My son left a northeastern college town near where he and his wife grew up because it was kid unfriendly and had bad schools, schools that promoted indoctrination over education. They moved to a beat up house with acreage in the middle south with their three young children. They have met families that enjoy having kids and critters and friendships. She is an educator, he a tradesman and they are home schooling with other families. He is in touch with his late 30’s married childless high school friends and they have good incomes, are aimless and bored. He and his wife worry and protect, but could not happier.
But is it not true that there are too many humans on the planet? The stress on resources is already enormous, not to even mention the fate of voiceless stakeholders like animals and plants. Once the Boomers are gone - the youngest being 59 now - maybe a smaller global population will make the planet more comfortable.
Ok, let’s say the current trend is as bad as the author is presenting here and the population should be growing. For how long? Is there no limit to how many humans this planet can sustain? Should we start slowing down at some point at least? What is that point? Sure, we can just keep making more babies to pay our SS, increase productivity etc. But what’s the long-term plan? Maybe we should start figuring out alternatives to growth ad infinitum. Think about how to incentivise urban “shrinkage” where necessary instead of urban sprawl. Let’s figure out how to provide nutritious meals and decent education for the kids we have first. When it comes to kids (I have 2), I prefer quality over quantity.
Fantastic article! Extremely well written. I do however, have a reason for Israel's high birth rate (amongst affluent & modern societies): Religion. With warts, pitfalls, contradictions and all, religion (at least the 3 monotheistic ones) imbeds an "Instinct," if you will, to procreate and expand one's lineage. They impart a "wisdom" that is vaguely understood, but never enumerated or explained in detail. More inferred.
I think Mr. Gurri unknowingly puts his finger on the problem when he mentions the welfare state that is jeopardized by depopulation.
People historically have had large families as a reaction to high child mortality rates, the need for help on the family farm - and to provide caretakers for their old age.
With the establishment of the welfare state the need for children has been reduced. Just as important, the welfare state is very expensive, requiring high taxes to feed its ravenous maw. And children are expensive! When faced with the high cost of the welfare state and the high cost of children, many have opted for fewer children because the welfare state will take care of them and to save on the money necessary to pay for said state.
"Absent the binding power of children, the extended family will disappear, and the nuclear family will disintegrate. There will be few mothers and fathers, no siblings, no cousins, no aunts or uncles; whole lineages will flicker out. If family is the audience to the drama of life, each individual will perform in the chill of an empty theater."
My mom is one of six kids; my dad is one of five kids; my husband's mom is one of eight kids; my husband's dad is one of nine kids. Most of them got married and had their own kids. I have twenty-five (I think?) first cousins, and my husband has never taken the time and effort to count his.
I'm an only child because my parents had fertility problems. My husband was an only child for most of his childhood, until his half-sister was born. Our two kids have no first cousins, and at this point, it looks like they're unlikely to have any. Theoretically, I would have liked a third kid, but I'm too introverted, mentally ill, and C-section-scarred.
I'm grateful for my dad's side of the family, which decided they wanted to keep doing huge family get-togethers, even when the cousins grew up and had their own kids. Big Halloween party today, packed with toddlers whose names I can't remember (one year, five kids were born in six months!) and too much candy.
Edit, the next day: And, it turns out one cousin’s wife is pregnant with their first baby. 🙂
How about the consequences of overpopulation? It has realistic and extreme consequences too. This is a terribly one sided article that doesn't go far enough in examining the evidence countering the argument for having more children.
Since the 1990s, rates of childlessness have risen most sharply for the least educated women. The most dramatic change has occurred among women with less than a high school diploma, whose likelihood of bearing no children rose 66% from 1994 to 2008. Rates rose less steeply over the same time period among high school graduates and women with some college but not a degree.
In 2006, 26.2 percent of women ages 30 to 34 were childless, meaning they had never given birth to a child. By 2016, that number had risen about 4 percentage points to 30.8 percent
2016 Report: Young people are delaying marriage, but most still
eventually tie the knot. In the 1970s, 8 in 10 people
married by the time they turned 30. Today, not until
the age of 45 have 8 in 10 people married.
