Why has the industrialized world failed to solve the low population birth problem?

Deep Dish

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The problem is feminism.

When low fertility rates are framed as a good thing, people openly acknowledge it's caused by women's education. When framed as a bad thing, human extinction, people suddenly act as if they have no idea what's causing it, something else must be done, because they don't want to take away women's rights.

When you try to take away women's rights, you will be painted as monster.

Feminism is a self-correcting problem. Either we will take away women's rights (which won't happen) or society will collapse.

Feminism is like terminal cancer. Once gynocentrism takes over as the dominant force in society, there's no chance of reversal, no chance of fixing the problem before societal collapse.
 

AmsterdamAssassin

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I'm just raising my daughter to become the first female world dictator.
 

BillyPilgrim

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To lower the overall world IQ. Have the poor countries overbreed, then ship them off to the industrialized ones. Even if the boats don't float.

Once the world is dumb enough, they won't notice or be able to stop the things being done to kill people off.
 
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BackInTheGame78

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This has been an issue since the late 20th century and now you are starting to see the US and even China get affected by it. Why has this problem been put under the sand for so long?
China did it to themselves by their strict enforcement of a 1 birth policy.
 

Pierce Manhammer

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Yes, China officially ended its one-child policy in 2015, switching to a two-child policy to address the challenges of an aging population and a shrinking workforce. In 2021, recognizing the continuing demographic challenges, the Chinese government further relaxed this policy, allowing couples to have up to three children. This change was in response to lower birth rates and the looming issue of an aging society, which could potentially lead to economic and social strains.
 

sangheilios

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Earth's population continues to rise, so it's challenging to make that case.

The United States had a population of 250 million in 1990 and now is over 330 million.
That's due to immigration, increased life expectancy and population momentum. The U.S has actually had a fertility rate BELOW replacement for quite a long time now, decades in fact.
 

sangheilios

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There are a lot of factors involved with this, some of which the others have touched upon.

The biggest one is by far the invention of female contraceptives (birth control, etc.). This has basically allowed women to choose when and if they have children.

When this technology emerged, we also start to see women pursuing college and careers. There's nothing necessarily wrong with this, but it ultimately leads to women postponing marriage, children, etc. The mothers of the boomer generation were already married AND had children by the time they were in their early to mid 20s. In fact, it wasn't unusual for women to be married at 18 lol. It also was the norm to marry the first man they had sex with, were dating, etc. In contrast, boomer women may have dated and had sex with multiple men before getting married to their husbands, having children, etc. This causes some profound changes with pair bonding for sure.

Though this wasn't as common in the boomer generation, younger generations of women are often heavily pursuing high levels of educational and career attainment. This further delays the process of marriage and children, often not even being remotely on their radar until they are well into their 30s. The other issue that this has is these women become increasingly pickier and demand a man of at least their own "value". This renders their dating pool much more limited and when you combine this with them being over 30 it's highly likely they will not get married. I saw a stat that if a woman is unmarried/single AND childless at 30 she has something like a 50% chance that she will never have kids.

I also believe that there is overall much less societal/culture value placed upon marriage and children today compared to what you would have seen with previous generations. A big part of this I personally believe is that many millennial and gen z individuals, both men and women, grew up in divorced or single parent households. It's totally easy to see why someone like this may be hesitant to get married. Many divorces are/were honestly quite intense and I believe could emotional scar the children that are caught in the middle of it.

Getting the female equivalent out of the way.

Economic factors are also a huge part of this. Back in 1950 a man could support his wife and children on his income alone. Over the decades, this changed to where both husband and wife may have to work. This leads to family planning, only have 2 kids, etc. More recently, we are seeing many adults struggling to get by on their own. Imagine living pay check to pay check to barely scrape by, or having to pick up a side hustle or part time job to make ends meet. Dating and relationships go on the back burner for sure. @Solomon posted some article about how people aren't even able to afford a simple date and needing to go into debt for it lol. Let's say you are in a relationship, any sane person wouldn't go and have a child when they are in this spot financially lol. Side note, I legitimately don't understand how the poor and underemployed class gets by, let alone when they have a bunch of children.

I partially wonder if this is all by design to depopulate the planet OR just the side effects of the very rich trying to milk everyone or everything they have.
 

MatureDJ

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Earth's population continues to rise, so it's challenging to make that case.

The United States had a population of 250 million in 1990 and now is over 330 million.
That's mostly due to immigration, especially illegal/asylum.
 

MatureDJ

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The birth control pill is the answer and the culprit.

People no longer need to have children as labor for their own survival. The richer and more advanced a country becomes, the less fertile they are. That's just a reality of how it works.

Kids are also really expensive. Especially when mommy decides that her career is more important and the kids are shipped off to daycare.

There is nothing to solve. We're living in the slowdown of human population growth. We'll adapt as we always have. If we can avoid destroying ourselves, automation will fill in the gap.

As far as I'm concerned, the less people in the world, the better.
It's more that when folks are poor, the kids can be poor (so long as they are not starving), and so they don't cost much; when folks are wealthy, they must spend a lot of money on their kids.
 
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