Birthrates are plummeting worldwide. Can governments turn the tide?
https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/aug/11/global-birthrates-dropping
Birthrates are plummeting worldwide. Can governments turn the tide?
https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/aug/11/global-birthrates-dropping
40 Comments
From the article
>On 11 July, the United Nations released [World Population Prospects 2024](https://population.un.org/wpp/), a revision of their population estimates from 1950 to the present for 237 countries, with projections to the year 2100. The report said that “women today bear one child fewer, on average, than they did around 1990”, and that the world’s population is now expected to peak at about 10.3 billion in the mid-2080s (up from about 8.2 billion today) before starting to fall.
>That peak will come earlier than expected for reasons including “lower-than-expected levels of fertility”, it found.
>In March, an article published in the Lancet set off a new wave of headlines warning of catastrophe. A study titled [global fertility in 204 countries and territories, 1950-2021, with forecasts to 2100: a comprehensive demographic analysis for the global burden of disease study 2021](https://www.healthdata.org/news-events/newsroom/news-releases/lancet-dramatic-declines-global-fertility-rates-set-transform), by the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), found the world was approaching a “low-fertility future”.
>The IHME study said by 2050, more than three quarters of the countries will be below replacement rate. By 2100, it will be 97%.
>The only countries projected to have more than 2.1 by then are Samoa, Somalia, Tonga, Niger, Chad and Tajikistan.
We went fast from overpopulation panic to birthrate worries.
We can start to worry when We Are back to 5 billion, or less:)
Why bother? There’s already too many people. Is this a continuation of the “growth at any cost” argument?
It’s almost like government creating an environment where the rich hoard all the wealth and everyone else is working like mad, barely making ends meet, is bad for growing families? Huh, whodathunkit.
So we’re going to shift our economies away from infinite growth-based, right?
…Right?
No, and they shouldn’t. Too many people in the world already, and not enough water, air, food, housing etc. to go around. Get old folks (and no, I’m not young) into VR capsules with porn and video games (or painless euthanasia for those who want that), run by a mainframe and maybe a janitor. Like, one human employee for every five hundred matrix pods. Fast forward fifty years, maybe the world will be a more livable place for those who are young then.
No why should they. The planet is dramatically overpopulated as it is, we really don’t need an increased birth rate.
Theoretically isn’t this a good thing in the long run. I know it hurts the economy. Maybe because the rich want cheaper labor but doesn’t this mean that more resources are available in the future for everyone.
Could they – sure.
WIll they? – not the current ones in power.
This was VERY foreseeable. SO they knew, and did nothing.
At this point – you would have to make Parents HERO’S for people to have more kids. vs the villains they are today.
I have 4 kids – almost everything fights you with more than 2. Even then – life is much harder with kids. Little government support, no incentive to have kids (financially). You think food prices suck? Think x4 or x6 – MOST of my income currently goes towards FOOD. And I am fckd – 2 are still little and are about to become full fledge teens and food consumption will go WAY up.
A government will need to do something like – have 1 kid – 15% tax break, 2 kids 25%, 3 – 35% and so on. WITH added things like – force companies to have FAMILY PLANS – as most max out at 4 or 5. More discounts/breaks for having a bigger family.
I guess making society an unlivable nightmare hellscape pyramid scheme where only the rich get to have a nice life kind of makes people not want kids. Shock and awe, questions asked at parliament.
There are already too many people. The problem is not declining birthrates, that is what we need.
The problem is that our economies are based on growth. We need to develop societal models that are robust without population growth.
Stop taxing us to death, making us pay incredibly high mortgage or rent, allowing prices of everything to shoot sky high! Let us afford to have families, So there is a choice. All three of my children don’t want kids because they can’t afford the upkeep on themselves, let alone a spouse and children.
Or, should they? In a world that’s already overcrowded?
Yes, but will they? I doubt it. The system is quite rigged and the political caste tends to be close to the top of the pyramid scheme
I’ve seen governments asking this question for years, when will they get it through their thick skulls they and their corporate benefactors are the cause of the problem?
There’s only one reason this is pushed on the media.