Although young people are delaying marriage, they are not putting off romantic relationships. Over the last 40 years, the number of young people living with a boyfriend or girlfriend has increased more than 12 times, making it the fastest growing living arrangement among young adults. Not only
are they living together without being married, they are doing so at the same age that earlier generations were settling down to marry. Since the 1980s, the age when people start their first co-residential relationship has stayed consistently around 22, whereas the age when they first marry has risen from 22 to 27 for women. In other words, young adults are still starting relationships at the same age that their parents did, but they are trading marriage for cohabitation.
Finally, looking at the 4 milestones of adulthood (living away from parents, ever married, lived with a child and in the labor force) we see a decrease in 25-34 year olds in all 4 categories between 1976 and 2016 from 45% to 24%. Of that change, the most striking is those in the labor force and living away from parents but not in the other 2 categories (ever married, living with child going from 6% to 23%. Add in the increase of those in the labor force only going from 3% to 8% and you see the change clearly.
Our national programs to avoid teenage pregnancies (causing a lowering of fertility among the poor) combined with delaying marriage and children leading to a higher percentage of childless 45 year old women seems to be the culprit. But, notable, it isn't the highly educated women causing this, but a change in the least educated women.
This post really bothered me for some reason. First, it makes grand assertions and then contradicts itself. Even the "Psychology Today" article it used is not fully fleshed out. Here is the concluding paragraph:
"So do children contribute to our happiness? A recent study examined the link between having children and happiness from two surveys completed by almost 120,000 people (Herbst & Ifcher, 2016). They identified two trends: First, compared with nonparents, parents are becoming happier. Second, nonparents are increasingly reporting lower levels of happiness.
Some other studies are now beginning to show that having children may actually produce a happiness surplus."
Not exactly what he implied it said.
Secondly, what we know about fertility in the US is mischaracterized. The drop in fertility started in 2008, merely 15 years ago. Long after those large families disappeared from sight. The drop was because a larger amount of women chose to forego childbearing. If we want to know why our fertility dropped, we need to examine those women, not the population. Existential crisis is not the answer. Neither is overall happiness of the entire population.
Something cause a smallish group of women to forego child bearing..........percentage of women age 45-49 that have had children going from 90% to 84.6%..........that needs to be fleshed out.
Funny how you had to throw in the threat of Donald Trump causing GenZ not to want children. I take it you support the Democrat party - the party that brings climate hysteria to our children, convincing them there is no future, so why have children?
I think Trump and his Republican Party welcome children, celebrate the family, have hope in America. The Democrats, no. America is evil, we are all oppressors, don’t bring children into this malice that is America. Sorry, but this is what Democrats now profess, and Trump Americans dispute it and find your alliance self fulfilling.
Your assumptions are badly off. Gurri is a deep, neutral, and profoundly intelligent observer of our cultural moment. In his writing he betrays no bias “for” or “against” Trump; “for” or “against” the Democrats; “for” or “against” the Republicans. The reference to Trump in the article above was a gentle nod to the overwrought anxiety towards Trump which so many people feel. I am quite certain that he meant humorously. That, anyway, is how I took it.
I write this waiting for the birth of my 3rd grandchild in Israel. I was supposed to go there a few weeks ago to babysit the 3.5 & 2 year old. Talk about a terrible situation. My son was called to serve in the reserves, but stayed at home to be with his family. There seem to be a playground every 100' feet in Israel, something I don't see here. As the saying goes, if I knew grandchildren were this much fun, I would have had them first. Pray for everyone....
Worth reading every word through to the end! The “studies” about childless families being “happier” always seemed vapid at best to me. The lostness of our culture — and especially of Gen Z perhaps only matched by the greatness of their privilege and equally the depths of their entitlement — has long term consequences we’re not paying sufficient attention to…
I am an only child. I never saw the benefit to having silblings (yes I like the benefits) until my parents reached 80, and now I see the benefits to having someone to share the responsibilities.
I always thought a child required two parents so I wasn't interested in becoming a mother without a husband. However I wanted to be a mother/
My son left a northeastern college town near where he and his wife grew up because it was kid unfriendly and had bad schools, schools that promoted indoctrination over education. They moved to a beat up house with acreage in the middle south with their three young children. They have met families that enjoy having kids and critters and friendships. She is an educator, he a tradesman and they are home schooling with other families. He is in touch with his late 30’s married childless high school friends and they have good incomes, are aimless and bored. He and his wife worry and protect, but could not happier.
