Reads like a pretty standard conservative argument regarding this subject to me. The fertility rate decline is real and while the article is a bit handwavey and doesn’t really bring concrete evidence to support their points, it does at the very minimum correctly identify that continually expanding childbearing benefits does very little to increase overall fertility, which indicates that there may be other things suppressing fertility (such as cost of living, desire for educational and career attainment, poor dating and relationship formation prospects, the over-digitization of life and associated social media brainrot, the death of third places, the elongation of adolescence, and a plethora of other things).
Fifth-Dimension-1966 on
What this article misses is that I don’t really see how sending kids to religious schools will actually increase religiosity
afkas17 on
The overwhelming majority of my medical school class used and needed GRAD + loans, I have no idea how this author plans on having nearly enough Drs, Dentists, Optometrists, Physical therapists, pharmacist or a whole host of other health professionals if those are eliminated.
JumentousPetrichor on
Are there really enough people going to grad school to make a difference?
On the religion thing part, I do worry that fundamentalism will increase in power if fundamentalists are disproportionately having kids. But, “have more kids so that the fanatics won’t replace us” isn’t a very effective message.
EpicChungusGamers on
No social security benefits for those without kids 😤
jurble on
Actual answer to boost birthrates:
Ban tractors, pesticides and fertilizer.
Food costs become 90% of household expenditure and people return to subsistence farming as large mechanized farms are broken up into millions of family plots, children become a cheap source of labor.
Also the millions of people starving to death will leave many individuals with devastated social circles and they will have children to fill the holes in their hearts left by all their dead friends and family, maybe.
Mddcat04 on
This article was written by two PhDs. Ironic.
Women’s education levels have been long shown to reduce fertility rates (which used to be argued as a positive externality back when we were concerned about overpopulation). So it’s not really a surprise that this is where conservatives will end up. And of course women need to be indoctrinated by a religious “education” that tells them that god wants them to pump out kids.
Horrific.
CzaroftheUniverse on
People don’t like the answer to this problem. There’s no solution compatible with a liberal democracy. Simply increasing child benefits doesn’t work.
kiwibutterket on
There is some merit to the argument, if one reads it in good faith. A good part of these arguments is actually shared by leftists and liberals only with a different reframe.
>We need to consider how existing government programs may be suppressing fertility rates and how reforming or eliminating those programs could make a significant difference.
This is just true. Incentives are important to consider when making policies.
>Education policy offers two prime examples of how government programs suppress fertility rates. People are more likely to have children if they start having families earlier […]. Yet current education policies push people to delay having families until they are much older […]
>The Grad Plus program, which offers unlimited loan amounts for graduate school, induces more people to remain even longer in school for graduate degrees.
>[…] we deem our 20-somethings unqualified to do much of anything and expect them to remain in school for years, accumulating credentials with the help of government subsidies before we let them tackle real adult responsibilities.
>Obviously, higher education can have significant economic and social benefits. But it does not follow that we should push everyone to go to university and remain in school indefinitely. There are diminishing returns to education. Ever-expanding educational attainment—often the result of government credentialing requirements—comes at the expense of fertility.
This is also true. Excessive requirements are damaging, and people on the left have been complaining about needing a bachelor’s degree for any entry level job. University programs are not actually required to hold most jobs and do them well. Simpler and shorter training programs could be sufficient in many cases.
I disagree profoundly with the religious argument on a moral level, so I don’t want to address it at all.
But there is merit in the idea of shortening the time *required* in higher education to hold white collar jobs that shouldn’t be discarded. It would allow people more freedom to live their lives as their wish, and to be less burdened with debt.
PaulKrugmanStan on
>Alexander Hamilton was 22 when he became George Washington’s aide-de-camp and helped direct the war of independence. Albert Einstein was 26 when he published a paper on his special theory of relativity. Yet we deem our 20-somethings unqualified to do much of anything and expect them to remain in school for years, accumulating credentials with the help of government subsidies before we let them tackle real adult responsibilities.
