3 ms·

> "With the Industrial Revolution, according to Galor, the value of human capital reached the point that parents chose to have fewer children and invest more in

by qiskit 4y ago

> "With the Industrial Revolution, according to Galor, the value of human capital reached the point that parents chose to have fewer children and invest more in their upbringing." Parents didn't "choose" to have fewer kids. The leaders of industrialized/industrializing nations encouraged/demanded/brainwashed people into having less children - both foreign and domestic. I guess being forced or brainwashed into having fewer kids is the saming thing as "choosing". It isn't that parents chose to have fewer kids and invest more in their upbringing. It's that the elites wanted fewer children so that parents could spend more time at work making more money for them. It's about extracting the most value from a population. Of course the flip side is eugenics. Where we encourage/fund/order the third world countries to have less children. The first major experiment was in hong kong where the british founded the eugenics league in the 1930s and encouraged a 2 child policy on the chinese people there.

notch656a 4y ago
It's also worth noting that the incentives and economics for having kids have changed in other ways. Having kids is a privatized loss with socialized gains. The parent is responsible for the costs. Even if one walks away, they are on the hook for 20% of their gross to pay for the upbringing. Socialized gains: everyone benefits from the tax the child pays after the parents finish raising the child. Many elderly and disabled benefit from the social security the tax the child will pay after they're raised. These recipients of social welfare benefit whether they had children themselves or not. It's a massive personal investment, and then once the child is an adult society taps the child as their tax piggy bank, with only the smallest tax offsets to the parent for raising the child. Counter this with the ways of old, where the child's contribution to the elderly was generally done through the family structure rather than through compelled taxes to general public elderly via social security, even those who didn't raise children. This incentive structure means the childless disproportionately benefit from the socialized gains and those with many children, assuming they raised them without welfare, almost assuredly disproportionately do not recoup the socialized gains after subtracting the personal losses. The stakes have gone up as well. CPS, child welfare laws, nosy neighbors, and all manner of other much stricter enforcement have emerged in the past 50 years. Before you could let your child play out on the street alone if they were ready at age, say 7. Now if you do that in the wrong place, many people will call CPS, at no risk to themselves and in fact in an extreme act of unconstitutional perversion you are not allowed to face your accuser who are protected as 'anonymous'. Many people are looking to crucify the parent they see making any perceived error, and the state apparatus has been vastly expanded to rush down and 'save the children' and destroy you in the process. This enforced coddling of children from every perceived outdoor 'danger' destroys the development of the child and improperly robs the parent of the ability to focus on other tasks, further yet destroying the will of the parent to make the mistake of raising another child. Note: there are some caveats to this: obviously the childless pay higher taxes and also K-12 is partially publicly funded, but these only damper the effects.
- jltsiren 4y ago
  The change has been stronger in the US than in Europe. While having kids is also a net economic loss in Europe, European countries tend to spend more public money on funding things like parental leaves, childcare, and education. I don't know if that has any significant effect on birth rates. Socialized gains apply to the entire economic contribution of the child, not only to the part that is paid as taxes. Your private retirement savings are worth something only because other people continue working and producing things.
  - dragonwriter 4y ago
    > European countries tend to spend more public money on funding things like parental leaves, childcare, and education. I don't know if that has any significant effect on birth rates. Yes, stronger social support networks consistently produce lower birthrates. A reason which has been suggested for this is that without such programs, children serve as a kind of safety net, in that familial bonds mean that a sufficient number of them means the parents (and siblings) are more likely to have support if they become unable to support themselves or have temporarily greater support needs. Where there is a strong public support system, this is less necessary.
- CMCDragonkai 4y ago
  Does that mean that the childless should deserve no social welfare?

by qiskit 4y ago

notch656a 4y ago

It's also worth noting that the incentives and economics for having kids have changed in other ways. Having kids is a privatized loss with socialized gains. The parent is responsible for the costs. Even if one walks away, they are on the hook for 20% of their gross to pay for the upbringing. Socialized gains: everyone benefits from the tax the child pays after the parents finish raising the child. Many elderly and disabled benefit from the social security the tax the child will pay after they're raised. These recipients of social welfare benefit whether they had children themselves or not. It's a massive personal investment, and then once the child is an adult society taps the child as their tax piggy bank, with only the smallest tax offsets to the parent for raising the child. Counter this with the ways of old, where the child's contribution to the elderly was generally done through the family structure rather than through compelled taxes to general public elderly via social security, even those who didn't raise children. This incentive structure means the childless disproportionately benefit from the socialized gains and those with many children, assuming they raised them without welfare, almost assuredly disproportionately do not recoup the socialized gains after subtracting the personal losses. The stakes have gone up as well. CPS, child welfare laws, nosy neighbors, and all manner of other much stricter enforcement have emerged in the past 50 years. Before you could let your child play out on the street alone if they were ready at age, say 7. Now if you do that in the wrong place, many people will call CPS, at no risk to themselves and in fact in an extreme act of unconstitutional perversion you are not allowed to face your accuser who are protected as 'anonymous'. Many people are looking to crucify the parent they see making any perceived error, and the state apparatus has been vastly expanded to rush down and 'save the children' and destroy you in the process. This enforced coddling of children from every perceived outdoor 'danger' destroys the development of the child and improperly robs the parent of the ability to focus on other tasks, further yet destroying the will of the parent to make the mistake of raising another child. Note: there are some caveats to this: obviously the childless pay higher taxes and also K-12 is partially publicly funded, but these only damper the effects.

jltsiren 4y ago
The change has been stronger in the US than in Europe. While having kids is also a net economic loss in Europe, European countries tend to spend more public money on funding things like parental leaves, childcare, and education. I don't know if that has any significant effect on birth rates. Socialized gains apply to the entire economic contribution of the child, not only to the part that is paid as taxes. Your private retirement savings are worth something only because other people continue working and producing things.
- dragonwriter 4y ago
  > European countries tend to spend more public money on funding things like parental leaves, childcare, and education. I don't know if that has any significant effect on birth rates. Yes, stronger social support networks consistently produce lower birthrates. A reason which has been suggested for this is that without such programs, children serve as a kind of safety net, in that familial bonds mean that a sufficient number of them means the parents (and siblings) are more likely to have support if they become unable to support themselves or have temporarily greater support needs. Where there is a strong public support system, this is less necessary.
CMCDragonkai 4y ago
Does that mean that the childless should deserve no social welfare?