The ultra wealthy are worried they won’t have enough new customers to keep that profit graph moving up
When I lived in the states, sometimes I’ve been in a Walmart or Sam’s Club or somewhere and I would look around and just be amazed at all the shit. Things we don’t actually need and there’s just so much of it to imagine that there’s tens of thousands of stores like that all over the country all over the world just stockpiled with shit we don’t need and imagining how much poison goes into the world to create all this shit that we don’t actually need. Then I realize maybe a lower population isn’t such a bad thing.
How about, and hear me out here, we start thinking about designing economic and social systems that are not dependant upon growth at all costs. Reflecting the fact that at some point the population will plateau, and this economic and social system needs to be able to sustain itself in that situation.
Population forecasts over the years have been remarkably accurate (for forecasts anyway). And population reflects an indisputable fact. That eventually, it adjusts according to natural resources. We have been somewhat lucky in that through some technological tricks we have managed to expand things like food production (at massive cost to the environment). But at some point we will likely hit a ceiling on this, and we find that it is much harder to magic things necessary to sustain life out of the air.
Just forcing people to breed more hasn’t worked so far. Evidence from South Korea and Japan point to that. I’m not sure what the solution is bar fundamentally changing our economic model away from expansion. But we cannot go on like we are now.
Every environmental problem that we face is due to over-consumption and human over-population: let’s hope the trend continues and governments can’t stop it.
Ya, compared to the 1950’s when the top tax rate was 91%.
On some other news. This week, the Netherlands reached 18 million people. Mostly because of immigration. The population is almost equal in size to New York State, but a lot smaller. NY State has, 141000 km2, while the Netherlands only has 41850 km2. Too many people, too much population, too few houses. I know population decline can cause issues, but there are also good sides to it, at least when you live in an overcrowded area.
I hope not. We’d benefit in the long run with a lower population. There are short term drawbacks but those can be mitigated by clawing back some of the wealth stolen by the billiionaire looter class and then we just get benefits all around.
Billionaires are suddenly realizing that the indentured servants aren’t producing more laborers.
Hang on, I have a complete list of people who care, let me find it.
Here it is:
Falling birthrate is a good thing if you are already into the billions.
Should they turn the tide would be a better question. Wouldn’t one billion people be enough worldwide?
Governments want population reduction. They think there are not enough resources for 8 billion, let alone 9 or 10 billion, and they are right. It is just an unpopular narrative that won’t get voter support, so they say one thing and do another. In 50 years, the world’s population has doubled. Let that sink in… 4 billion in the 1970’s to 8 billion today. That kind of explosive growth of any species is not sustainable.
I think the question is rather: should we turn the tide?
Well, politicizing IVF and other reproductive healthcare certainly isn’t going to help.
Boy after work i have barely time to cook or do sports, furthermore government takes like 40% of my earnings – when tf am i supposed to reproduce or even raise a child?
Why do we want to turn the tide? We are an overpopulated planet.
Short answer: no. Governmental influence is at maximum 0.13 on TFR according to Emanuelle Todd. So no. The main part is how societes are adapted to modern life.
Americans don’t want to recognize it, but this is the only reason they let so many people in at the border. It kept our rate at 2.3 per couple, which means while the world economies get fucked up, we have a faucet we can turn on and off to keep the dance going.
You cant expect me to create workers for your factories if I cannot afford to create workers, while working at your factory.
You wanna turn the tide…sure…actually do something about climate change that actually gives us hope that our children would actually have a future.
Microplastics…fix that issue
Pay people enough to actually afford to live themselves and maybe then they might consider it
When you combine economy, climate change, microplastics, war, and just the way the world is…you can’t give me an actual solid reason to have a child.
Studies show microplastics are killing our cells and you can’t avoid that stuff unless you leave the planet. Climate change is worse than we can imagine…so bad reports suggesting by 2100 temps will be between 5-7…they also stated 4 degrees most the planet becomes uninhabitable and we’ll pass 2 this decade
I’m 42 and can’t afford to move out my parents with no sign things improving.
I wanted kids but when you put all those things together…its selfish to have them now.
Yeah, give us what boomers had, and then we can actually afford having kids.
Let them plumet, our planet is overloaded as it is.
Why would we want to do this? Because we cannot imagine altering the credit-debt cycle?
Lower population is ultimately a good thing. We just need the political and economic structures to make the transition.
You’d have to double my pay and cut my work day in half to get me to have a kid.
Some are trying to force it; while also taking away healthcare, education, and solid infrastructure