Maybe because society has gotten significantly better at doing these jobs to the point where a 25 year old won’t be qualified? Getting rid of college isn’t gonna make 25 year olds be able to lead the US military or make groundbreaking scientific breakthroughs ffs
38CFRM21 on
Just tax childlessness lol
MuscularPhysicist on
Just let immigrants in lol
admiraltarkin on
I planned on engaging with the article in good faith, but couldn’t even get to the article before they fully de-legitimized themselves
14 Comments
Just tax not having children
Oh wait we already do that
Reads like a pretty standard conservative argument regarding this subject to me. The fertility rate decline is real and while the article is a bit handwavey and doesn’t really bring concrete evidence to support their points, it does at the very minimum correctly identify that continually expanding childbearing benefits does very little to increase overall fertility, which indicates that there may be other things suppressing fertility (such as cost of living, desire for educational and career attainment, poor dating and relationship formation prospects, the over-digitization of life and associated social media brainrot, the death of third places, the elongation of adolescence, and a plethora of other things).
What this article misses is that I don’t really see how sending kids to religious schools will actually increase religiosity
The overwhelming majority of my medical school class used and needed GRAD + loans, I have no idea how this author plans on having nearly enough Drs, Dentists, Optometrists, Physical therapists, pharmacist or a whole host of other health professionals if those are eliminated.
Are there really enough people going to grad school to make a difference?
On the religion thing part, I do worry that fundamentalism will increase in power if fundamentalists are disproportionately having kids. But, “have more kids so that the fanatics won’t replace us” isn’t a very effective message.
No social security benefits for those without kids 😤
Actual answer to boost birthrates:
Ban tractors, pesticides and fertilizer.
Food costs become 90% of household expenditure and people return to subsistence farming as large mechanized farms are broken up into millions of family plots, children become a cheap source of labor.
Also the millions of people starving to death will leave many individuals with devastated social circles and they will have children to fill the holes in their hearts left by all their dead friends and family, maybe.
This article was written by two PhDs. Ironic.
Women’s education levels have been long shown to reduce fertility rates (which used to be argued as a positive externality back when we were concerned about overpopulation). So it’s not really a surprise that this is where conservatives will end up. And of course women need to be indoctrinated by a religious “education” that tells them that god wants them to pump out kids.
Horrific.
People don’t like the answer to this problem. There’s no solution compatible with a liberal democracy. Simply increasing child benefits doesn’t work.
There is some merit to the argument, if one reads it in good faith. A good part of these arguments is actually shared by leftists and liberals only with a different reframe.
>We need to consider how existing government programs may be suppressing fertility rates and how reforming or eliminating those programs could make a significant difference.
This is just true. Incentives are important to consider when making policies.
>Education policy offers two prime examples of how government programs suppress fertility rates. People are more likely to have children if they start having families earlier […]. Yet current education policies push people to delay having families until they are much older […]
>The Grad Plus program, which offers unlimited loan amounts for graduate school, induces more people to remain even longer in school for graduate degrees.
>[…] we deem our 20-somethings unqualified to do much of anything and expect them to remain in school for years, accumulating credentials with the help of government subsidies before we let them tackle real adult responsibilities.
>Obviously, higher education can have significant economic and social benefits. But it does not follow that we should push everyone to go to university and remain in school indefinitely. There are diminishing returns to education. Ever-expanding educational attainment—often the result of government credentialing requirements—comes at the expense of fertility.
This is also true. Excessive requirements are damaging, and people on the left have been complaining about needing a bachelor’s degree for any entry level job. University programs are not actually required to hold most jobs and do them well. Simpler and shorter training programs could be sufficient in many cases.
I disagree profoundly with the religious argument on a moral level, so I don’t want to address it at all.
But there is merit in the idea of shortening the time *required* in higher education to hold white collar jobs that shouldn’t be discarded. It would allow people more freedom to live their lives as their wish, and to be less burdened with debt.
>Alexander Hamilton was 22 when he became George Washington’s aide-de-camp and helped direct the war of independence. Albert Einstein was 26 when he published a paper on his special theory of relativity. Yet we deem our 20-somethings unqualified to do much of anything and expect them to remain in school for years, accumulating credentials with the help of government subsidies before we let them tackle real adult responsibilities.
Maybe because society has gotten significantly better at doing these jobs to the point where a 25 year old won’t be qualified? Getting rid of college isn’t gonna make 25 year olds be able to lead the US military or make groundbreaking scientific breakthroughs ffs
Just tax childlessness lol
Just let immigrants in lol
I planned on engaging with the article in good faith, but couldn’t even get to the article before they fully de-legitimized themselves
https://preview.redd.it/mwx51cml3b7e1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=89ea65d14a7b675924219636c131644600c386ad