4 ms·

So long as population is growing, we'll trade farmland for housing. It's not popular to say that we have multiples of the necessary population to ensure humanit

So long as population is growing, we'll trade farmland for housing. It's not popular to say that we have multiples of the necessary population to ensure humanity's continuation.

nemomarx 2y ago
shrinking population means no continually growing economy and explodes our pension/ social security systems, so it's necessarily unpopular. you'd need some revamps to the economy first. of course having a lot of kids is also not that popular in the West, so.
- PaulHoule 2y ago
  I think even less popular in the sinosphere.
- mhog_hn 2y ago
  “Howdy young fellas, please work hard to support the pensions of my NIMBY generation! Maybe if you work hard you also get to have a house once you reach the retirement age :-)”
- bobthepanda 2y ago
  having kids is not popular anywhere rich and modern enough. the only OECD country with fertility rate above 2.1 is Israel and that's mostly because they have a highly fertile minority that eschews much of modern life.
- vinyl7 2y ago
  I think the oligarchs are betting on AI and robots to replace us peons
- WarOnPrivacy 2y ago
  > of course having a lot of kids is also not that popular in the West, so. A twenty-fold increase in parenting time (from my parents' generation) + our modern 4 income economy = no clear path for typical_income couples to start families.
- rufus_foreman 2y ago
  >> shrinking population means no continually growing economy "The U.S. Census Bureau today released July 1, 2024, population estimates for the nation and states. The U.S. population reached 340.1 million, up 0.98% from 336.8 million on July 1, 2023 — the highest year-over-year increase since a jump of 0.99% between 2000 and 2001." -- https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2024/12/population-estimates.html https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2024/12/population-es...
- tzs 2y ago
  I'm not sure pensions/social security systems would be infeasible without a growing population. When they operate by having the payments into the system from current workers pay for the benefits of retired workers then yes, you may need a continually growing workforce to keep them going. But if the payments in by workers were put into a fund that invested conservatively with the goal of just keeping up with inflation, that could be sufficient to grow enough to pay for their benefits when they retire. I recently calculated if such a system would have worked with my US Social Security (SS) taxes. At ssa.gov you can download a record of all your reported earnings by year. They also have tables for converting amounts from past years to current dollars. I believe the conversion is based on income percentiles rather than inflation, but from what I've been able to tell those are reasonable close to each other. For example I see that in 1986 I earned exactly $42 000. In today's wages that would be $161 537. From another table at ssa.gov I see that in 1986 they would have withheld 5.7% of my pay for SS, and my employer would have also paid 5.7%, so that is $4 788 contributed to SS, which in today's dollars $18 415. If all of that was just put in an account somewhere that earned just enough to just keep up with inflation it would have enough that if I retired next year it could pay my monthly SS benefit for 16 years. The life expectancy of a US male at the age I will be next year is 18 years, so that's pretty close. I did another calculation where I assumed that my monthly SS contributions went into a fund that each month earned interest at a rate that matched the current T-bill rate. That turned out to not earn as much, but still earned enough to pay my monthly SS benefit for around 14 years. If we assume that some of the fund especially when the worker is far from retirement is invested in something that aims for better growth than merely keeping up with inflation, but still is reasonably safe, there should be no trouble growing it to enough that when the worker retires the fund has enough to cover their benefits until death. I did a similar calculation with my Medicare contributions. My total contributions for that, in today's dollars, are such that if I start Medicare next year would be enough that if paid monthly over my life expectancy and put toward the premiums from a health insurance plan from my state's ACA marketplace the amount the amount extra I'd have to pay monthly is pretty close to the current Medicare premium. As with SS, if the contributions were managed for more growth than just keeping up with inflation, but still conservatively, it would be enough for an ACA marketplace plan. I wonder if there are any pension/social security systems that actually work like that?
WarOnPrivacy 2y ago
> we'll trade farmland for housing. Shrinking birthrates aside, we have undeveloped land near population centers - but it tends to be dominated by counterdevelopment mindsets (NIMBY, onerous zoning).