Done my part, people: 4 kids. The rest of you - get hot!
But is it not true that there are too many humans on the planet? The stress on resources is already enormous, not to even mention the fate of voiceless stakeholders like animals and plants. Once the Boomers are gone - the youngest being 59 now - maybe a smaller global population will make the planet more comfortable.
Ok, let’s say the current trend is as bad as the author is presenting here and the population should be growing. For how long? Is there no limit to how many humans this planet can sustain? Should we start slowing down at some point at least? What is that point? Sure, we can just keep making more babies to pay our SS, increase productivity etc. But what’s the long-term plan? Maybe we should start figuring out alternatives to growth ad infinitum. Think about how to incentivise urban “shrinkage” where necessary instead of urban sprawl. Let’s figure out how to provide nutritious meals and decent education for the kids we have first. When it comes to kids (I have 2), I prefer quality over quantity.
Fantastic article! Extremely well written. I do however, have a reason for Israel's high birth rate (amongst affluent & modern societies): Religion. With warts, pitfalls, contradictions and all, religion (at least the 3 monotheistic ones) imbeds an "Instinct," if you will, to procreate and expand one's lineage. They impart a "wisdom" that is vaguely understood, but never enumerated or explained in detail. More inferred.
I think Mr. Gurri unknowingly puts his finger on the problem when he mentions the welfare state that is jeopardized by depopulation.
People historically have had large families as a reaction to high child mortality rates, the need for help on the family farm - and to provide caretakers for their old age.
With the establishment of the welfare state the need for children has been reduced. Just as important, the welfare state is very expensive, requiring high taxes to feed its ravenous maw. And children are expensive! When faced with the high cost of the welfare state and the high cost of children, many have opted for fewer children because the welfare state will take care of them and to save on the money necessary to pay for said state.
"Absent the binding power of children, the extended family will disappear, and the nuclear family will disintegrate. There will be few mothers and fathers, no siblings, no cousins, no aunts or uncles; whole lineages will flicker out. If family is the audience to the drama of life, each individual will perform in the chill of an empty theater."
My mom is one of six kids; my dad is one of five kids; my husband's mom is one of eight kids; my husband's dad is one of nine kids. Most of them got married and had their own kids. I have twenty-five (I think?) first cousins, and my husband has never taken the time and effort to count his.
I'm an only child because my parents had fertility problems. My husband was an only child for most of his childhood, until his half-sister was born. Our two kids have no first cousins, and at this point, it looks like they're unlikely to have any. Theoretically, I would have liked a third kid, but I'm too introverted, mentally ill, and C-section-scarred.
I'm grateful for my dad's side of the family, which decided they wanted to keep doing huge family get-togethers, even when the cousins grew up and had their own kids. Big Halloween party today, packed with toddlers whose names I can't remember (one year, five kids were born in six months!) and too much candy.
Edit, the next day: And, it turns out one cousin’s wife is pregnant with their first baby. 🙂
How about the consequences of overpopulation? It has realistic and extreme consequences too. This is a terribly one sided article that doesn't go far enough in examining the evidence countering the argument for having more children.
Compilation from multiple census reports:
Since the 1990s, rates of childlessness have risen most sharply for the least educated women. The most dramatic change has occurred among women with less than a high school diploma, whose likelihood of bearing no children rose 66% from 1994 to 2008. Rates rose less steeply over the same time period among high school graduates and women with some college but not a degree.
In 2006, 26.2 percent of women ages 30 to 34 were childless, meaning they had never given birth to a child. By 2016, that number had risen about 4 percentage points to 30.8 percent
2016 Report: Young people are delaying marriage, but most still
eventually tie the knot. In the 1970s, 8 in 10 people
married by the time they turned 30. Today, not until
the age of 45 have 8 in 10 people married.
