The Biggest Problem Facing Humanity
It's not what you think
Ironically I wrote this yesterday and the WSJ had an article on its cover about it today.
I’m not quite sure how this one has flown under my radar for so long, but now that some news out of China has leaked, I’m obsessed with the #1 problem humanity will face this century, and it’s not climate change, but depopulation.
According to sources, 7.88 million babies were born in China in 2023. That’s compared to 19.7 million in 2012.
That’s a 60% decline in eleven years; the largest peacetime decline in birth rate in all of human history.
And it’s not just China. All over the world, birth rates are plummeting. You’ll have to excuse my lack of sources as most of the information I have vacuumed up about this has come from YouTube videos over the last week of relative quiet at work.
But the US’s birthrate, if I remember correctly, is down 23% from 2006/2007.
Reasons vary, and we’ll get into why, but overall they seem to be based around a few common themes:
Expense of children
Quality of life / work expectations
Increasing education levels
Deteriorating hope for the future
Poor dating/marriage prospects
Let’s go through each one.
Expense of children
I don’t think anyone needs me to get into how or why children are expensive but there are many factors today that didn’t used to exist as I’ve learned recently. For instance, increased urbanization has had a direct effect on decreasing birth rates as the cost of housing large enough to support children has skyrocketed. Additionally, children used to be a form of free labor on farms. Now, they give little back to households so there is less reason to have a large family. And, biggest of all, since almost all families these days are dual income, a child almost always requires the sacrifice of a portion of at least one parent’s income or earning’s potential to be raised, which is quite a trade off. More and more people consider children out of reach financially and are putting it off temporarily or permanently. Although, perhaps paradoxically, birth rate is inversely correlated with wealth although we’ll discuss this in the education section.
Quality of Life / Work Expectations
Let’s face it: people are finding meaning without kids or at least they have a lot more endeavors to pursue without them. Additionally, people are told increasingly that having children is somehow selfish or will hurt the planet. More and more, people are dissuaded from having children in a society dependent upon the next generation. One need look no further than social media to see how consumerist modern society has become. Personally, I find it abhorrent when I see corporations offering to pay for freezing eggs or otherwise helping to promote their workers to delay having children (word to the wise: they are doing this because they want you at your desk, not because they care about you). If companies wanted you to have children, they’d give you a big bonus for each child you had. Think about how many companies do that. Modern people are soaked in beliefs that their careers and consumption should come first before a family and it’s not until rather late in life that many decide it’s about time to get started. Far be it from me to tell anyone how to live their lives (especially as someone without children) but everything in society tells young people that children are not the path to happiness and the falling birth rate at least partially reflects this.
Additionally, I know more people working two jobs now, including many high income earners, than I ever have in my life. After this latest bout of inflation, it’s never seemed harder to get ahead. Corporations these days seem to expect you to devote your entire lives to them (I know my last W-2 job was absolutely abysmal with my boss sometimes waking me up at 2am, even dialing repeatedly to break through my do not disturb) and the idea of taking on the responsibility of a child and the hours involved seems to many frankly absurd with all of the stress already involved just getting by. Some 60% of Americans already live paycheck to paycheck and many wonder, rightfully, if that’s a situation to bring a child into.
Increasing Education Levels
This is a dicey one but several important studies have been done. See, the smarter and more educated and industrialized a nation gets, the faster their birth rate falls. Japan was really the first to experience this. It’s pretty self-explanatory. People are more careful about getting pregnant and make more educated decisions about when and how to have a child. As I said above, birth rates are inversely correlated to wealth. However, what this is really about is those who invest well are better able to make smart financial decisions and they frequently see a child as a poor investment.
Now, here’s the very controversial part. Studies have shown a very direct link between how highly educated women are specifically and falling birth rates. China is a great example of this as the latest generation is the first highly educated generation of women are the vast majority are not interested in marriage or children. Again, this makes perfect sense. The more opportunities women have besides being a wife and mother, the more they may well pick those other opportunities. Nothing wrong with that and a perfectly logical decision.
Mind you, I’m not saying this is a bad thing. I’m just sharing what I’ve learned.
Deteriorating Hope for the Future
This is one I see less of except, say, in comments on Youtube videos and in reddit threads. The question of, “Well, why would I/we want to bring a child into this world?” I have to say, anecdotally, since inflation really set in, I’ve been seeing this more and more. It goes along with a lot of the spending trends in the US right now (so called “doom” spending) which is basically that people don’t have much hope for a better future. Rightfully, many younger people worldwide, especially in developed, expensive countries are wondering why they would burden the next generation with what they already view as a not great living situation. If I really wanted to, I’m sure I could back this up with data such as levels of depression, suicide, etc. but I am pretty sure we all can understand this one.
Poor Dating/Marriage Prospects
Let me tell you…it takes a lot of self control not to write constant articles about this topic. I just bite my tongue. It’s rough out there for both men and women (and it’s both sexes’ fault). And it’s not just the US. I’ve studied what’s going on in China and it’s a disaster too. The internet was supposed to draw us closer and instead it’s driven us further apart than we’ve ever been. Dating apps are horrible, social media and porn make peoples expectations insane, and in general no one knows how to socialize anymore. And dating apps make everyone think they have an endless supply of options. So no one settles and no one settles down together. Did you know boomers had more sexual partners than millennials at the same age? That’s right, they partied harder than we did. We’re the prudes! I’m not even going to wade into this topic anymore. If you want to know more, ask your single friends how good their app dating is going.
Need I bring up that AI partners and sex robots are around the corner? Out of pure curiosity and for research, a few months ago I tried one of the leading AI girlfriend websites for a few hours and was absolutely shocked at how well version 0.1 of this technology already mimicked an emotionally supportive and flirtatious partner, which fulfills a lot of need especially when your other option is nothing. I can easily see this becoming dangerous technology.
Now, some of you may be asking, “So what?” And that’s a good question to ask. With all the fears promulgated about overpopulation over the last 50 years, is it so bad we’re going to have fewer humans? Well, it actually is. See, it’s not so much that this is a problem of actual raw population but a problem of demographics.
Take a look at this.
This is the age demographic chart of the United States as of July 2022. Now, in a healthy society, this looks like a triangle. There should be few old people, more middle aged, and even more younger people. For much of human history, that’s what the US and every other growing country’s chart looked like.
But look what is happening already. The lowest end of the chart is not only not larger than the middle, it’s smaller.
That’s disastrous.
What that means is an aging population and tax base with no one to replace them. I.e. increased costs on a system with no one to generate revenue. Furthermore, those older people will need workers and other people to help take care of them (not to mention financial support), and if the younger generation isn’t significantly larger, it all falls apart.
This is where the problem lies, and it’s not solved by any different governmental system whether it be capitalism, socialism, etc.. You simply need to have a growing population or at least a sustained population to maintain a country and functioning economy. Otherwise, the wheels fall off very, very quickly.
Now, major powers have realized this for a while now.
Why do you think Europe and the US have been letting in as many immigrants as they can?
They are increasing their population through means other than births simply because they see this issue coming and know they need to deal with it one way or another. It’s really that simple.
There’s a lot more to this than I can put into one article and in my typical format. This was meant as a primer. Look for more coming. I hoe you enjoyed this. Happy New Year.