And there are those of us who wouldn’t ‘do our duty’ no matter how many day care and workplace bribes were thrown at us. Even the wording of the title, “Record Number of Women Childless” seems to imply that for a woman, not having children is somehow wrong, or it makes them incomplete, missing something they should have.
Maybe it’s just that thanks to modern technology, we’ve finally reached a time where women who don’t want to have babies can achieve that goal whereas years ago they just did what was expected of them and had their 2.2 kids, dog, and picket fence yard in the suburbs.
The guilt trip put on women who don’t want to have kids is absolutely amazing, and these ‘articles’ certainly don’t help.
Someone please correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t there record numbers of women overall now? And wouldn’t that mean record numbers of women without kids even if percentages were the same? The article talks a lot about how the actual number is increasing, but the percentage of women 40-44 without kids has been stable for ten years. What that says to me is that nothing’s really changed except the size of the population.
CrazyCatLady – that was exactly how I read the article too. Plus, they plumped up the numbers by including 15 - 17 year olds in the sample. In previous years they tracked 18 - 44 year olds.
Exactly. I’m someone who might possibly consider it, but only if it was at zero detriment to my career. And given my current career and lifestyle, that will never be possible.
I find the idea that women not having children makes them “uncomplete” quite wicked. Where does that leave infertile women? Women having to have hysterectomies because of illness such as cancer? Women whose only child/children died?
Denmark and Sweden both have one year maternity leave – usually on full salary. The first part is reserved for the mother, in Sweden some of the rest is reserved for the father. Schools and colleges and Universities are free. There are private elementary schools, but I know of none with nowhere near the cost put up in this thread. The ones I have looked into cost on average about $1,500 / year. Kindergartens (6 months – 6 years) is also heavily, but not completely, subsidized. Denmark in addition give parents a cash sum for each child, amounting to some $1,000 - $1,5000 / year per child – I think Sweden has something similar. Then there’re all the other things; it’s theoretically nearly impossible to sack pregnant women, free healthcare and dentists for children, free public transportation for children, etc.
While it’s always hard to separate cause and effect, all this have probably helped boost Scandinavian birth rates above that of most of the rest of Europe, 1.7 – 2.1 children / mother. But alas not above reproduction level.
One of the obvious consequences of a greying population is a growing burden of passive welfare recipients; meaning everybody will have to work harder or be poorer. How much of a problem depends on whether current trends will continue (I think much of southern Europe’s child bust is delayed children rather that no children) (on the other hand I have heard experts claim it’s already a lost battle). If the trends do indeed continue, there will be severe problems. Already, according to some newspapers, we have witnessed some of the first generation skirmishes, in the current pension reforms being pushed through in Germany, France, Italy and Austria (all trying against much opposition to reduce the states involvement in pension payments by postponing pension-age). I expect such generation scuffles to escalate dramatically as the strain pension system translates into rising taxes and down prioritising other state responsibilities (schools, hospitals, etc.) Other, more drastic solutions are slowly rising from crackpot status to parliamentary discussion. E.g. I think Austria has seriously been debating whether pension payments should be paid relative to the number of children born by the recipient. (such a proposal has also been put forward in Denmark) Etc.
Also with the already high unemployment rate much of Europe suffer with, and now the rising pensioner group, one can question whether democracy will work when the number of people that live by passive welfare payments constitute a majority in themselves – and vote thereafter. Already special interests pensioner organisations are massively influential due to sheer numbers.
Perhaps some of the problems can be mitigated by a controlled immigration. Germany has already, with very mixed results, tried with an America inspired green-card formula. But for these kind of educated, skilled immigrants, Europe is competing with American and Canada, and mostly Europe (due to many factors, not least salary and tax rates) is second choice.
