# Is There Any Practical Way to Increase the Birthrate? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 6, 2025, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655 "2025-01-06T20:41:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 59
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1161 "2025-05-18T15:22:56Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > Humans are thought to have been at least partially responsible for the extinction of megafauna in North America. > > The Maori hunted the Moa to extinction in New Zealand (and the eagle that used to prey on them also went extinct). There’s nothing new about lack of environmental awareness. Indigenous Australians burned woodland to flush out game and create more favorable hunting grounds. Everyone knows about Native Americans using buffalo jumps, but they only seem remarkable because Europeans had never seen it before. Humans used cliffs and even constructed walls to herd massive numbers of wild animals to the slaughter since the Paleolithic. In most places on the planet, the evidence is long gone; but we can find evidence in places like Doggerland, where such a wall still exists under the water, nearly undisturbed and over a kilometer long. It was built at least 11,000 years ago. We have been causing massive environmental changes for as long as we have existed. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1162 "2025-05-18T15:27:59Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > Either you’ve misunderstood my position, or you’re strawmanning it. Not strawmanning and I am failing to see how it is anything other than the arguments you’ve made. I cannot see where I have not understood what you’ve said in many ways in many posts. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1163 "2025-05-18T15:39:57Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > And to reduce my ignorance: is there a specific name for the fallacy you’ve engaged in? It is not _ad hominem_ really but that’s close. It is one that occurs with medical and mental health conditions with some regularity … “if you don’t have my condition you can’t understand it so I won’t engage with the content you say.” It’s standpoint epistemology. 😂 ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1164 "2025-05-18T15:41:09Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > We have been causing massive environmental changes for as long as we have existed. I will concur. And yes _even with_ much smaller populations we’ve contributed to regional disasters. Maybe megafauna in North America would have survived a climate change event if humans were not also of growing population hunting them so well. Maybe a smaller human population for the space constraints would have left enough moa to maintain. (I don’t think the controlled burn practices were designed to be environmentally friendly but FWIW they are being readopted as being such.) There is a point, that arguably we are already at, where human population size and more so correlated impact, is of existential threat to world able to sustain the ecosystems that allow our civilizations. That is more our limiting factor than food supply. Technology _may_ offer solutions, and _when_ they have been implemented then further growth can be sustained safely. Further growth before such has occurred is reckless. Rapid decline is not advisable. Agree that societies dropping rapidly economically are going to think selfishly short term rather than invest in the future. Maintaining or gradual decline is however sustainable without returning to preindustrial standards. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1165 "2025-05-18T16:00:44Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > Technology _may_ offer solutions, and _when_ they have been implemented then further growth can be sustained safely. Further growth before such has occurred is reckless. > > Rapid decline is not advisable. AFAIK China instituted its one child policy with the intention of not just stabilising the population, but shrinking it, under the belief that a smaller population would allow for a higher standard of living. Now, I regularly see people saying the opposite: that the resultant aging and decline of the population spells economic doom for China, and that Paul Ehrlich is responsible for preventing China overtaking the US as superpower. Leaving aside the ethical aspects, what do you think would have been the ideal birthrate for China? No one child policy probably would have led to a larger peak population; would that have been worth it if it led to a steady state or slower decline afterwards? And if you could wave a magic wand, what would be the ideal birthrate for the US, or for European countries? I’d be interested in other people’s answers to this, too. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1166 "2025-05-18T16:23:17Z")
You’ll not like my take. 😀 My magic wand would be about where the United States and much of Europe currently is for fertility rates. Maybe marginally higher. With issues of demographic imbalance met by these three approaches, all of which I see as also having their own intrinsic pro-social goods: 1. Controlled immigration. I believe the multiculturalism has been to the United States long term benefit and independent of the need for young workers is good for it. I believe it has been part of America’s track record of excellence in innovation. Also ethically being a home for the huddled masses, for refugees, is a value I believe in. 2. Continuing to improve healthspan and keeping us aging farts productive longer, and needing less help as we are no longer working. I see very real possibilities for this. It is doable. 