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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

#981

Post by ahartmetz »

Johanx64 wrote: post #716
program_whiz wrote: post #703

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just want to chime in, for anyone else reading this: I can say I used to think this way. Having kids is 100% the best thing, would never trade them for anything, including all of the above and a 5x raise and early retirement. Absolutely nothing about single life is even close to the value you feel having a child. Of course this is "anecdata" but so is "the single life is so awesome" given most of the stats about ment…

> once you get bored of mindless work/consumption cycle, go ahead and get to the good part! The good part is spawning another entity which has to slog through mindless work and consumption cycle, (experience the misery of aging, wither and die) - just so you can feel good about yourself? You acknowledge the stats about mental health and loneliness and how prevalent that is, and yet you will roll a dice on (other pers…

On the one hand, I like blunt descriptions like yours - the reasons why loving a romantic partner, sex, and caring for children feels good is because that makes the species (or your genes more specifically) continue to exist.

The optimism that some people seem to have about their children weirds me out, too: They will probably end up being pretty normal people. Probably more or less like their parents.

But all of that being bad depends on whether you think that life is mostly suffering and should rather be avoided. It's not what I think. If you think that life is mostly good, then giving life is a good thing.

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

#982

Post by angiolillo »

socalgal2 wrote: post #668
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 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…

> My take is that modern culture just doesn't want kids.

This is true for many people. I know a few childfree couples that you could offer them a hefty salary to raise kids and they would decline.

However I know even more people who ended up having fewer kids than they would have liked, especially when I lived in a big city. Typically because they couldn't find a suitable partner, got divorced and remarried too late to have kids, found raising their current child(ren) challenging enough that they didn't think they could handle another, or reevaluated their preferences after watching friends and neighbors struggling.

> 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.

For many, sure. But for other people addressing the root causes (of which cost is one) can move the needle.

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

#983

Post by coryrc »

tfehring wrote: post #618
coryrc wrote: post #562

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're comparing an average, but the demographics are different. If you compare, say, native-born-white to native-born-white, they fit those inputs much closer. Total fertility is down because a smaller fraction of the population are immigrants from Mexico and Central/South America now and those immigrants have a higher birth rate. Their children regress to the mean.

I don't follow. The fertility rate has decreased significantly for US-born women of every race and ethnicity since the 1990s. I couldn't quickly find good stats on trend in birth control usage or labor force participation by race, ethnicity, or immigration status, but I'm skeptical that the trend is in the opposite direction for any particular demographic. So I expect the claims in my previous comment still hold even…

The magnitude is what I wish to quibble about. There may be a trend, but it's much smaller than the other effects.

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

#984

Post by supertrope »

loeg wrote: post #950
supertrope wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the ways the Netherlands made streets safer for dismounted people was by framing it as stopping killing kids with your cars. Yes this is "think of the children" logic but since kids are generally healthy the top causes of kid death in the US are gunfire and cars.

FWIW "gunfire" as a killer of children (under 18) is mostly inter-gang violence, not school shootings or anything else. Cars dominate. Guns are mostly a risk factor you have some control over as a parent (don't have guns at home, don't raise your kids into gangs), whereas car culture really isn't.

FYI this is like telling poor people that they just should move to a better neighborhood. This advice is about as practical as telling people to move to Manhattan to reduce car accident injury risk for your teen driver.

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

#985

Post by socalgal2 »

fleeting900 wrote: post #782
socalgal2 wrote: post #672

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have plenty of friends with young kids that are super social. They invite people over, take their kids to restaurants and invite people to come, go to picniqs, festivals, and other things. We love their kids (or at least all the people that show up do). You have the agency to make it happen.

You and your love for and acceptance of their kids and willingness to show up to family-friendly activities are very likely the key to their ability to do this.

If your friends suck, get new friends.

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

#986

Post by socalgal2 »

angiolillo wrote: post #982
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…

> My take is that modern culture just doesn't want kids. This is true for many people. I know a few childfree couples that you could offer them a hefty salary to raise kids and they would decline. However I know even more people who ended up having fewer kids than they would have liked, especially when I lived in a big city. Typically because they couldn't find a suitable partner, got divorced and remarried too late…

> Typically because they couldn't find a suitable partner, got divorced and remarried too late to have kids

You then brought up cost as the reason. Cost can basically be removed as a reason. There are plenty of studies that it was far more costly in the past than now.

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

#987

Post by Johanx64 »

ahartmetz wrote: post #981
Johanx64 wrote: post #716

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> once you get bored of mindless work/consumption cycle, go ahead and get to the good part! The good part is spawning another entity which has to slog through mindless work and consumption cycle, (experience the misery of aging, wither and die) - just so you can feel good about yourself? You acknowledge the stats about mental health and loneliness and how prevalent that is, and yet you will roll a dice on (other pers…

On the one hand, I like blunt descriptions like yours - the reasons why loving a romantic partner, sex, and caring for children feels good is because that makes the species (or your genes more specifically) continue to exist. The optimism that some people seem to have about their children weirds me out, too: They will probably end up being pretty normal people. Probably more or less like their parents. But all of tha…

The issue is - fundamentally - whether you think life is "mostly good" isn't based on measurement.