One of the problems with some European pensioner systems is that they’re not based on a saving principle, but on a transfer system. I.e. the money used for pension payments is not money actually put away by the pensioners themselves during their working years, but paid by current tax payers. This works fine when the percentage of elder recipients is much smaller that that of younger payers (as it was when the systems were established), and when the rate of the two groups is fairly steady. However, as neither of these things is no longer the case, many countries try to move to a saving oriented system. Which has only led to strong feelings of entitlement for the pensioners, but unfortunately unfounded, since the pittance (and that often with massive tax incentives) put away in no way compares to the amount withdrawn – especially considering the steady increasing length of pensioner years as the life span lengthens. But even if pensioners would be able to pay their own way (rent, food, transport, etc.) society has other costs besides those – which they’d not help pay (since they’d not be working) but still exploit.
I have heard many American pensioners are moving to Florida. Lately European pensioners have been moving to southern Spain and France. Two years back I spend a winter in a small town south of Grenada (southern Spain), and found whole communities of Scandinavian and British pensioners where the lingua franca was anything but Spanish. Also it stroke me, so to speak, how many of these retirees not only seemed very wealthy, but also very able, healthy and in full vigour. Do I relish the thought of being forced to fund an ever growing mass of pensioners living 20-40 years on passive welfare payments – especially when many seem to be quite able to put in another decade of work themselves? Well, to put it mildly, it’s not on the top of my Christmas present list.
Also I see some people are advocating immigration as the moral superior, end all solve all, solution. But a massive immigration of educated people into Europe will drain those (third world) countries which are supplying the emigrants of desperately needed and expensively educated expertise – leaving them poorer. A new model economic colonist exploitism - rich Europe leeching off poor Africa / Middle East. Just how wonderful is that scenario?
Further, how high should a people that have consumed and consumed with no though of tomorrow be regarded, when they suddenly, in their old age, find they’re unable to support themselves. (Screw them! They made their own bed, now they can bloody well go lie there!). If they couldn’t be bothered to have children because it interfered with their eternal youth trip and consumer spree, why the heck should they think they’re entitled to maintenance from other people once they get older and can’t be bothered to work anymore?
It has often been pointed out that women’s education and birth rate are intimately linked. The higher the education level the lower the birth rate (for men it’s the opposite). What should we make of that? It m u s t be possible to have a society with both sustainable birth rates and female liberation, but how – when ready available kindergartens, women friendly work places, and all the other sweeteners of the Scandinavian welfare system has proved inadequate. On a more easy note, one can be worked up over the genetic consequences when intelligence in women apparently has shown to itself to be an evolutionary detriment. Are we breeding stupid women? And where will tomorrow’s feminist come from, when today’s feminist are killing themselves off?
If we can manage to look beyond the race thing for just a small moment, we can perhaps see there are other elements involved here; namely culture. I can’t see what’s the inherent evilness in wishing for a continuation of European culture and civilisation? Of not looking favourable for a much weakened Europe? Somehow it seems to provoke some people to no end when I say I’m proud of my Europeaness, that I in fact consider European civilisation to be the best thing since sliced bread. But given that, naturally I do look with some consternation on our imminent auto-genocide. A nearly criminal disregard on a monumental scale - and that we’re bringing it upon ourselves only doubles the shame.
Can’t see how you can come to that conclusion. If the number of children born is below that of replacement level (about 2.1 per woman) the long term effect (disregarding other factors – such as immigration, etc. ) will surely be one of declining population – not levelling.
Let me finish that for you since you seem to have such an aversion to the word. WHITE, “those people aren’t White”, is what you want say. It always amazes me how quick some people are to pull the race card. Probably it’s one of these things (like religion) that differs America from Denmark, IRL race is almost never an issue that comes into any discussion in any way. Here race and religion are always in there somewhere.
I’m not American, but I consider the whole of North America, Middle and South American more or less part of western civilization, and have never quite understood why Americans apparently makes a great difference between North and South.
