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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?

#871

Post by sebmellen »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #818
sebmellen wrote: post #764

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had my first child at 24 on a shoestring budget in a 700 sq. ft. apartment and it has been completely manageable. Children are way less expensive than you might think (definitely cheaper than an adult) and if you’re creative you can find good quality, full-time daycare or childcare for $10-15k/yr. Does this add extra work? Oh yes, absolutely it does. But while having children means you sacrifice certain things, the…

> full-time daycare or childcare for $10-15k/yr. That's what it cost 5-10 years ago. Today, it depends on the city, but in the Seattle area you are looking at at least $20k/yr.

True, I may be biased since I’m in Texas!

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

#872

Post by sebmellen »

Sohcahtoa82 wrote: post #801
sebmellen wrote: post #764

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had my first child at 24 on a shoestring budget in a 700 sq. ft. apartment and it has been completely manageable. Children are way less expensive than you might think (definitely cheaper than an adult) and if you’re creative you can find good quality, full-time daycare or childcare for $10-15k/yr. Does this add extra work? Oh yes, absolutely it does. But while having children means you sacrifice certain things, the…

> and if you’re creative you can find good quality, full-time daycare or childcare for $10-15k/yr. For people still making only the mid 5-figures, that's a significant chunk of money.

That’s completely true. But you can still be creative.

I know a couple who both earn in that range and work around each other’s schedules to do it and take care of their two kids at the same time. Yes it’s a lot to juggle, but it is absolutely worth it.

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

#873

Post by labcomputer »

121789 wrote: post #528
labcomputer wrote: post #468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The data doesn't exactly support your argument though: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/births-by-age-of-mother Just looking at raw number of births by age of mother: * 15-19 peaked in 1989 and has decreased 35% since then * 25-29 is higher than at any point in the 20th century * 30-34 is higher than at any point in the 20th century * 35-39 is higher than at any point in the 20th century * 40-44 is higher than the…

You are looking at the full world numbers, which isn’t really what’s being discussed in this thread. Try filtering for South Korea or the US

Sure thing, boss:

If we filter by US,

* 15-19 is down almost 80% (!!!) since the mid-century peak.

* 20-24 is down about 60% since the mid-century peak.

* 25-29 is about flat since mid-century

* 30-34 is higher than any time in the 20th century

* 35-39 is higher than any time in the 20th century

* 40-44 is higher than any time in the 20th century

In other words, the story is about the same as global.

Remember, I was responding to a comment that stated "Reduced teen pregnancies are not the driving factor in recent fertility rate declines at all."

If I was going to steel-man your argument, I would note that 20-24 is the cohort with the largest numerical reduction in the US... but then the argument still rests on splitting hairs that 20-24 are not technically teenagers, and teenage pregnancies "only" account for 40% the total reduction in fertility (while teenage mothers only accounted for 16% of births in 1970).

Of course, it's hard to square splitting those hairs with the definitive statement "not the driving factor [...] at all" (emphasis mine). In fact, the only way it makes sense is if you define "recent" to mean "since 2017", but measuring things like this over a period of less than a decade is silly anyway.

The data is also abundantly clear than older women are having more babies (not just a greater percentage, but actually more babies). In Japan women ages 35-44 had more babies in 2023 than any time since 1950. In Korea, women ages 30-44 had more babies than any time since 1980.

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

#874

Post by adam_arthur »

missedthecue wrote: post #798
adam_arthur wrote: post #797

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this true for very wealthy people, or only for above average earners? There are many examples of very wealthy people having lots of children. Children are still a significant investment for high earners, but at a certain wealth level it becomes inconsequential. Quick google shows some support for this idea: "There is a new emerging trend where better-off men and women are more likely to have children than less wel…

The birth rate for billionaires under 50 in the US is 1.05

"Those under 45 have 1 child and those under 55 have ~2.3 kids."

Yes, people are having kids at older ages.

Looking at an arbitrary subset consisting of a younger population when considering lifetime fertility is not proper analysis.

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

#875

Post by vjulian »

al_borland wrote: post #867
vjulian wrote: post #760

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get the sense that by pleasure you’re referring simply to orgasm during sex itself? Again, that is part of the problem. As for religion, I believe your view is in fact rooted in religion which strategically and historically segmented the sexual experience; not that you’re explicitly espousing a religious view but that it is implicit in what you’re suggesting.

You’ve used the word “great” and “pleasure”, however you’re not specific about what you’re talking about. I’m having to guess at what you mean, and you keep telling me I’m guessing wrong, without clarifying your point. This isn’t productive.

I suspect our experiences are vastly different, thus a difficulty in communication.

