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

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

#971

Post by jonmb » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 9:17 PM UTC

tuesdaynight wrote: post #780

crystal_revenge wrote: post #463

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Many of our child-free friends are going to go through a lot of loneliness when they're old I've seen this "kids are insurance against loneliness" logic repeated often, but I don't believe this bares out in reality. I personally know plenty of child-free older couples who remain quite happy and social. I also know plenty of parents whose kids don't speak to them anymore or whose children have lives on the other sid…

About your first point, I understand why it happens, but I get frustrated at these debates nowadays. Both sides cannot talk about their experiences without having to add something that invalidates the other side choice. They cannot fathom that the other side may prefer the disadvantages of their choice instead of the disadvantages of yours. Maybe it's the human condition to try to point out how the other side will re…

Well said. I appreciate people on both sides that can simply acknowledge having kids is great for some people, and not having them is great for others, and the world is big enough for all of us.

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

#972

Post by tuna74 » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 9:22 PM UTC

JPKab wrote: post #946

tuna74 wrote: post #720

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting that you only seem to think that mothers should take care of their kids.

I was raised by a single father, but thanks for derailing the conversation with your assumption that I'm a sexist because I didn't account for the edge case in parenting.

If you think that fathers taking care of their kids is an "edge case in parenting" I don't really have anything to add.

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

#973

Post by angiolillo » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 9:32 PM UTC

somenameforme wrote: post #891

montroser wrote: post #681

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Say you hire a nanny for $6k/mo... What problem have you solved? You're still paying the six grand, and you had better hope the nanny is good, because that is your kids' whole world now for a chunk of their existence.

It depends on the area, but a nanny is typically nowhere near $6k/month. If desired you can also generally arrange something with other parents in your area to do a cost share with the side benefit of also getting a bit more socialization for your kids. There's endless differences with nanny vs daycare. A big one is that most studies show children do best when raised by a small handful of consistent figures. In dayca…

> It depends on the area, but a nanny is typically nowhere near $6k/month.

Agreed that it depends on the area. In high cost-of-living areas, both nanny and childcare can be (significantly) higher than $6k/mo, and in lower cost-of-living areas they're typically a bit less. In my experience having lived in different areas the price ranges for infant/toddler daycares and (legal) nannies are closely correlated.

> I'm not even entirely sure a "good" nanny is required.

Having employed a couple of bad nannies, I strongly disagree with this statement.

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

#974

Post by angiolillo » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 10:23 PM UTC

daymanstep wrote: post #472

alephnerd wrote: post #425

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm actually really eager to hear why you think Chad, Somalia, and DR Congo are the countries where people feel the most optimistic about the future, and what you think rich countries should be learning from them! Why not ask Israelis? Even ignoring Haredim and Arab Israelis (both whose fertility rate has fallen dramatically), secular Israelis tend to have 2 kids on average [0]. Israelis also work much longer hours…

Are you saying that Israelis are more likely to have kids mainly because Israeli society is more tolerant of kids? You seem to be supposing a model where most people naturally want kids, but are just discouraged from having kids because...other people might give them a stink eye if their kids run around in a mall. In my model, people choose to have kids because it's an important life goal for them, and this decision…

> Are you saying that Israelis are more likely to have kids mainly because Israeli society is more tolerant of kids?

Yes, absolutely.

I used to work in a big city where friends, neighbors, and coworkers with young kids had to sacrifice their career trajectory, friends, hobbies, savings, personal space, and more. Most couples we knew had no kids, some had one, a few exceptional folks had two. A few couples we knew even commented that they ended up having fewer children than they were planning to because of the difficulty with the one(s) they had.

Then my partner and I moved near relatives to a small, family-friendly town. Most of our neighbors have two kids, some have three, and a few exceptional folks have four or more. Almost everything here revolves around families -- even my company has family events and taking time to take care of kids is normalized.

True, living here did not change our decision to have kids, but it actually did change how many kids we ended up having.

> In my model, people choose to have kids because it's an important life goal for them, and this decision is not very much affected by whether other people might give them a stink eye if their kids run around in a mall.

That's a plausible model, but my model is that people alter their goals based on what they observe happening to other people who pursue those same goals. If young people see their friends, coworkers, and neighbors struggling due to their decision to have children, it seems reasonable that they would reevaluate how important it is to them.

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

#975

Post by slaw » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 10:31 PM UTC

Night_Thastus wrote: post #949

slaw wrote: post #843

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All projections show world population growth until at least 2100, thanks to Africa birth rate above 4.