Maybe, maybe not. Long time planning is always very difficult. And yet there’s no way around it, we’ll have to make our plans best as we can – not just hope everything will turn out for the best. Also it’s safe to say that whatever misery the world is suffering from right now – it’s not long time planning.
While I’m all for utopia on a principle level, you’ll never get that. Choices have consequences. Problems can be alleviated and helped, never completely removed. Children have consequences – you either live with that, or without them; you have chosen without – fine, just don’t pretend it’s anything but a personal choice. BTW. Wasn’t Istara an Assyrian or Babylonian love and fertility goddess?
Urgh! Not that one again. Next you’ll be talking about childfree or your “natural aversion to children”.
As you are probably aware, catsix not mentioning the persecution of the ‘childfree’ is about as likely as Alderbran to not mention the evils of the U.S. Some things in the universe are just constants.
Well fuck me, this is a thread about what’s wrong with this country because record numbers of women aren’t having kids.
And my answer is: Nothing is wrong with it. Not having children isn’t wrong, it’s not a problem to be corrected.
If this thread wasn’t all about the idea that something is horribly wrong because women aren’t pushing out babies, I wouldn’t have brought up that there’s nothing wrong with women who choose not to have kids, which is what’s implied by the word ‘childless’. That somehow any woman who doesn’t have a kid is missing something, rather like a legless person is missing their legs.
The population is growing, which apparently means we don’t have to worry about going extinct any time soon. The population of the US, especially younger immigrants who have jobs is also growing, so there’s not much to be concerned about with a tax base, now is there?
So why all the issue over the number of women who aren’t having babies?
For many of the women who aren’t having babies, it’s not a choice, it’s infertility. So to refer to all of them as childfree would be inaccurate. Many of them are sadly childless.
And I think the point of the thread is to question if there is or isn’t a problem with the fact that fewer women are having babies. You don’t think there is a problem. Many disagree.
Haivng fewer babies means a top-heavy population. More retirees, fewer workers to support them. This is a big problem in countries that are experiencing it.
This isn’t about your often repeated declaration about your woefully discriminated against position to not have babies. It’s not about you at all.
I guess that’s why my post wasn’t a ‘but I’m persecuted!’ post, it was a response that no matter how many tax cut type ‘bribes’ exist, there will be women who don’t want to have them, and probably more women who succeed at that now due to the birth control and other options available to them.
You didn’t pay much attention to that post, did you? Didn’t notice that it was in response to istara’s comment regarding tax breaks and maternity leaves to convince more women to have children? Those things might be beneficial to some women who want kids, but they certainly won’t be convincing anyone who doesn’t want kids.
I do think that there is absolutely no problem with more and more women deciding not to have children (and actually, for those with fertility problems, less of them are childless now than ever due to things like in vitro fertilization and surrogacy that weren’t possible in the past). What I see, though, is that news reports regarding the issue are slanted in the direction that it is a problem.
Of course this thread isn’t about me. It’s about whether or not these articles or reports are correct, that there’s some kind of problem indicated by less women having babies. The articles are written from the point of view that it is a problem. I don’t think it is, I responded as such. I also responded to some specifics in istara’s post that I found particularly interesting. I have talked to many women who are much older than me (forty or fifty years older than me) who have said they had children because that’s just the way it was done. You grew up, you got married, and you had kids. I think that attitude has changed, and I consider that a good thing. It allows each person more self-determination.
Why on earth are you now in here harping on me as if I did something wrong? I’m participating in the discussion at hand with relevant comments. Debating the topic, as it were.
What should we make of the link between female education and reduced family size? Well, what I make of it is that the more options women have, the less attractive motherhood seems to a lot of them. Motherhood isn’t exactly a thrill a minute never-ending party, you know. It has its good points, but it’s a long hard slog, and unlike most crappy jobs, you never get to clock out and go home. All the sweeteners in the world won’t change the fact that it’s a tiring, stressful job that never freaking ends, or make people more willing to take it on.
