The folks over at Lawyers, Guns & Money have several posts up about "depopulation" and declining birth rates, which are apparently a global trend.
The first linked piece posits that it's cell phones.
Kidding. Sorta. The conclusion is that:
"...we do have this big increase in personal online entertainment, whether it’s watching shows on Netflix, sports bets — online gambling has become absolutely massive across Brazil and Latin America more broadly. You can go on PornHub. Online connectivity enables people to stroll on Instagram, play Call of Duty, World of Warcraft.
So we are all becoming — it’s not just being single — we’re all retreating into this digital solitude. I think that’s partly because technology makes it nicer and easier to stay at home — you can work from home — and some of these apps are so hyper-engaging that you get distracted by the constant stream of dopamine hits as each app, as each technology company competes against others to keep its users hooked."
IOW we have more fun "practicing while I'm alone" than we do with some other human being in meatspace.
There may be something to that, but I'm not sure it's smartphones per se.
I think I've discussed this before.
(In fact I know I did, back in April)
The thing with kids is that you the parents end up spending LOTS of time and money on kids.
At at time when there's lots of fun things to spend time and money on. Travel. Entertainment. Porn. Games. Sports. Leisure.
As opposed to changing diapers, taxiing to soccer games, reading bedtime stories, kissing owies.
Are those good? Are they worth it?
I think so.
But based on global fertility? A lot of people disagree.
There are real risks about that, though, including the reality that our modern industrial welfare states depend on a continual supply of people paying into the system to pay for us olds. And for them when they get old. If the pillar becomes a pyramid, with fewer and fewer paying in and more and more pulling out..?
Yike.
The second LG&M post makes a good point about our New MAGAt Moron Overlords, tho;
"The triumph of the authentic Trumpian stupidity is reflected in the extent to which it has made one particular belief absolutely central to all political discourse in the Republican party, and on the American right wing generally.
That particular belief is the key concept at the core of the stupid person’s world view, and it is this: All of these apparently complicated problems that trouble our society, and that interfere with our impending return to greatness, are actually very simple. For every social problem there is always a simple solution – one weird trick – that solves the problem perfectly. All you need is common sense, and an unwillingness to be fooled by the so-called experts. This is the stupid person’s Nicene Creed.
Moreover, stupid people love simple answers to complex questions, because such answers validate their entire world view."
Yes. Oh fuuuuuuuck yes.
Is there an answer to this slide into a post-population world?
If there is I don't know of it.
But if there is, I do know this; it won't be simple.
Or easy.
Or quick.
4 comments:
There's also the option that many don't want to bring kids into this world where stupidity, greed, and hate seem to be in the ascendant.
Simple solutions tend to spawn complex unintended consequences.
https://populationmatters.org/news/2018/11/what-do-declining-global-fertility-rates-really-mean/
"While a decline in fertility is positive, it does not necessarily translate into a reduced population. Over that same period (1950 to the present), global population has tripled. That is because people are living longer, and also because past high fertility rates and lower child mortality lead to high numbers of people of childbearing age a generation later. TFR effectively means number of children per family but if the number of families goes up, population continues to rise. That is why, despite expected continued declines in fertility, the UN projects population continuing to rise until the end of this century – to more than 11 billion people, according to its median projection."
https://statranker.org/birth/global-fertility-rates-why-are-birth-rates-declining/
"Governments have implemented pro-natal policies, such as childcare subsidies and parental leave, but their impact is limited. A 2024 IHME study found that such policies increase TFR by only 0.2 births per woman, insufficient to reverse declines. McKinsey’s 2025 report suggests that even if fertility rates rebounded to 2.1 starting in 2024, most countries would not achieve population stability due to demographic momentum."
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/social-sciences/fertility-decline
"credible evidence identifying the causes of the fertility decline in the transition economies is limited, so much of this discussion is speculative."
This is something that's right off the bottom of my worry list.
If there is really nothing to this, then it's a nonproblem by definition.
If there IS something to this, then until we know more about root causes and long term effects, the odds, so far as we can calculate them, are we're more likely going to be better off than worse. Nearly all of my life, overpopulation was generally considered to be an enormously dangerous and horribly intractable problem. China tried fixing their local overpopulation by fiat and brute force decades ago and got nowhere. India had a go at their population issues and did even worse.
I'm living on a planet where entirely too many powers have significant arsenals of deliverable nuclear weapons. So the possibility that the overall load of humans on this place may be decreasing by mostly nonviolent means isn't going to trouble my sleep any.
So the genesis of this one wasn't really "depopulation" (tho it's worth noting that a dearth of military-age males tends to force polities to rely more on weaponry - including possibly nuclear weaponry - to offset enemy demographics...) so much as the nonsensical idea(s) that in a modern-ish economy people can be bribed or coerced into having kids or having MORE kids. Whether it's stupidity, greed, hate, or simple economics, the reality is that fewer kids means less stress and more freedom of choice for the adults.
We're not going back to medieval-peasant-eight-kid-families unless and until we go back to medieval peasant living conditions. We're just not. But reactionary "thinkers" seem to believe that's doable, and are trying to the extent they can to tilt the table that direction. Expensive, stupid, and futile?
That's modern "conservatism" for ya.
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