So long as population is growing, we'll trade farmland for housing. It's not popular to say that we have multiples of the necessary population to ensure humanity's continuation.

nemomarx 2y ago

shrinking population means no continually growing economy and explodes our pension/ social security systems, so it's necessarily unpopular. you'd need some revamps to the economy first. of course having a lot of kids is also not that popular in the West, so.

PaulHoule 2y ago
I think even less popular in the sinosphere.
mhog_hn 2y ago
“Howdy young fellas, please work hard to support the pensions of my NIMBY generation! Maybe if you work hard you also get to have a house once you reach the retirement age :-)”
bobthepanda 2y ago
having kids is not popular anywhere rich and modern enough. the only OECD country with fertility rate above 2.1 is Israel and that's mostly because they have a highly fertile minority that eschews much of modern life.
vinyl7 2y ago
I think the oligarchs are betting on AI and robots to replace us peons
WarOnPrivacy 2y ago
> of course having a lot of kids is also not that popular in the West, so. A twenty-fold increase in parenting time (from my parents' generation) + our modern 4 income economy = no clear path for typical_income couples to start families.
rufus_foreman 2y ago
>> shrinking population means no continually growing economy "The U.S. Census Bureau today released July 1, 2024, population estimates for the nation and states. The U.S. population reached 340.1 million, up 0.98% from 336.8 million on July 1, 2023 — the highest year-over-year increase since a jump of 0.99% between 2000 and 2001." -- https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2024/12/population-estimates.html https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2024/12/population-es...
tzs 2y ago
I'm not sure pensions/social security systems would be infeasible without a growing population. When they operate by having the payments into the system from current workers pay for the benefits of retired workers then yes, you may need a continually growing workforce to keep them going. But if the payments in by workers were put into a fund that invested conservatively with the goal of just keeping up with inflation, that could be sufficient to grow enough to pay for their benefits when they retire. I recently calculated if such a system would have worked with my US Social Security (SS) taxes. At ssa.gov you can download a record of all your reported earnings by year. They also have tables for converting amounts from past years to current dollars. I believe the conversion is based on income percentiles rather than inflation, but from what I've been able to tell those are reasonable close to each other. For example I see that in 1986 I earned exactly $42 000. In today's wages that would be $161 537. From another table at ssa.gov I see that in 1986 they would have withheld 5.7% of my pay for SS, and my employer would have also paid 5.7%, so that is $4 788 contributed to SS, which in today's dollars $18 415. If all of that was just put in an account somewhere that earned just enough to just keep up with inflation it would have enough that if I retired next year it could pay my monthly SS benefit for 16 years. The life expectancy of a US male at the age I will be next year is 18 years, so that's pretty close. I did another calculation where I assumed that my monthly SS contributions went into a fund that each month earned interest at a rate that matched the current T-bill rate. That turned out to not earn as much, but still earned enough to pay my monthly SS benefit for around 14 years. If we assume that some of the fund especially when the worker is far from retirement is invested in something that aims for better growth than merely keeping up with inflation, but still is reasonably safe, there should be no trouble growing it to enough that when the worker retires the fund has enough to cover their benefits until death. I did a similar calculation with my Medicare contributions. My total contributions for that, in today's dollars, are such that if I start Medicare next year would be enough that if paid monthly over my life expectancy and put toward the premiums from a health insurance plan from my state's ACA marketplace the amount the amount extra I'd have to pay monthly is pretty close to the current Medicare premium. As with SS, if the contributions were managed for more growth than just keeping up with inflation, but still conservatively, it would be enough for an ACA marketplace plan. I wonder if there are any pension/social security systems that actually work like that?

WarOnPrivacy 2y ago

> we'll trade farmland for housing. Shrinking birthrates aside, we have undeveloped land near population centers - but it tends to be dominated by counterdevelopment mindsets (NIMBY, onerous zoning).