Where will tomorrow’s feminists come from? Same place today’s did, from women who choose to have kids. Ideologies aren’t exactly genetic, you know.
Leaving aside the matter of graying pensioners, a decrease in the birth rate is a good thing. Overpopulation is the scourge of the world - more ecological and sociological problems have that at their root than anything else. (Although I suppose religion might tie with the sociological, since throughout history more people have been killed in the name of religion of than all other causes combined.) Too much population leads to things like famine, overpriced homes, ever-increasing traffic and road rage, ever-dwindling populations of fauna and flora, ever-decreasing limited natural resources, huge strains on the national power grid, projected shortages of drinkable water in even the developed world, and so on.
O.K, about the less women having babies thing. The way it was always presented to me was that declining birthrates was a natural process that went along with socio-economic development. Nothing about militant femininsts deciding they’d prefer to piss their life away pursuing totally selfish goals, or whatever these silly people try and claim it is. It’s just a natural step once people have access to birth control and a few choices. And for the record, I think arguments like this
are very unhelpful- there’s more ways to contribute to society than just by having 2.5 kids- what if you’re a doctor, and during your career you’ve saved hundreds of lives, to give one very uncomplicated example.
As for emmigration from less developed countries draining their pool of resources, yes, that is a problem to be wary of, but to be honest that’s already happening- where do you think all the U.K’s nurses and teachers are coming from, now that no native people seem to want to do the job anymore? It’s not fair, but that’s how things seem to work in a global economy, and I have no real solutions to offfer.
However, I don’t think it’s just skilled and educated workers that are lacking in the Western world these days, many manual labourers jobs are already filled with illegal immigrants, who are being horribly exploited in many cases. Once governments face up to these people’s existance, and the real labour shortage that exists, these people will be welcomed to the country and given full legal status. Yeah I know, in my dreams, but sometimes it’s good to dream…
And finally, I’m in full agreement with those that argue that a declining world population is a good thing. Few people would argue that the world doesn’t have enough people in it, as things stand today, they just need to be spread out round the globe a bit better. And while we’re at it, lets spread out all the money a bit more too, and let’s have world peace- Damn!, there I go again…
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by WinstonSmith * I can’t see what’s the inherent evilness in wishing for a continuation of European culture and civilisation? Of not looking favourable for a much weakened Europe?
It’s fine, as long as your not building it on the backs of unwilling women. I’m all for Western Civilization, but if a good chunk of the people involved have better things to do than use their bodies to continue Western Civilization, I’m not going to get bent out of shape about it. And I’m going to question the motivations of those that do.
Western Culture will survive. It takes thousands of years for a culture to die out entirely. Nothing we do today is going to doom us. So what are we really worried about? Our ability to maintain global dominance, for one. We’re already losing our grip on this one as the East discovers the raw power it it’s population. We’re also worried about losing our land.
Imagine how you would feel if part of Europe became a Muslm state- even out of their own free will. Now analyze why you feel this way. Personally, I don’t think that any group of people has any special entitlement to any land, and in my experience the concepts of homelands lead to more trouble than they’re worth. But a desire to keep Europe for the Europeans is definately at play here.
**
Maybe it’s because we have loons like Pat Buchanan making it very clear that this is indeed about race. Please read that excerpt from his latest book. This guy is not too far out in parts of America. His attitudes are common attitudes. And in this situation he is, unfortunately, the company that you are keeping.
**
Well I am American, Californian in fact. I live right next to one of those towns where more people speak Spanish than English. I don’t really see what the big difference is. I go to the store to buy bread, they go to the pananderia to buy bread. The come to my town and have trouble communicating, I go to their town and have trouble communicating. We all smile a lot and things go by pretty well. It doesn’t seem to different than me. Certainly not to the point where I’d say they are a bad thing.
