The US is flirting with its first-ever population decline • Hacker News Board

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

#951

Post by loeg » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 4:57 PM UTC

insane_dreamer wrote: post #933

throwawayohio wrote: post #85

Living in a city that this administration has constantly been attacking forced me and my wife, as well as many of our neighbors, to put off our family growth plans. Not only did many of my neighbors lose their jobs, but others are simply fearful of living their lives. We're fine financially, have housing, etc, but at this point why would we go through the stress of raising a child when a masked federal agent might ju…

Not to mention fear of a school shooting that would leave your kid traumatized at best and dead at worst.

School shootings are incredibly rare, and existed 25 years ago too.

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

#952

Post by someperson » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 5:12 PM UTC

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #49

someperson wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish there were more reasoned debate and distinguishing between legal immigration including tech workers (H-1B visas) versus illegal immigration for eg food truck workers, DoorDash scooter drivers. Also the lack of knowledge about the existence of the fantastic and generous H-2A visa for farm workers is maddening.

H-2A is expensive and prone to abuse. It is generally considered a failure by both employers and workers who participate in it. So I’m guessing your use of fantastic and generous is either sarcasm or uninformed?

I've read opinions from farmers who say they wouldn't be able to operate without H-2A.

The stipulations are incredibly generous with unlimited renewals though have to leave the country for 60 days every 3 years.

There's also a pathway to citizenship for specializations in agriculture such as the dairy industry. And they can bring family members too. It's an uncapped program too.

At least on paper it's an incredibly generous visa compared to other types of visas with more restrictions for family sponsorship and immigration.

I agree it's expensive though, that's a big reason why there so many illegal immigrant farm workers. A few reforms and that can be legalized through H-2A

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

#953

Post by insane_dreamer » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 5:13 PM UTC

loeg wrote: post #951

insane_dreamer wrote: post #933

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to mention fear of a school shooting that would leave your kid traumatized at best and dead at worst.

School shootings are incredibly rare, and existed 25 years ago too.

> incredibly rare

312 shootings in the past 5 years [0]

that's an average of ~ 1 shooting every 4 school days (across ~ 120,000 schools)

that is not incredibly rare; you can try to rationalize it, but if you're a parent and your kid is going to school every day for 12 years, that's about 3000 opportunities for this rare event to happen to them

If I'm computing this correctly, that's approximately 4 * 120,000 = 1 / 480,000 chance of it happening on any given day, or a 1 / 160 chance of it happening to your child in the course of their lifetime; compare that with a 1 / 15300 chance of getting struck by lightening over your lifetime, or a 1 in 800,000,000 chance of dying in a plane crash (this is according to Gemini, I didn't research these numbers thoroughly).

And yet, look how much effort we put into airplane safety.

> existed 25 years ago too

sure, but it's so much worse: [1]

55 shootings in the '70s 80 in the '80s 157 in the '90s 121 in the '00s 260 in the '10s 312 so far in the '20s

the fact that we know this has been a problem for 50 years and instead of doing something about it, the problem is actually getting worse. All so that some grown men can play with their guns (please don't tell me that it's about 2A ability to "resist tyranny"; that hasn't been true for a very long time)

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_school_shootings_in_th...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_school_shootings_in_th...

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

#954

Post by KellyCriterion » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 5:20 PM UTC

NoLinkToMe wrote: post #913

echelon wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that being a parent is harder - it's actually easier (excluding the post-WWII American boom years which were a fluke). It's that the floor of being single has risen to stratospheric highs. Being single used to be: boring (no internet, tv, constant dopamine drip. Having kids was an escape from mundane boredom.) Being single used to be: lonely (now we have dating and hookup apps, online games, tons of in-perso…

Agreed. By just about every measure, we're much better off than the past, yet have fewer kids. Statistics have supported this correlation (richer -> fewer kids) for a century, across the board around the worldwide, yet people often still get the causality exactly backwards: it's too expensive to have kids. Real median incomes have risen, decade after decade. And because of this, consumption in key categories has impr…

> The cost of kids isn't unaffordable per se

Deopends on country and social support Id say?

In western EU countries, parental-costs are estimated to 180.000 - 200.000 EUR per head that parents will pay for the first 25 years.

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

#955

Post by dpc050505 » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 5:23 PM UTC

b65e8bee43c2ed0 wrote: post #375

incels blame women, femcels blame men, the left blames cost of living, the right blames lack of values, journalists blame the current thing. it's all so tiresome. the real reason is both boring and obvious: a very significant percentage of educated urban people in the developed world don't want children. both sexes have a very high number of very valid reasons for that, and it's very pointless to examine any particul…

Pulling out is pretty effective when you do it right, they can't really ban that. In very catholic Quebec up to the 1950s priests would get involved in couple's marital lives and apply pressure when wives weren't getting pregnant for just that reason.

