3 ms·
Worth highlighting in this video is the discovery in the data by the Economist that more than half of the drop in the US fertility rate is from women aged 15-19
by shadowgovt 2y ago
Worth highlighting in this video is the discovery in the data by the Economist that more than half of the drop in the US fertility rate is from women aged 15-19 choosing to not have children in that age range.
The significant birthrate drop turns out to be an unexpected consequence of a societal goal that various moral actors in the US had been working towards for decades.
- Chris2048 2y agoThe commenter describes them as a "backbone", but I'm a little sceptical - Do we really want an economy propped up by unplanned births, and the unwilling, difficult labour of single parents? Also, they never correlate with actual future tax contributions vs use of services, rendering the raw birthrate comparison meaningless..
- shadowgovt 2y agoSort of a hallmark of American cognitive dissonance about their place in the global economy is the disconnect between the reality on the ground of how their country makes money and what they want the truth of that story to be. In the modern era for example, we know that American agriculture is basically backstopped by undocumented and underdocumented labor of immigrant workers. Successful 100% enforcement of immigration law and border security would result in a food crisis due to a lack of hands to pick the harvest (because farm incomes are not sustainable paying a standard American living wage). Illegal immigration is currently the backbone of the American agricultural economy, and it's an inconvenient truth that Americans like to ignore.