3. Productivity increases. AI is overhyped. It isn’t there … yet. But we oddly have worries discussed about AI and other automation doing all the jobs and worries that there aren’t going to be young people to do the jobs. AI will, over time, be able to be implemented in ways that increase per capita productivity, and like many technological innovations the impacts are not likely to be just linear once they get going. My magic wand wants a bit below replacement levels to have room for those three to occur. Of course my magic wand would not be upset if _my_ four kids produced a few grandkids … 😃 Oh. And the marginally higher achieved by family supports as discussed earlier in the thread. Not because they will get us so hugely changed on fertility rates, a little bit but not hugely, but because I think they are good things for families. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1167 "2025-05-18T20:04:52Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > Virtually every country is following the same pattern. If it can happen there, and the same patterns hold elsewhere, then it can happen here. The current world Birthrate is 2.27 births per woman. > [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > Before you can fix a problem, you must recognize that there is in fact a problem. This is not a problem. It is a Good Thing. Many people were freaking out about the increasing world population. You are worried about a decline that isnt happening world wide. > **[Population Decline Will Change the World for the Better](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/population-decline-will-change-the-world-for-the-better/)** > > A future with fewer people offers increased opportunity and a healthier environment _Nations predicts [dozens of countries](https://www.un.org/development/desa/pd/sites/www.un.org.development.desa.pd/files/wpp2022_summary_of_results.pdf) will have shrinking populations by 2050. This is good news. Considering no other large animal’s population has grown as much, as quickly or as devastatingly for other species as ours, we should all be celebrating population decline… Declining populations will ease the pressure eight billion people put on the planet. As the population and sustainability director at the Center for Biological Diversity, I’ve seen the devastating effects of our ever-expanding footprint on global ecosystems. But if you listen to [economists](https://www.ft.com/content/c017334e-36bb-11ea-a6d3-9a26f8c3cba4) (and [Elon Musk](https://thehill.com/changing-america/sustainability/565224-elon-musk-says-population-collapse-potentially-the-greatest/)), you might believe falling birthrates mean the sky is falling as fewer babies means fewer workers and consumers driving economic growth._ _But there’s more to the story than dollars. Where our current model of endless growth and short-term profits sacrifices vulnerable people and the planet’s future, population decline could help create a future with more opportunity and a healthy, biologically rich world._ > **[Why a shrinking human population is a good thing](https://conservationbytes.com/2022/06/30/why-a-shrinking-human-population-is-a-good-thing/)** > > The other day I was asked to do an interview for a South Korean radio station about the declining-population “crisis”. Therein lies the rub — there is no crisis. While I think the inter… _The other day I was asked to do an interview for a [South Korean radio station](https://www.facebook.com/efmthismorning) about the declining-population “crisis”… Probably the most important aspect that I didn’t even get a chance to cover is that globally, our [economic system is essentially broken](https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/final-report-the-economics-of-biodiversity-the-dasgupta-review) because we are forced to exist inside a paradigm that erroneously assumes Earth’s resources are infinite. They are not, as the [global ecological footprint](https://www.footprintnetwork.org/) clearly shows._ _To slow and perhaps even reverse climate change, as well as mitigate [the extinction crisis underway](https://conservationbytes.com/2021/01/13/time-for-a-cold-shower-about-our-ability-to-avoid-a-ghastly-future/), we are obliged to reduce consumption globally. Shrinking human populations will contribute to that goal (provided we simultaneously reduce per-capita consumption)._ _But that argument, no matter how defensible, is still not even remotely appreciated by most people. It is the aim of only a minority, most of whom have very little political power to engender change._ The oft-touted ‘[crisis](https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/birth-rate-too-low-to-replace-ageing-citizens-x9vzkcqzf)‘ of ageing populations is founded on the erroneous notion that it will lead to economic crises for the affected countries. Indeed, countries like South Korea and Japan have [declining populations](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/future-population-projections-by-country?country=BRA~USA~JPN~ITA~KOR), others like Italy are [stable and will be declining soon](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/future-population-projections-by-country?country=BRA~USA~JPN~ITA~KOR), and others like [Australia are only growing because of net immigration](https://conservationbytes.com/2016/06/12/what-immigration-means-for-australias-climate-change-policies/). The reason for the hyped-up panic generally comes down to the overly simplistic ‘[dependency ratio](https://ourworldindata.org/age-structure)‘, which has several different forms but generally compares the number of people in the labour force against those who have retired from it. The idea here is that once the number of people no longer in the labour force exceeds the number of those in the labour force, the latter can no longer support the entirety of the former. This simplistic 1:1 relationship essentially assumes that you need one person working to support one retired person. Errrh. Right. Let’s look at this in more detail. First, in any country experiencing population decline (i.e., mainly high-income nations), there is almost always a form of national [superannuation](https://www.ato.gov.au/general/other-languages/in-detail/information-in-other-languages/your-superannuation-basics/#Whatissuperannuation1) (retirement savings). This means that while you are working, you squirrel away money in a special investment fund (usually guaranteed or supported by government co-contributions) such that by the time you retire, you’ll have more or less enough to live on until you kark it. Certainly some superannuation schemes are better than others, but the idea that the working support the non-working is not only simplistic, it is mostly wrong. My own superannuation accumulated principally by me is designed to support me (and my family) later (yes, I realise government co-contributions depend to some extent on the number of current taxpayers). Therein lies the rub — there is no crisis. There= Science. