reduction in teen pregnancy is indeed a big contributor to the decreasing fertility rate. I would guess the reason this doesn't get brought up in discussions about how to _increase_ the fertility rate is that reversing the trend on teen pregnancy is just really not a palatable solution to many people. Although there are some, usually on the religious right, who advocate for banning contrac…

I think not talking about it skews the conversation towards incorrect remedies - the discourse is about what has changed about the economy, communities, family life, etc, that makes people want fewer kids and then trying to derive solutions from those things as the assumed problem. It makes too much of the discourse a question of “how do we go back to the previous conditions?” If instead we say this is a biological i…

Ah, I see what you're saying. Agreed!

Re: The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

#764

Post by Herring »

tasuki wrote: post #755
Balgair wrote: post #207

I like to hang out on fertility twitter. It's a strange place. Since the fertility problem is worldwide, you get a lot of ideologies mixing about. There's hardcore CCP folks, free market Mormons, radical Imams, universalist preachers, the whole lot of them. They're all trying to share ideas and jumping on the latest research findings from reputable and crackpot sources. They're all looking for the recipe to get peopl…

> My take on it is: you have to make your country/society a place where people will want to have children and feel/know that their children's lives will be good ones. I think this is not the right explanation. If you look say 500 years in the past, people definitely could not guarantee their children's lives would be good ones. In many (most?) cases, it was almost certain the children's lives would not be very good.…

The poor have nothing to lose. It's the same around the world today, poor countries have high fertility. The OECD middle class has low fertility because they're worrying about other stuff (lost wages, career stagnation, etc). The rich (high fertility) have plenty of money for private schools, nannies, housekeepers, extracurriculars, etc for 14+ kids (Musk).

It's weird to say the poor are more secure than the middle class, but that's what the data shows. Opportunity cost is a real thing. If other middle class people forgo kids and you don't, house rents will go up and you might not be able to afford a place.

Re: The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

#765

Post by vharuck »

fullstop wrote: post #290
Aurornis wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a period of behind effectively a stay at home dad and I disagree with this completely. Being a stay at home parent doesn’t literally mean you have to stay at home . Take the kids and leave the house. Go on adventures. I met so many people randomly during that time. It was vastly more social than sitting in an office or working from home alone.

Did you struggle with dirty looks at the park? I wasn't a SAHP but I'd spend time with my kids at a park nearby and people would give me dirty looks for playing with my kids if my wife wasn't present.

I've found people are friendlier with me when I'm with my son. His aura of cuteness probably makes me look less curmudgeonly.

Re: The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

#766

Post by fleeting900 »

HelloMcFly wrote: post #575
WhompingWindows wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not alone, Kraig911. It's very hard to be a parent in modern society. My wife and I's friends have basically vanished from our lives, they have zero initiative or interest in coming over to see the kids or help in any way. They say they do, but they rely on us to take the initiative and make social things happen. After dozens of rejections or silence from dozens of them, it's rejection fatigue with the friends…

> My wife and I's friends have basically vanished from our lives, they have zero initiative or interest in coming over to see the kids or help in any way I completely believe that’s been your experience, but want to highlight that his is a difficult asymmetry in these friendships. I in no way mean to imply that the below is the experience your friends had with you, just that the challenges are not one-way. In my own…

Speaking from the other side, but having been on your side for most of my 20s and 30s and felt exactly how you do, they probably do feel you detached from them.

Their lives fundamentally changed to the extent that as you say, any gathering necessarily must be on terms that allow them to parent.

And the level of last-minute cancellations and apologies increase.

And on top of that, they’re just not prioritising reaching out to you. Mainly because parenting occupies 25 hours of most days and they’re exhausted, but they’re also probably assuming that any activity in reach for them, like simply getting coffee at a playground while they try to make sure their kid doesn’t eat too much sand, is not your idea of a fun time.

So your outreach tapered down in response, but that is ultimately your choice.

The alternative requires you to quite selflessly keep up the outreach and be OK with a lower hit rate, and lean into the fact that you have far, far greater flexibility to meet on their terms than they do to meet on yours.

Not doing that is not an unreasonable choice, but they probably miss you and want you to be part of their kids lives.

Anyway, thanks for sharing this point of view. It’s a hard situation.

Re: The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

#767

Post by tasuki »

sizzle wrote: post #708
socalgal2 wrote: post #668

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My take is that modern culture just doesn't want kids. It doesn't matter how cheap you make having a family, for many it's just not remotely the same culture as it was 50-70 years ago. Then, for most, it was, at 20-ish, find a partner ASAP and have a family. That was "the culture". Today it's "have a great career, travel, party, netflix, game, ... and maybe someday think about kids" There's other stats like in the US…

It’s literally the only purpose of life to pass on our genetics to our offsprings in a Darwinian sense.

Third such comment I see in this thread. And... so what? What does the Darwinian purpose have to do with anything mentioned here?

Re: The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

#768

Post by jfengel »

Animats wrote: post #704

Robots may fill the gap. Really. It seems silly now, but give it twenty years. The developed world may end up with a modest human population and a large robotic population. Asimov explored that idea in SF decades ago. The humans may still think they're in charge. They won't be.

I don't see why there has to be a "gap" at all. The country had half as many people in 1950, and it got along fine. The world is different now, but I don't see why it takes 300 million people to run the country today.

If the US gets back to 150 million people, it will look different, but I don't see why it has to be any worse than it is now. And I can think of a lot of reasons why it might be better.

Re: The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

#769

Post by sp527 »

sizzle wrote: post #708
socalgal2 wrote: post #668

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My take is that modern culture just doesn't want kids. It doesn't matter how cheap you make having a family, for many it's just not remotely the same culture as it was 50-70 years ago. Then, for most, it was, at 20-ish, find a partner ASAP and have a family. That was "the culture". Today it's "have a great career, travel, party, netflix, game, ... and maybe someday think about kids" There's other stats like in the US…

It’s literally the only purpose of life to pass on our genetics to our offsprings in a Darwinian sense.

Turns out that's mediated by the sexual impulse, and can be short-circuited via contraception.

Re: The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline

#770

Post by pino83 »

tasuki wrote: post #760
pino83 wrote: post #718

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You're not alone, Kraig911. It's very hard to be a parent in modern society. My wife and I's friends have basically vanished from our lives, they have zero initiative or interest in coming over to see the kids or help in any way. Similar to what I wrote in the other reply: How far went _your_ initiative to stay in actual contact with them, in a way it's not a boring duty call, but something _actually_ nice? If I ha…

> But if it turns out that these friends have no desire to spend time with _me_ anymore - without any kids involved See the problem is the kids. You can't quite make them go away that easily. My guess would be your friends would love to spend some time with you but can't, because logistics. > where do I profit from that friendship?? It often gets quite asymmetrical and boring. Friendships are not for profit. If you w…

> See the problem is the kids. You can't quite make them go away that easily.

You can't, sure. You shouldn't at least. But what does it mean to me? It leads to the fact that the friendship is pointless. So why should I take a lot of initiative, when I don't get anything back anymore? For a reason that they've actively decided for (typically), btw.

> Friendships are not for profit. If you want profit, start a business.

I'm not talking about commercial/monetary/material profits. I'm talking about profits in terms of social lives. If my wording is unfortunate, I hope that it's still clear what I mean. One important (not the only one) currency in that regard is: Timeslots in the calendar.

PS: If the other side shows at least some remote awareness of the situation and indicates a little goodwill, it's already a different thing. In my personal experience, even that isn't common, though.

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