Lets say you had a device that could accurately quantify and measure how much pain/suffering and joy/pleasure you experience.

Lets say that number comes out to 70% pain&suffering and 30% joy.

Is life mostly good?

Lets say 70% of people say that the ratio sucks, and 30% of people says it is a good thing. After a couple of generations, the only people that exist are mainly the ones that think 70 units of pain vs 30 units of joy is "good life" and continue procreating producing offspring that are selected for the same qualitites.

Lets say environment changes, and life is 90 units of pain vs 10 units of joy. Given some time, the only people that exist think this life is a "good thing". They still feel pain mind you, but think the trade-off is worth it.

If you don't think the trade-off is worth it, you get selected out of the gene pool.

Now you can take this thought experiment to extremes, 9999 units of pain and 1 unit of joy, etc. This life would also end up being a "good thing", because natural selection optimizes for procreation and survival, and not for "quality of life", "joy/enjoyement", etc.

70% pain and 30% joy is derived 5 workdays and 2 days of rest, as a starting point.

I'm afraid there isn't any thinking involved in any of this, it's just hard survival instincts selected by natural selection. The people that think that having children now (for whatever reasons) isn't a good idea wont exist anymore, and only people that "think" it is a good idea and end up doing it. This isn't based on objective measurement of pain/pleasure (it's almost irrelevant).

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

#988

Post by littlexsparkee »

csallen wrote: post #279
JPKab wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Only if the mothers in aggregate truly believe that their children will have good lives, then will they have them." Then please explain why birth rates throughout human history, when life was vastly more difficult and dangerous than it is now, were so much higher? Nobody had to meet this bar you set before. Let's just be honest here. There were three recent developments, all of which were, by themselves, good things…

> Modern humans live in what would have been historically viewed as a Utopia. I think about this all the time, and how tragic (comedic?) it is that humanity finally created a Utopian age but most of its inhabitants are ignorant of that fact, and thus don't appreciate it, and instead genuinely believe they live in one of the worst times ever.

Have you considered that rather than people being ignorant, not everyone lives this average experience, or that some portion of this increase in wellbeing creates collateral damage and those that experience it don't have the same rosy view?

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

#989

Post by loeg »

supertrope wrote: post #984
loeg wrote: post #950

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW "gunfire" as a killer of children (under 18) is mostly inter-gang violence, not school shootings or anything else. Cars dominate. Guns are mostly a risk factor you have some control over as a parent (don't have guns at home, don't raise your kids into gangs), whereas car culture really isn't.

FYI this is like telling poor people that they just should move to a better neighborhood. This advice is about as practical as telling people to move to Manhattan to reduce car accident injury risk for your teen driver.

It’s actionable. Kids with present parents don’t join gangs. Kids who aren’t in gangs aren’t targeted by gang shootings. You don't have to be rich to be involved in your kids lives.

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

#990

Post by angiolillo »

socalgal2 wrote: post #986
angiolillo wrote: post #982

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My take is that modern culture just doesn't want kids. This is true for many people. I know a few childfree couples that you could offer them a hefty salary to raise kids and they would decline. However I know even more people who ended up having fewer kids than they would have liked, especially when I lived in a big city. Typically because they couldn't find a suitable partner, got divorced and remarried too late…

> Typically because they couldn't find a suitable partner, got divorced and remarried too late to have kids You then brought up cost as the reason. Cost can basically be removed as a reason. There are plenty of studies that it was far more costly in the past than now.

> You then brought up cost as the reason.

To be clear, I said cost is one root cause, I did not say it was the root cause.

> Cost can basically be removed as a reason.

How have you come to this conclusion? From an empirical standpoint, Pew Research finds that financial concerns rank among the top reasons adults say they are unlikely to have more children, the US Census reports that a substantial share of women who expect to have fewer children than desired cite economic constraints, and OECD fertility analyses find that financial insecurity and housing costs are closely associated with lower realized fertility in OECD countries.

> There are plenty of studies that it was far more costly in the past than now.

Can you provide more detail about these studies? At least when it comes to paid childcare in the US this seems to run counter to the data. Before the 1940s paid/institutional childcare was less common in the US, with most childcare provided by mothers, extended families, neighbors, religious institutions, and charities. From 1990 to 2025, the Day Care and Preschool CPI index increased ~280%, outpacing the ~150% increase in overall CPI during that same period.

Not to mention that double-income households are much more common, especially in high cost-of-living areas, and this raises the opportunity cost of having a child compared to a couple with only one income.

And not to mention housing costs outpacing inflation, and for many people stable housing is often a prerequisite for considering starting a family.

Again, I'm not saying spiraling costs is the only reason, and I would not even claim that fertility is highly elastic, but the worsening economics of child rearing do seem to be shifting behavior at the margins.

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