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1168 "2025-05-18T20:32:06Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > The current world Birthrate is 2.27 births per woman. And in 2010, it was 2.56, and in 2000 it was 2.72, and in 1990 it was 3.31. > [@DrDeth](#): > > Many people were freaking out about the increasing world population. Yeah, because a bunch of idiots wrote books about this and it permeated culture into sci-fi and a bunch of other areas to the point that a bunch of people are still deeply confused about things. Instead of looking back and saying “Gee, Ehrlich was wrong about pretty much everything in _The Population Bomb_, we didn’t have mass famines that killed billions, so maybe everything those guys wrote is total horseshit”, we seem to have a generation of people that still believe in that nonsense. > [@DrDeth](#): > > This simplistic 1:1 relationship essentially assumes that you need one person working to support one retired person. Errrh. Right. Let’s look at this in more detail. Nice strawman they knocked down. No one says that. > [@DrDeth](#): > > First, in any country experiencing population decline (i.e., mainly high-income nations), there is almost always a form of national [superannuation](https://www.ato.gov.au/general/other-languages/in-detail/information-in-other-languages/your-superannuation-basics/#Whatissuperannuation1) (retirement savings). And now they’re even more confused. It doesn’t matter how much retirement savings you have if there’s not enough people to provide the labor. What do they think will happen to the cost of services when there is a much smaller labor pool available? ---
**Author:** ![BippityBoppityBoo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bippityboppityboo/32/5745_2.png) [@BippityBoppityBoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BippityBoppityBoo)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1169 "2025-05-18T21:02:14Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > What do they think will happen to the cost of services when there is a much smaller labor pool available? Same thing that happens now, only the more affluent will get adequate personal care and supports. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1170 "2025-05-18T21:04:05Z")
> [@BippityBoppityBoo](#): > > Same thing that happens now, only the more affluent will get adequate personal care and supports. Exactly. Except, of course, it’ll get even _worse_. Unless the robots take over by then, at least. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1171 "2025-05-18T21:06:57Z")
The link @DrDeth provided is worth reading through. It gives a name to a concept that has been brought up here: > [@](#): > > Alternative types of “dependency ratio” can capture at least some of the nuances. The _Labor Force Dependency Ratio_ (LFDR) is useful for this purpose – it shows the number of people participating in the labor force relative to those not in the labor force. “Participation” in this context is defined as people working or actively searching for work. … > > … The Age Dependency Ratio, for example, does not account for labor force participation past the age of 65. Meanwhile, the Labor Force Dependency Ratio covers everyone participating in the labor force. The LFDR scenario assumes gradual improvements in labor participation (e.g. to the levels seen in 2015 Sweden by the year 2060).[9](https://ourworldindata.org/age-structure#note-9) > > Even though the LFDR is still expected to climb, it suggests there is more flexibility. If Europe were to move closer to higher participation rates among its adult population (both under- and over-65) — as in Sweden, Czechia, Germany, or the Baltic countries — then much of the feared rise in dependency would fail to materialize. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1172 "2025-05-18T21:09:28Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > What do they think will happen to the cost of services when there is a much smaller labor pool available? But we live in a global economy, so while it’s true that elderly Koreans need young Koreans to cut their hair, they don’t need young Koreans to produce their food or other goods. They can import them. This is why population is largely (not completely) a global issue. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1173 "2025-05-18T21:10:17Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > This is pretty disconnected from reality. Governments across the world are spending far _more_ time and effort regulating industries for environmental purposes than ever in the past. Even in the US, where Trump is trying to take a wrecking ball to that world view, we are far ahead of where we were a few decades ago. And? Trump **is** in power, and the authoritarians are on the rise all over the world. Once the national parks have been clearcut and filled with toxic waste, the oceans fished out & poisoned, decades of science destroyed, global warming enters its end stages and the environmentalists are all rounded up and sent to camps or mass graves there’s not going to be much concern for the environment, and not much environment to care about in the first place. We’ve passed out peak as a civilization and it’s all downhill into Hell from here. In the end a larger birth rate just means more people born into a future worse than death. And to starve as the world quickly is rendered uninhabitable out of sheer spite by the lunatics we insist on putting into power. > [@Babale](#): > > > [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > > > Their long term plan seems to be to turn the world into Trantor or Coruscant; a world-city where nature is dead. > > [Citation needed] The “cite” is this thread, where people have been talking about limitless population growth, resource extraction and control of nature. That _at best_ ends with Trantor. Or HG Well’s Mars. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1174 "2025-05-18T21:12:28Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > Unless the robots take over by then, at least. “The robots” will not be taking over I think, but “they” will be providing for greater per capita productivity. That will highly probably partly offset what would otherwise be shortage in the workforce. Hopefully it doesn’t _overshoot_ that mark and result in the mass unemployment that so many have been afraid higher levels of automation will result in. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1175 "2025-05-18T21:12:47Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > The “cite” is this thread, where people have been talking about limitless population growth, resource extraction and control of nature. Yep. Mind you, we dont want a huge sudden decline. A 10% drop is about right. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1176 "2025-05-18T21:14:03Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Mind you, we dont want a huge sudden decline. A 10% drop is about right. Yeah. There’s a large grey area between demographic collapse and breeding like rabbits until famine sets in. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1177 "2025-05-18T21:16:01Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Nations predicts [dozens of countries](https://www.un.org/development/desa/pd/sites/www.un.org.development.desa.pd/files/wpp2022_summary_of_results.pdf) will have shrinking populations by 2050. This is from a website that DrDeth quotes, not necessarily what he himself believes. There are already 40 countries with shrinking populations, which I would call “dozens” of them. One projection is that by 2100, 198 out of 204 countries will have shrinking populations. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1178 "2025-05-18T21:17:31Z")
The term is fine, but the article implies that people are arguing for some magic 1:1 threshold where things fall apart, and I’ve never seen that be the case. It’s just that things get worse as that ratio increases (or decreases, depending on which way you look at it). I’ve said from the beginning that older people will have to work more years to compensate. I think everyone is in agreement on that even if there’s disagreement on how “good” it is (I think it’s good when older people are active, but personally I’d rather choose what keeps me occupied rather than be forced by circumstances back into the labor force). The article goes off into the weeds when it fails to acknowledge that it doesn’t matter how much retirement savings you have when the labor isn’t there. If there’s a shortage, prices will go up and only the rich will be able to afford things like health care. The total services rendered can’t exceed the active labor force. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1179 "2025-05-18T21:34:24Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > But we live in a global economy, so while it’s true that elderly Koreans need young Koreans to cut their hair, they don’t need young Koreans to produce their food or other goods. They can import them. True as long as their savings lasts. I’m not sure if SK ever had a savings culture, but it looks like it’s not so hot at the moment: > **[Korea's household savings plummet to decade low](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/2024-08-24/business/economy/Koreas-household-savings-plummet-to-decade-low/2119384)** > > Korea's household savings hit a decade low due to inflation, high interest rates, and record-high household debt, leaving many struggling with financial burdens. In any case, that’s another thing that **DrDeth** ’s cite ignores. It matters if the dominant retirement system is savings-based or pay-as-you-go. Social Security is pay-as-you-go and if the labor force dries up, so does the money. 401ks and such are real money in an account and can be used to buy things from overseas if required. Countries with large sovereign wealth funds can hold out a bit longer with respect to social funding. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2025, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655/1180 "2025-05-18T21:44:27Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > the article implies that people are arguing for some magic 1:1 threshold where things fall apart I’m not seeing that in the article. I read @DrDeth portraying the concept as that but the article to my read takes pain to explain the concept as more complicated than that. Including the difference between high age dependence ratio based on an older population with low fertility and one with higher mortality but high fertility rates. Not stated explicitly there is the implication of an advantage to immigration of working age adults over increased fertility as a more immediate impact on labor force dependency ratio. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655.md?page=58) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-practical-way-to-increase-the-birthrate/1012655.md?page=60)