Can't engage with these guys, having been through Buchanan. I just skipped all the JDV quotes and read JL's summaries...well, skimmed. Such old stuff.
The real reason couples of every colour and culture stop having kids is actually MORE money. When a society gets richer, it has fewer kids - every society.
Can't engage with these guys, having been through Buchanan. I just skipped all the JDV quotes and read JL's summaries...well, skimmed. Such old stuff.
The real reason couples of every colour and culture stop having kids is actually MORE money. When a society gets richer, it has fewer kids - every society.
We are not having children because they are not valued as much as money is. We regard a family with 1 kid and a big house and car as "richer" than a family with four kids and a three bedroom townhouse, two kids per bedroom. Are the extra three kids regarded as "riches" and the parents envied? No, the big house is regarded as riches; children simply are not envied, they do not confer societal status.
Just ask yourself this about status, and regard, and "what's valued" - can you even imagine that telling your boss you planned to have at least 3 kids would cause your boss to think "What a responsible and patriotic and giving person this employee is: I'll have to mark him for early promotion - and gladly give raises to be sure those kids are well!"
No. That would confer exactly zero, going on negative, status at work. Status at work would come from a declaration that you wanted, because you believed in the mission, to spend 90 hours a week, and didn't have time for dating.
This will all just go on until the world population peaks, and several features of the global economy that depend on endless growth begin to fail.
Right now, our economy is structured to make reproduction not rewarded, not worth the trouble. Which strikes me as fine, really, the planet being way overcrowded. Ask one of the non-meat animals that now comprise only 3% of all animals.
Yeah. Implicit in these arguments for more native kids is that immigration is a dangerous and high-cost solution.
Which certainly *can* be true. But whether it's immigration or birth, government policies can make them more sustainable, practice, possible, and acceptable to the public. (It wasn't so long ago that White American was irate that Black America was having so many kids, and pointing to all the consequences of their racist economic policies as justification.) "What do we value?" is always the best way to phrase it. "We value the liberty to have kids if you want, we value a fair and generous immigration system, we value the idea that if you come here and work hard you can have a great future" — these used to be the value statements that governed America. (And, at least in the minds of most Americans, still do!)
I believe the emancipation of women (education and careers) is also directly tied to lower birth rates. I suspect India isn’t far behind, and if African nations move in that that direction, we may see the same phenomenon. Sometimes I wish I could live another 100 years just to see how it all turns out.
Can't engage with these guys, having been through Buchanan. I just skipped all the JDV quotes and read JL's summaries...well, skimmed. Such old stuff.
The real reason couples of every colour and culture stop having kids is actually MORE money. When a society gets richer, it has fewer kids - every society.
We are not having children because they are not valued as much as money is. We regard a family with 1 kid and a big house and car as "richer" than a family with four kids and a three bedroom townhouse, two kids per bedroom. Are the extra three kids regarded as "riches" and the parents envied? No, the big house is regarded as riches; children simply are not envied, they do not confer societal status.
Just ask yourself this about status, and regard, and "what's valued" - can you even imagine that telling your boss you planned to have at least 3 kids would cause your boss to think "What a responsible and patriotic and giving person this employee is: I'll have to mark him for early promotion - and gladly give raises to be sure those kids are well!"
No. That would confer exactly zero, going on negative, status at work. Status at work would come from a declaration that you wanted, because you believed in the mission, to spend 90 hours a week, and didn't have time for dating.
This will all just go on until the world population peaks, and several features of the global economy that depend on endless growth begin to fail.
Right now, our economy is structured to make reproduction not rewarded, not worth the trouble. Which strikes me as fine, really, the planet being way overcrowded. Ask one of the non-meat animals that now comprise only 3% of all animals.
Yeah. Implicit in these arguments for more native kids is that immigration is a dangerous and high-cost solution.
Which certainly *can* be true. But whether it's immigration or birth, government policies can make them more sustainable, practice, possible, and acceptable to the public. (It wasn't so long ago that White American was irate that Black America was having so many kids, and pointing to all the consequences of their racist economic policies as justification.) "What do we value?" is always the best way to phrase it. "We value the liberty to have kids if you want, we value a fair and generous immigration system, we value the idea that if you come here and work hard you can have a great future" — these used to be the value statements that governed America. (And, at least in the minds of most Americans, still do!)
I believe the emancipation of women (education and careers) is also directly tied to lower birth rates. I suspect India isn’t far behind, and if African nations move in that that direction, we may see the same phenomenon. Sometimes I wish I could live another 100 years just to see how it all turns out.