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You can’t even pay people to have more kids (www.vox.com)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

371 comments fedilink hide all child comments

These countries tried everything from cash to patriotic calls to duty to reverse drastically declining birth rates. It didn’t work.

…

If history is any guide, none of this will work: No matter what governments do to convince them to procreate, people around the world are having fewer and fewer kids.

In the US, the birth rate has been falling since the Great Recession, dropping almost 23 percent between 2007 and 2022. Today, the average American woman has about 1.6 children, down from three in 1950, and significantly below the “replacement rate” of 2.1 children needed to sustain a stable population. In Italy, 12 people now die for every seven babies born. In South Korea, the birth rate is down to 0.81 children per woman. In China, after decades of a strictly enforced one-child policy, the population is shrinking for the first time since the 1960s. In Taiwan, the birth rate stands at 0.87.

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[–] [email protected] 47 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

They might also recognize that shrinking family size isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Lower birth rates around the world could lessen environmental degradation, competition for resources, and even global conflict, Wang Feng, a sociology professor at UC Irvine, writes in the New York Times.

In every single one of these "depopulation crisis" articles the "maybe a shrinking population isn't entirely a bad thing" perspective is always in a throwaway paragraph near the end, if it's even mentioned at all.

Also consistently missing in these types of articles: an actual breakdown of the costs of raising a child (including the opportunity costs to one's career as the result of parental leave) vs the benefits the government is offering.

Also invariably missing: a description of the serious short- and long-term physical and mental risks of pregnancy and childbirth; at least this article mentions maternal mortality, but there's so much more at risk even in a "healthy" pregnancy and birth, from post-partum depression to incontinence. Occasionally articles will muse about women's fear of "frivolous" conditions like weight gain and stretch marks, but never life-altering ones like severe hemorrhaging, organ failure, and fistulas. How many women are postponing or forgoing pregnancy because they're not willing to risk life and limb to procreate? We'll never know as long as no one thinks to ask.

I have read a million of these "birth rates are dropping despite government efforts" articles, and they all echo the same pro-growth propaganda while conveniently neglecting these major, crucial points. JOURNALISTS, DO BETTER!

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago

In every single one of these “depopulation crisis” articles the “maybe a shrinking population isn’t entirely a bad thing” perspective is always in a throwaway paragraph near the end, if it’s even mentioned at all.

That's because people aren't willing to leave the "babies are the super bestest things ever and if you are super happy then you're a horrible person" narrative.