No, they don't. That's the UN prediction, because they assume that somehow, magically, all countries below replacement will simultaneously, near-instantly increase in fertility rate by huge amounts over the next couple of years. Look at the graphs, they're nonsensical. If you look at the actual trends of those rates, peak population is ~2050, maybe sooner.

> near-instantly increase in fertility rate by huge amounts over the next couple of years

Nothing like this on Wikipedia. Do you have a better link?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_population_projections

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

#976

Post by xnx » Wed, Feb 11, 2026, 10:33 PM UTC

jdlyga wrote: post #68

Once you have a kid, it's obvious why even besides the costs involved. There's not much sense of community, particularly in the white middle class. People are very individualistic and distrusting of others. There's a good reason for some of this, but to have a community you need to be a community member. And that means letting people in, trusting others and being trustworthy, and being out for the group instead of ju…

> being out for the group instead of just yourself

This is so far removed from present day US. A large portion of the country enthusiastically/fanatically/religiously supports someone who thinks exclusively of himself.

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

#977

Post by brightball » Thu, Feb 12, 2026, 1:07 AM UTC

mullingitover wrote: post #236

brightball wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've watched most of my life as narratives have been pushed in popular culture, TV, music, magazines, online articles, etc that go out of their way to convince people not to have children. Just some examples of trends I've observed personally. - Scare media about the cost of having children - Scare media about the environmental impact of having children, even calling it irresponsible for the planet - Scare media abou…

> there is nothing in this world that brings people more joy than their families and their children. Nothing. Counterpoint: Yes, you're giving the standard apologetic we all hear from parents. However, plain and simple, objectively it's typically the most stressful thing you will do in your entire life. It's so bad the US Surgeon General had to put out an entire advisory paper about it[1]: > 41% of parents say that m…

It's a lot easier if you live near either your parents or your in-laws. Having grandparents around to help is the cheat code to making parenting easier. We didn't have that until our oldest was 7 and it was life changing.

But before that, it's exhausting and still by far the most rewarding thing you'll ever do with your life.

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

#978

Post by phendrenad2 » Thu, Feb 12, 2026, 1:55 AM UTC

g9yuayon wrote: post #837

Honest question: why are we so afraid of population decline? For people on the left, it means less consumption, less environment impact, less carbon footprint, and in general fewer damn evil people who are destroying the mother earth. For the right, everyone is responsible for their own destiny including their retirement life so they worry about their retirement spending solely on their own anyway. In practice, Japan…

I haven't been able to get a good answer to this, but gently asking this question of people around me, I've noted that even people who aren't usually tuned-in to social issues have an opinion on it (specifically that it's vaguely a bad thing). I suspect that there's a bit of latent tribalism inherent in people. People don't like to see their "tribe" get smaller. It just instinctively gives people anxiety. (I somehow dodged this sentiment, maybe a benefit of my neurodivergence).

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

#979

Post by somenameforme » Thu, Feb 12, 2026, 3:38 AM UTC

angiolillo wrote: post #973

somenameforme wrote: post #891

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends on the area, but a nanny is typically nowhere near $6k/month. If desired you can also generally arrange something with other parents in your area to do a cost share with the side benefit of also getting a bit more socialization for your kids. There's endless differences with nanny vs daycare. A big one is that most studies show children do best when raised by a small handful of consistent figures. In dayca…

> It depends on the area, but a nanny is typically nowhere near $6k/month. Agreed that it depends on the area. In high cost-of-living areas, both nanny and childcare can be (significantly) higher than $6k/mo, and in lower cost-of-living areas they're typically a bit less. In my experience having lived in different areas the price ranges for infant/toddler daycares and (legal) nannies are closely correlated. > I'm not…

Real median personal income in the US is $45k which is $3750 gross per month. [1] Nannies are obviously not making more than the vast majority of Americans. What was your experience with bad nannies?

[1] - https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEPAINUSA672N

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

#980

Post by MrSkelter » Thu, Feb 12, 2026, 9:33 AM UTC

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…

Having children at greater than replacement rate isn’t smart if you aren’t poor. Replacement for a couple is 3 (you can’t have a fraction of a child), more is 4.

The demands 4 children place on housing, income and time are literally double that of 2 children - which is less than replacement. That’s before you consider transport and other factors.

I don’t see why on a finite planet people think we need ever more humans. A smaller population would be better in every regard. The only thing that would need to change is capitalism. That’s not hard.