3 ms·

The weirdest part is that I’m pretty sure women generally want a replacement rate (or more!) number of children when surveyed, but feel like they’re unable to s

The weirdest part is that I’m pretty sure women generally want a replacement rate (or more!) number of children when surveyed, but feel like they’re unable to support that number. Why can’t we address those? Edited to ask: some replies seemed skeptical so I went to find what I based this idea off of. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/13/upshot/american-fertility-is-falling-short-of-what-women-want.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/13/upshot/american-fertility... https://ifstudies.org/blog/how-many-kids-do-women-want https://ifstudies.org/blog/how-many-kids-do-women-want

yablak 3y ago
lol citation needed.
- SamoyedFurFluff 3y ago
  So I googled this and I don’t seem to be wrong. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/13/upshot/american-fertility-is-falling-short-of-what-women-want.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/13/upshot/american-fertility...
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago
    Being pregnant, birthing kids, breastfeeding them, and raising them to age ~3 sucks for a woman. It could just be that evolution did not bestow humans with a sufficiently easy and risk free process to reproduce, hence the price women demand is too high (in an environment where women can actually price their sacrifice in birthing and raising children due to achieving in financial independence).
    - fredski42 3y ago
      So, is emancipation to blame?
      - yablak 3y ago
        Why "blame"? Having more children is not somehow a noble good. Unless you're one of those "every sperm is sacred" types.
philosopher1234 3y ago
I'm sure the American allergy to welfare/social safety has something to do with it.
- srl 3y ago
  The American allergy to welfare and social safety has caused _global_ fertility to collapse?
  - refulgentis 3y ago
    its not global so much as prosperity-trap nations, there's enough of those these days (c.f. China) that it lets you say that generally globally, its true
    - milsorgen 3y ago
      There were predictions 10+ years ago that illustrated this _global_ trend. One stuck with me in particular, I might of found it through /. or Ars, not sure can't find the exact paper. But it predicted all but a handful of nations would be at or below replacement rates by 2050. It was spattering of African countries and Yemen. I think there was one another non African country but it escapes me. It stuck with me because I scoffed at the idea, yet every year and now seemingly every week we see more and more data that shows we are quickly lining up with that prediction. I don't think we'll be able to navigate this decline with any semblance of grace. Not with the state of our culture and politics. We'll see tremendous instability leading to further erosion of rights, we'll see wealth inequality skyrocket... I mean we are barely even talking about the birth rate issue let alone at a point where we could perhaps have strategies to confront this rapidly approaching future.
- sneed_chucker 3y ago
  maybe, but American fertility rates are equal or higher than countries like Sweden, Norway, and Finland which have great welfare and social safety nets.
TheArcane 3y ago
ah the widely cited "I'm pretty sure" statistic
hindsightbias 3y ago
Perhaps SV needs to disrupt the existing moribund market. Think bootcamp contracts, but targeted to infants. Pay to... exist. If you believe IQ is all genetics, there should be at least ~250K players in the SV market.
- btown 3y ago
  https://modest.io/proposal https://modest.io/proposal
svnt 3y ago
Elon is on it. Saving the world again.
bcrosby95 3y ago
Some of it is a real concern, such as cost associated. Some of it is pressures we put on ourselves: a lot of people think you basically need to be perfect to be a parent. No one is perfect, and I see a lot of shit from people without kids expecting parents to be so.
lynx23 3y ago
I am not sure it always just boils down to resources. I know cases where she decided to have no more kids after her first, because she realized raising kids is psychologically stressful. Being able to take the easy way out is definitely a factor, the question is how much it weights.
bombcar 3y ago
Surveys in general like this are kind of useless, you have to see what people actually do. Almost everyone when surveyed says they want to reduce pollution and help the environment, but do they actually do things (especially things that inconvenience them)?
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

yablak 3y ago

lol citation needed.

SamoyedFurFluff 3y ago
So I googled this and I don’t seem to be wrong. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/13/upshot/american-fertility-is-falling-short-of-what-women-want.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/13/upshot/american-fertility...
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  Being pregnant, birthing kids, breastfeeding them, and raising them to age ~3 sucks for a woman. It could just be that evolution did not bestow humans with a sufficiently easy and risk free process to reproduce, hence the price women demand is too high (in an environment where women can actually price their sacrifice in birthing and raising children due to achieving in financial independence).
  - fredski42 3y ago
    So, is emancipation to blame?
    - yablak 3y ago
      Why "blame"? Having more children is not somehow a noble good. Unless you're one of those "every sperm is sacred" types.

philosopher1234 3y ago

I'm sure the American allergy to welfare/social safety has something to do with it.

srl 3y ago
The American allergy to welfare and social safety has caused _global_ fertility to collapse?
- refulgentis 3y ago
  its not global so much as prosperity-trap nations, there's enough of those these days (c.f. China) that it lets you say that generally globally, its true
  - milsorgen 3y ago
    There were predictions 10+ years ago that illustrated this _global_ trend. One stuck with me in particular, I might of found it through /. or Ars, not sure can't find the exact paper. But it predicted all but a handful of nations would be at or below replacement rates by 2050. It was spattering of African countries and Yemen. I think there was one another non African country but it escapes me. It stuck with me because I scoffed at the idea, yet every year and now seemingly every week we see more and more data that shows we are quickly lining up with that prediction. I don't think we'll be able to navigate this decline with any semblance of grace. Not with the state of our culture and politics. We'll see tremendous instability leading to further erosion of rights, we'll see wealth inequality skyrocket... I mean we are barely even talking about the birth rate issue let alone at a point where we could perhaps have strategies to confront this rapidly approaching future.
sneed_chucker 3y ago
maybe, but American fertility rates are equal or higher than countries like Sweden, Norway, and Finland which have great welfare and social safety nets.

TheArcane 3y ago

ah the widely cited "I'm pretty sure" statistic

hindsightbias 3y ago

Perhaps SV needs to disrupt the existing moribund market. Think bootcamp contracts, but targeted to infants. Pay to... exist. If you believe IQ is all genetics, there should be at least ~250K players in the SV market.

btown 3y ago
https://modest.io/proposal https://modest.io/proposal

svnt 3y ago

Elon is on it. Saving the world again.

bcrosby95 3y ago

Some of it is a real concern, such as cost associated. Some of it is pressures we put on ourselves: a lot of people think you basically need to be perfect to be a parent. No one is perfect, and I see a lot of shit from people without kids expecting parents to be so.

lynx23 3y ago

I am not sure it always just boils down to resources. I know cases where she decided to have no more kids after her first, because she realized raising kids is psychologically stressful. Being able to take the easy way out is definitely a factor, the question is how much it weights.

bombcar 3y ago

Surveys in general like this are kind of useless, you have to see what people actually do. Almost everyone when surveyed says they want to reduce pollution and help the environment, but do they actually do things (especially things that inconvenience them)?

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]