Although young people are delaying marriage, they are not putting off romantic relationships. Over the last 40 years, the number of young people living with a boyfriend or girlfriend has increased more than 12 times, making it the fastest growing living arrangement among young adults. Not only
are they living together without being married, they are doing so at the same age that earlier generations were settling down to marry. Since the 1980s, the age when people start their first co-residential relationship has stayed consistently around 22, whereas the age when they first marry has risen from 22 to 27 for women. In other words, young adults are still starting relationships at the same age that their parents did, but they are trading marriage for cohabitation.
Finally, looking at the 4 milestones of adulthood (living away from parents, ever married, lived with a child and in the labor force) we see a decrease in 25-34 year olds in all 4 categories between 1976 and 2016 from 45% to 24%. Of that change, the most striking is those in the labor force and living away from parents but not in the other 2 categories (ever married, living with child going from 6% to 23%. Add in the increase of those in the labor force only going from 3% to 8% and you see the change clearly.
Our national programs to avoid teenage pregnancies (causing a lowering of fertility among the poor) combined with delaying marriage and children leading to a higher percentage of childless 45 year old women seems to be the culprit. But, notable, it isn't the highly educated women causing this, but a change in the least educated women.
This post really bothered me for some reason. First, it makes grand assertions and then contradicts itself. Even the "Psychology Today" article it used is not fully fleshed out. Here is the concluding paragraph:
"So do children contribute to our happiness? A recent study examined the link between having children and happiness from two surveys completed by almost 120,000 people (Herbst & Ifcher, 2016). They identified two trends: First, compared with nonparents, parents are becoming happier. Second, nonparents are increasingly reporting lower levels of happiness.
Some other studies are now beginning to show that having children may actually produce a happiness surplus."
Not exactly what he implied it said.
Secondly, what we know about fertility in the US is mischaracterized. The drop in fertility started in 2008, merely 15 years ago. Long after those large families disappeared from sight. The drop was because a larger amount of women chose to forego childbearing. If we want to know why our fertility dropped, we need to examine those women, not the population. Existential crisis is not the answer. Neither is overall happiness of the entire population.
Something cause a smallish group of women to forego child bearing..........percentage of women age 45-49 that have had children going from 90% to 84.6%..........that needs to be fleshed out.
This is a much better discussion on the issue: https://www.aporiamagazine.com/p/the-wests-fertility-crisis?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=828904&post_id=137662764&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1oa580&utm_medium=email
Dave, Thank you for the link. It was a very interesting article!
Such a great writer. That last sentence is perfect.
Funny how you had to throw in the threat of Donald Trump causing GenZ not to want children. I take it you support the Democrat party - the party that brings climate hysteria to our children, convincing them there is no future, so why have children?
I think Trump and his Republican Party welcome children, celebrate the family, have hope in America. The Democrats, no. America is evil, we are all oppressors, don’t bring children into this malice that is America. Sorry, but this is what Democrats now profess, and Trump Americans dispute it and find your alliance self fulfilling.
Your assumptions are badly off. Gurri is a deep, neutral, and profoundly intelligent observer of our cultural moment. In his writing he betrays no bias “for” or “against” Trump; “for” or “against” the Democrats; “for” or “against” the Republicans. The reference to Trump in the article above was a gentle nod to the overwrought anxiety towards Trump which so many people feel. I am quite certain that he meant humorously. That, anyway, is how I took it.
I write this waiting for the birth of my 3rd grandchild in Israel. I was supposed to go there a few weeks ago to babysit the 3.5 & 2 year old. Talk about a terrible situation. My son was called to serve in the reserves, but stayed at home to be with his family. There seem to be a playground every 100' feet in Israel, something I don't see here. As the saying goes, if I knew grandchildren were this much fun, I would have had them first. Pray for everyone....
Worth reading every word through to the end! The “studies” about childless families being “happier” always seemed vapid at best to me. The lostness of our culture — and especially of Gen Z perhaps only matched by the greatness of their privilege and equally the depths of their entitlement — has long term consequences we’re not paying sufficient attention to…
Each time I read something you have written, I am more convinced you are the most under-rated intellectual in America.
I am an only child. I never saw the benefit to having silblings (yes I like the benefits) until my parents reached 80, and now I see the benefits to having someone to share the responsibilities.
I always thought a child required two parents so I wasn't interested in becoming a mother without a husband. However I wanted to be a mother/