And yet everyday in California we hear about the “Mexican invasion”. We hear about how they are going to destroy our Western values (with what? their very Western Catholicsm?). We hear about how horrible it is that they speak Spanish. Many people believe it is akin to a military occupation. Some believe that it is part of a serious plan to annex California into Mexico. Massive re-culturalization projects are proposed. Anything that would be percieved as helping Mexicans in America is an outrage.
And yes, I’ve heard the “They have so many babies and we have so little” hysteria regarding Mexicans.
Why do we care so much if the family down the street is Mexican or not? We’re all people. We all need to live somewhere. Historically Mexicans and Americans have shared this land since we took it from the Native Americans. Spanish and English have always co-existed here. So it’s not even a “we were here first” thing.
What it is is a “We are the only ones suitible for this land” thing. And the “we” in that equation is white people. And once again, this is the company you keep.
Japan has fewer and fewer babies being born. They also have very little history of immigration. In order to maintain the same number of workers they currently have, they would have to import 600,000 immigrants a year.
Yes, there are plenty of people world wide who would love the chance to immigrate to a wealthy country like Japan.
So let’s imagine bringing 600,000 people a year from Afganstan (one of the countries with the highest birth rates in the world). That almost 5 million transplanted Afgans in just 4 years.
It wouldn’t exactly be a seemless transition. The cultures of Japan and Afganistan are totally different. The languages are totally different.
I think it would be a legitimate concern of the Japanese that these new people don’t know much about Japanese holidays, histories, art, religions etc.
Over 20 or 30 years, Japan would probably be a very different place. Not necessarily worse, but different.
You can’t just say, well there are too many people in country X, so we’ll move them to country Y which needs more people! It’s not that simple.
It’s not just simple racism that makes people afraid of their country being overrun by people from another country.
Japan is a country that could probably benefit from a period of negative population growth purely due to the fact that it is extremely limited in resources such as inhabitable land area.
Many places in Japan are extremely crowded in terms of population density, and if the population continually grows finding places for all the people to live becomes a problem.
Please don’t think this means I believe there should be less Japanese people, as that is not what I’m saying. I am saying that if population always experiences positive growth, especially when that places is geographically too small to support it, there will reach a time when the population is no longer sustainable. As it is now, Japan lacks enough room to grow food for those who live in Japan. As an absurd example of their lack of room, Japan has very few golf courses, and playing one of them is so expensive that often wealthy Japanese businessmen will fly to another country for their round of golf because it is less expensive. Sorry, can’t remember what the reference is for that, it was something brought up in a course I took in college.
Aside from “everybody knows that”, got a source for that.
By the way, don’t forget Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao’s cultural revolution, Genghis Khan, Julius Caesar in Gaul.
Women should not be made feel bad for not having children. It is their choice. However a society can encourage women tho have them because it foresees what could happen.
The discussion was: *“what’s the consequences for modern industrial economies when record numbers of women aren’t having children.” * The good/wrong moral damnation is entirely your own highjack or a thread about consequences. Perhaps that’s what irritates people, that all discussion on falling fertility must invariably be turned to your favorite subject; the persecution of childless (nor does proudly stating “your natural aversion to children” help much.)
I think we all agree that there’s nothing morally wrong with women who decide to forego motherhood. But this is not the subject, and there’s nothing wrong in examining the longtime consequences for nations with sustained below reproduction rates, and perhaps there is something wrong with a society that foregoes a future.
That the population is growing right now does not mean long time sustainability if such growth is fueled by an aging population – rather it’s smack the problem on the head - what to do with looming pensioner boom; which you seem to have no answer to beyond the “fuck me”. So “fuck me” if I think you’re on topic.
Children can without a doubt be stressful, and some sweeteners can without doubt help reduce the stress. However as I wrote, I was more interested in thoughts on possible fusion of female education and sustainable family size. Your take on that seems to be it’s impossible. Female liberation will inexorable lead to extinction?