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

#956

Post by dpc050505 » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 5:27 PM UTC

mamonster wrote: post #689

dv_dt wrote: post #609

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The latter half of careers, and certainly 30-55 is generally the period of highest productivity of working careers. Its even higher value for the economy when wages do a catch up slowly over their time. I think it is politiczed fear mongering to suggest that the economic balance is negative in that kind of exchange.

>The latter half of careers, and certainly 30-55 is generally the period of highest productivity of working careers. For illegal immigrants though? They are not regularized to the C-suite but to Uber Eats and construction work.

A good construction worker can make more money than a bad web developer and certainly more money than an e-mailer that can barely use excel.

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

#957

Post by loeg » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 5:28 PM UTC

insane_dreamer wrote: post #953

loeg wrote: post #951

Earlier quoted context omitted.

School shootings are incredibly rare, and existed 25 years ago too.

> incredibly rare 312 shootings in the past 5 years [0] that's an average of ~ 1 shooting every 4 school days (across ~ 120,000 schools) that is not incredibly rare; you can try to rationalize it, but if you're a parent and your kid is going to school every day for 12 years, that's about 3000 opportunities for this rare event to happen to them If I'm computing this correctly, that's approximately 4 * 120,000 = 1 / 48…

That 300+ figure (60/year) is including things other than mass shootings people typically think of as school shootings (e.g., targeted gang violence).

There are ~74 million children in the US. Even taking your number at face value, it's 0.00000081 shootings per child per year. This is rare.

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

#958

Post by thrance » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 5:28 PM UTC

anal_reactor wrote: post #551

Night_Thastus wrote: post #336

This is happening everywhere , including nations with great social systems/healthcare/parental leave/etc. And it happens even when nations try throwing money at the problem. While economic concerns may be worsening the issue - I don't think they're the root cause as many would like to say. I think the root cause is that we have outsmarted our biology. Once you give people education on the risks of sex and pregnancy,…

Yes, exactly. I think the real reason why we don't see aliens is that once the population reaches certain level of intelligence and awareness, it takes only one generation thinking "this is not worth it" to cause dramatic population collapse which might wipe out entire species. And the thing is, "life isn't worth it" might actually be true, as much as evolution does everything to convince us otherwise. But now that I…

What you're proposing is awfully dystopian. If people don't want kids anymore, then let them not have kids. Society should adapt to the will of its members, not the other way around. And with all our technology we can live very decent lives even with declining birthrates. Maybe we'll have to do with less travel, less cheap garbage and so, but I'm fine with that.

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

#959

Post by KellyCriterion » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 5:31 PM UTC

yandie wrote: post #545

somenameforme wrote: post #516

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I read things like this I find it confusing in so many ways. I've been out of the US for a while now so perhaps there's some contemporary issues I'm just not considering? For $6k a month, why not hire a private nanny? You could also work with other parents in your area to setup something for a bit more socializing depending on their age. Similarly, I find it practically impossible not to meet people literally ev…

My childcare cost is $52k/year for two kids. To hire a private nanny for TWO kids, it'll be at least $35/hour with benefits (insurance, paid time off etc) in my area. That'll be around $80k/year for a private nanny. And once the kids are older, the value of a nanny isn't as good IMO since they don't provide the variety of social challenges that a daycare can provide (group working, relationship building, conflict res…

> 52k/year

LOL, this is my income after taxes before paying anything! :-X

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

#960

Post by dpc050505 » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 5:32 PM UTC

bombcar wrote: post #59

sandworm101 wrote: post #9

Good. As the working population stagnates perhaps employers will attach some value to workers. Of course, without an underclass of immigrant labor, prices will rise and the US will have to import more food. And temporary heathcare workers can be brought in to help the aging population. It's good that America's cordial relationships with key trading partners will facilitate the free movement of goods and labor ... #1…

It's not a guarantee that we'll import more food - though that may be a good thing in the long run to help other countries - we could also switch what kinds of food we eat. Not everything needs manual labor to harvest like strawberries, crops like corn and wheat and others are quite capable of being harvested in bulk by machinery. Net calories per employee/farmer would be an interesting metric.

Eating only corn and wheat will leave you with nutrient deficiencies. You can be obese and still malnourished if all the veggies you eat are a slice of tomato and lettuce in your burger and half a potato with the same volume of frying oil.