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

#876

Post by seanmcdirmid »

sebmellen wrote: post #869
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #808

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why is it irresponsible to have a child when you're young and financially not established? Just imagine being the kid in that situation. Your parents are still almost kids themselves, they are working min wage jobs and had to drop out of college. Seriously, this isn't rocket science: we are having kids older because growing up in a financial stable household is just good for kids. If you have a trust fund or are so…

Had first kid at 24 on a shoestring budget in a small apartment with very minimal family support and we handled it. Kids are not that hard or expensive!

I’m actually glad it worked out for you. As a previously neglected kid growing up, I wasn’t willing to do the same and had a kid later (and now trying for #2).

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

#877

Post by Aeolun »

sebmellen wrote: post #693
coldtea wrote: post #684

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People today think a 18-19 year old (which is still a legal adult in most places and for most purposes, can drive, go to war, live alone, work, and was always considered an adult throughout history) is "a child". Of course kind of makes sense when 30 and 40 year olds also behave and live like children and find "adulting" out of their capabilities.

I can't tell you how strange it is to have become a parent at 24. It anecdotally feels like the average parents my wife and I meet (with similarly-aged kids) are about ten years older than us. Making life is a normal part of life, and it's quite sad that we don't acknowledge the capacity of young adults.

> Making life is a normal part of life, and it's quite sad that we don't acknowledge the capacity of young adults.

I think it’s more that we’re all just faking it. The thirty or fourty year old that thinks they know better than the 20 year old is deceiving themselves. The differences between individuals are much larger than the differences between the averages at those ages.

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

#878

Post by Aeolun »

tstrimple wrote: post #747
Aeolun wrote: post #672

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say that as if having children is a disease. If you are old enough to have a child, you are very likely old enough to successfully raise one. Otherwise the human race wouldn’t exist.

Having a child under a certain age has all the health risks of a serious disease putting the life of the mother and child at much higher risks. Why shouldn't it be treated as such? https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5965834/

A 5% chance of your child dying when you give birth at age 15 and lower seems pretty reasonable to me? At least I’d have expected those number to be far higher.

At 16-17 it’s 4% and at 18-19 it’s 3%, which makes it even better, but 19 out of every 20 children surviving longer than 28 days is pretty good.

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

#879

Post by sjw987 »

sebmellen wrote: post #770
sjw987 wrote: post #720

It's the economy, stupid. Most younger people can't afford homes. People's money doesn't go as far as it used to. Academic qualifications are worth less than they used to be. Many people currently working now won't see a pension. Many won't see a good paying job, even with good academic qualifications and work experience. General health and wellbeing is getting worse, with businesses abusing human psychology to shift…

There is an unbroken evolutionary thread of more than 4.5 billion years of evolution from the very first organism to you. Every one of our ancestors made it, and chances are they did so in more difficult and perilous circumstances than we can imagine. You can as well. This kind of doomerism is only accessible because you have social media and global news networks that expose you to the negativity bias of humanity. Th…

Somebody else echoed my opinion exactly. Don't load your expectations onto other people as a given.

I don't use social media. I read (and less often, post on) Hacker News at work sometimes, and that is quite literally all the user submitting content I produce. I've never used social networks (truly, personal choice), nor browsed them anonymously.

I also don't read the news on a daily basis. I use one day per week to catch up on news from a relatively neutral, brief and unbiased source (The Economist Weekly summaries).

You don't need to use social media or read the news frequently to see that the world is in a bad state. You see it every day around you, and you can see it getting worse. Personally, I try my best to block out the things I can't change. I stay offline as much as I can outside of work time, exercise and read a lot. I spend about as little time as you can engaging with world affairs and politics, yet I still notice it. I'm not unhappy in general in life, but I acknowledge that things aren't as good as they were a few years ago, can work out the direction things are headed, and can project that 20, 30, 40 years down the line, things aren't going to be better or probably even stay at this level.

We're all well aware people have had it worse historically. That doesn't detract from the fact that when we have more education than the typical person born before the 1900s, and when women have the means to control their reproductive cycle, many people aren't going to go ahead and have kids when they foresee the future being worse for their kids.

We have lived through a golden age the last 50+ years. Things are going to get worse. The perfect storm which led to our (in the West) prosperity isnt't going to whip up again as it did before, even if we did have a WW3 and "won" it. The spoils simply wouldn't be the same.

The dodo went extinct in 1662, it also was an unbroken evolutionary thread of more than 4.5 billion years. The opening line is a meaningless tidbit.

Your response to the other poster comes across a tad condescending. Just because somebody doesn't see things positively doesn't make them have a "doomerism" mindset (sounds like the exact sort of forced trend word vomit that comes from social media).

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

#880

Post by refurb »

groby_b wrote: post #418
refurb wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Underrated comment right here. When the baseline belief in society goes from “make it work” to “better to end the pregnancy” it shouldn’t be surprising that overall the number of birth goes way down.

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…

Nobody said anything about teens?
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