What happens in Stage 5 basically means that Western democracies will have to face its achillies heel: social instability. Historically, this meant the rise of autocrats (symbolically symbolized by Emperor Augustus) and the political polarization/radicalization of society (i.e. French Third Republic). However, social instability is more of an achillies heel to autocracies than they are to democracies, especially the more voting power you give to the masses.
Are there countries that could avoid the slide to stage 5 through a highly fertile religious subgroup? For example the Haredi in Israel and Amish/Mennonites/Mormons in US each year produce a higher share of births. Eventually they might be the majority.
Or perhaps increased productivity means that instead of 10 hour work weeks for everyone, young people will have 30 hour work weeks and that will be sufficient to support a larger retired population. Plus increased immigration is inevitable due to climate change - the only other option is mass death. I also strongly suspect birth rates would increase substantially if individuals weren’t still bearing the vast majority of the cost of child rearing (it doesn’t have to be that way - U.S. society is not at all child friendly). Japan for example is extremely patriarchal in ways that make having kids very unappealing to women. Most women want more kids and plenty want more than they have - given favorable circumstances they will have them (my personal opinion is that 4 is the upper bound for any woman making totally free choices.)
Hey! I appreciate your response. Hope you don't mind respectful disagreement:
Let's see how the AI boom plays out to see if productivity increases enough that we work 30 hour weeks. I work as an ML Product manager in fintech and work with AI/ML engineers and I don't see this happening so far. Maybe you'll be vindicated in the next 10 years!
The birth rate issue doesn't just take place in America or Japan, but in across the America, Europe, and developed Asia, including very egalitarian societies like Sweden and Norway. America has one of the best fertility rates in the west. Also Hungary, Japan, and Singapore have and all developed countries have made pro-natalist cash and subsidy schemes but, at best, these schemes slow down the rate of decrease in fertility. All these countries still have below replacement fertility rates. The fact that America, which doesn't invest much in child care, has the same birthrate as Sweden (1.7 kids), and has better birthrates than Norway (1.6), Finland (1.5), or Canada (1.4) makes me disagree with the claim that "most women want more kids and plenty want more than they have - given favorable circumstances". The data just doesn't bare that out to me.
You’re correct about the subsidies but I think there’s a failure of the imagination in thinking the results we’ve seen so far demonstrate that subsidies don’t work. Those subsidies are just not very much even the most generous. These subsidies off set some of the cost of having children - but one could imagine subsidies that actually make having children financially profitable or at least not a lifetime financial loss - a huge difference. And even the egalitarian societies are not completely egalitarian. Money is not the only driver of the decision to have kids or not, there’s also opportunity cost and hope/despair for the future but money is absolutely relevant. Let’s try actually favorable circumstances and see what the fertility rate is. Make being a single mom easier than being a single woman, then lets see.
Native Nordic fertility is also on the down slope lately.
I think financial incentives can work but they need to:
1) Be Much Bigger
2) Be Cash
All of these complicated subsidy schemes provide goods that parents might not want, or might now want that much. What is subsidized daycare worth to you if you would prefer to be a SAHM? Who needs a tax break on earnings if your a SAHM?
I think the number of people that want to have lots of kids but never see them because they are working all the time is pretty limited.
Just give people money and let them decide.
Also, though it's politically difficult, what we really need is higher births amongst the Middle to UMC. You probably want to structure it as scaling with income while denying that's what you're doing.
I look around and it seems like there’s a lot of “slack” in the U.S. economy. That is, if about half of the jobs that exist today disappeared there would not necessarily be any decrease in anyone’s quality of life. We absolutely need teachers and construction workers and shop keepers but we also have a lot of bullshit jobs and maybe a lot more shops than absolutely necessary. Significant adjustments to pay scales might be necessary.
Helpful response. I was kind of blowing this one off because I tend not to pore over statistics. I will look into this. Maybe I can try reading this one again!
What happens in Stage 5 basically means that Western democracies will have to face its achillies heel: social instability. Historically, this meant the rise of autocrats (symbolically symbolized by Emperor Augustus) and the political polarization/radicalization of society (i.e. French Third Republic). However, social instability is more of an achillies heel to autocracies than they are to democracies, especially the more voting power you give to the masses.