I was thinking more on the lines, that feminists are more likely to raise feminist daughters. While mothers uninterested in (or directly hostile to) feminism are less likely to teach their daughters about the joys of feminism. You might not know that feminism is in fact not genetically programmed – so who will do the teaching?
Love it how you include things like famine and road-rage in one sentence. Undoubtly population has an impact on the environment, but mainly what’s driving famine, overpriced homes, road rage, dwindling populations of fauna and flora etc. is not population but bad politics. BTW. Rodrigo, you’re not going to get a cite on that, because it’s clearly absurd, none the lesser for being repeated so often, – unless you’d hold that Nazism, Communism and Nationalism are some kind of religion.
Denmark (I’m not completely kidding; England has very actively been seeking nurses and teaches in Denmark). However, I was addressing the exact position of some people who held that worries were misplaces if not indeed morally wrong, since we could just open the door on immigration – which, I mean, will obviously open up an whole other can of moral disgusting practices. And that the fact that it’s already happening today, hardly makes it better to seek out a course for the future which demands a dramatically increasing numbers.
Finally, I think it’s very questionable whether a lower population (especially in the west) will translate into higher living standards (Europe is the continent with the highest population density, and we’re hardly the poorest). Further, our coming massive age problems will only result in lesser funds being diverged to helping third world countries (already Denmark has begun scaling down on third world aid, specifically to help pensioners), and being less open for to their problems. So while we may get poorer, they’re not going to get any richer – on the contrary.
Loons exist everywhere at all times, it’s only when you take them serious they become dangerous. And let me remind you that it is you who are repeating and disseminating the racial ideas in this thread. Anyway the last statement (“the company that you are keeping”) is hardly fair By that logic I can say you’ve become bosom friends with the KKK, since they too insist on putting a racial spin on everything. Unless you claim I agree with Pat Buchanan ideas and can argument specifically how, such statements are nothing but ad-hominems.
Whites, there you go with your racial theories again sven, next you’ll be on to the negroes and ape thing. Unless you can show precisely where I come with racial bigotry, you better stop accusing me of racist equations.
I think Japan is self sufficient in food. At least population has little to do with it, if not. Holland, one of the countries in the world with the highest population density, is not only self sufficient but also has a very large export of food stuffs.
If current trends will continue, as everything seems to point at, more than one in three (36%) will be a retiree in 2050. In comparison the UN defines an aged society as one where 14% are above 65 years. This will mean an explosion of pensioner payments and health related costs, and might likely destabilize the whole country (and region if it comes to that). The Japanese Health Minister was recently quoted saying: “A sharp decline in the birthrate will have serious and adverse effects on socioeconomic matters, including social security” and more that employees will have to pay significant higher monthly contributions to the state-run pension program, from 17% of the salary today to 32% in 2050. Overall the population is projected to decline by 22% to 2050, and 53% by 2100. Continuing current trends Italy’s population is projected to decline to 5 million by 2100. This is tantamount to an extermination of the Italian culture, the way some people say this is nothing to be worried about since there’re too many people other places on the globe – taste an awful much like, if not outright racism, then at least like saying the Italian culture is worth shit.
I guess we have plenty of ‘incentives’ here. You get ‘barnbidrag’, which is a sum of money per child. You daycare is free if you’re poor, and healtcare is of course free. Of course this doesn’t make people have more children, it only helps those who aren’t well off when they do.
Our ratio is 1.54, so well below the replacement rate. This is well known and we are fixing the problem by importing people from other countries. Everybody except the neo-nazis seem pretty happy with that solution. Guess I will have an opportunity to pick up another language when I gow old.
(I’m not completely kidding; England has very actively been seeking nurses and teaches in Denmark). However, I was addressing the exact position of some people who held that worries were misplaces if not indeed morally wrong, since we could just open the door on immigration – which, I mean, will obviously open up an whole other can of moral disgusting practices. And that the fact that it’s already happening today, hardly makes it better to seek out a course for the future which demands a dramatically increasing numbers.