I totally agree on the instability piece.
Are there countries that could avoid the slide to stage 5 through a highly fertile religious subgroup? For example the Haredi in Israel and Amish/Mennonites/Mormons in US each year produce a higher share of births. Eventually they might be the majority.
I think modernity will hit them too.
Israel will force modernity on the Haredi (forcing them in the army, maybe restricting their welfare in the future).
Also Mormon's kids will eventually lose their faith or moderate.
Or perhaps increased productivity means that instead of 10 hour work weeks for everyone, young people will have 30 hour work weeks and that will be sufficient to support a larger retired population. Plus increased immigration is inevitable due to climate change - the only other option is mass death. I also strongly suspect birth rates would increase substantially if individuals weren’t still bearing the vast majority of the cost of child rearing (it doesn’t have to be that way - U.S. society is not at all child friendly). Japan for example is extremely patriarchal in ways that make having kids very unappealing to women. Most women want more kids and plenty want more than they have - given favorable circumstances they will have them (my personal opinion is that 4 is the upper bound for any woman making totally free choices.)
Hey! I appreciate your response. Hope you don't mind respectful disagreement:
Let's see how the AI boom plays out to see if productivity increases enough that we work 30 hour weeks. I work as an ML Product manager in fintech and work with AI/ML engineers and I don't see this happening so far. Maybe you'll be vindicated in the next 10 years!
The birth rate issue doesn't just take place in America or Japan, but in across the America, Europe, and developed Asia, including very egalitarian societies like Sweden and Norway. America has one of the best fertility rates in the west. Also Hungary, Japan, and Singapore have and all developed countries have made pro-natalist cash and subsidy schemes but, at best, these schemes slow down the rate of decrease in fertility. All these countries still have below replacement fertility rates. The fact that America, which doesn't invest much in child care, has the same birthrate as Sweden (1.7 kids), and has better birthrates than Norway (1.6), Finland (1.5), or Canada (1.4) makes me disagree with the claim that "most women want more kids and plenty want more than they have - given favorable circumstances". The data just doesn't bare that out to me.
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN?locations=SE-US-FI-NO-CA
You’re correct about the subsidies but I think there’s a failure of the imagination in thinking the results we’ve seen so far demonstrate that subsidies don’t work. Those subsidies are just not very much even the most generous. These subsidies off set some of the cost of having children - but one could imagine subsidies that actually make having children financially profitable or at least not a lifetime financial loss - a huge difference. And even the egalitarian societies are not completely egalitarian. Money is not the only driver of the decision to have kids or not, there’s also opportunity cost and hope/despair for the future but money is absolutely relevant. Let’s try actually favorable circumstances and see what the fertility rate is. Make being a single mom easier than being a single woman, then lets see.
Native Nordic fertility is also on the down slope lately.
I think financial incentives can work but they need to:
1) Be Much Bigger
2) Be Cash
All of these complicated subsidy schemes provide goods that parents might not want, or might now want that much. What is subsidized daycare worth to you if you would prefer to be a SAHM? Who needs a tax break on earnings if your a SAHM?
I think the number of people that want to have lots of kids but never see them because they are working all the time is pretty limited.
Just give people money and let them decide.
Also, though it's politically difficult, what we really need is higher births amongst the Middle to UMC. You probably want to structure it as scaling with income while denying that's what you're doing.
I look around and it seems like there’s a lot of “slack” in the U.S. economy. That is, if about half of the jobs that exist today disappeared there would not necessarily be any decrease in anyone’s quality of life. We absolutely need teachers and construction workers and shop keepers but we also have a lot of bullshit jobs and maybe a lot more shops than absolutely necessary. Significant adjustments to pay scales might be necessary.
Interesting point here. I agree with most of this.
"The statistical study of human populations." It always has to be statistical?
Well there's qualitative and quantitative analysis in demography. But overall a demographic analysis requires looking at statistics.
Helpful response. I was kind of blowing this one off because I tend not to pore over statistics. I will look into this. Maybe I can try reading this one again!
Great story! Good links!