Trying to Stabilize Populations Before It is Too Late

18 thoughts on “Trying to Stabilize Populations Before It is Too Late”

1. So, housing prices will come down again? Win.

2. I am quite sure that family determination is defined by those that decide to get involved in a family (or not involved). As our society became more complex and the tasks required to be a functional part of the society requiried more time and resources to be developed people get involved in a family after having achieved the necessary steps to secure a good job. And indeed not being able to get a good job regardless if is due to the arrival of a child is often seen as a failure, even here on nbf

3. No mention of China except in headline. What’s its TFR?

   • China’s TFR remains a contentious topic, with official figures from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) hovering around or slightly above 1.0. Independent researchers like Yi Fuxian—a demographer at the University of Wisconsin-Madison—argue that data has been historically inflated due to incentives during the one-child policy era (ocal officials overreporting births to meet quotas). Leaked internal estimates and alternative proxies (BCG vaccinations, marriage registrations) support Yi’s view that actual births are 10-20% lower than reported, pushing TFR below 1.0 to 0.9 or 0.8.

4. For a discussion of the issue that sounds sensible to me.
   https://onlys.ky/what-would-it-take-to-raise-the-birth-rate/

   • No cases meet the full criteria: massive housing boosts yielding +0.3 TFR. Correlations show housing costs/density reduce fertility (e.g., 10% price hike → 0.01-0.03 TFR drop), and micro-interventions like access lotteries boost individual births modestly. Macro supply surges (e.g., post-WWII US or 1990s Ireland) coincided with TFR rises, but these were confounded by economic booms, not isolatable to housing.

     Analysis and LimitationsSupport for the Assertion: Housing matters—density/costs delay births (3-4 years in expensive markets) and reduce TFR by 0.1-0.3 in constrained settings. Micro-evidence (Brazil) shows access can add ~0.3 children individually by alleviating crowding, aligning with the article’s urbanization thesis. Broader studies confirm affordability as a barrier, especially in cities where small units limit families (TFR 1.2-1.35 in 1-2 bedrooms vs. 1.9+ in larger homes).

     Weaknesses/No +0.3 Cases: No macro examples of massive supply boosts (e.g., 20%+ unit growth) yielding +0.3 TFR. Gains are small/modest because fertility is multifactorial (e.g., women’s careers, childcare, culture). Policies like Brazil’s target access, not broad supply; aggregate TFRs remain low amid urbanization (global TFR fell from 3.3 in 1960 to 1.5 in 2022). Confounders (e.g., recessions) obscure effects, and reverse causality exists (low fertility reduces housing demand long-term).

     Implications: Housing reforms could help (e.g., +0.1-0.2 TFR with zoning changes, per models), but alone won’t reverse declines—pair with subsidies/childcare. The article’s optimism is plausible but unproven at scale; experts recommend experimentation in high-density cities like Seoul or NYC.

     • Yesterday it was reported that 1 in 7 NYC public school children is homeless at some point in their year. Clearly, the poorest people aren’t deterred from having children by their poverty. It’s just the opposite. Yes, poverty should be alleviated for its own reasons, but opportunities for women decreases the fecundity (not fertility, which is capability) rate. Islamists, third world (these two are highly correlated) women have more babies, despite the terrible conditions, or it appears, because of them. The types of babies being produced and raised are the problem, not the lack of them. It’s not politically corrcet to say so, but the world is more likely to die in a Dark Ages redo than in a global population collapse.

       • Most of those homeless statistics are BS. I spoke with a homeless advocate. They classify anytime someone does not sleep in their own bed and room as homeless. I lived on my brother’s couch for 4 months in my undergraduate. That would classify me as homeless per statistics during that time.

         Your points about poverty are irrelevant to the global population decline. 95% of India and Bangladesh are poor. India total fertility rate is now 1.9. 10% below replacement. Bangladesh is just over 2.0.

         The relationship between household income and total fertility rate (TFR)—the average number of children a woman would have over her lifetime—in the US is not straightforward but follows a U-shaped pattern based on the most recent comprehensive data (from the 2018–2022 American Community Survey). This means:Poor households (e.g., bottom income quintile, around <$25,000 annually) tend to have higher TFRs than middle-class households. Compared to the middle class (e.g., $50,000–$100,000, or middle quintile), yes—low-income groups have notably higher fertility. Compared to the affluent (e.g., top quintile, >$150,000), it’s more mixed: Middle-to-upper-middle incomes ($100,000–$300,000) often have the lowest TFRs, but very high-income households ($400,000+) rebound to levels similar to or slightly exceeding those of low-income groups.

5. The same solution needed anyway for the post-Labor economy would boost the birth rate. Universal Basic Wealth. UBW. Defining classes of property that are already logically a common heritage to be owned in Usufruct by everyone with the income they generate equally distributed. That class includes a tranche of all IP especially including the IP that’s called AI, and the IP generated by AI (from the common heritage of human knowledge).

   If everyone had a reliable income from Wealth (not UBI income transfers dependent on the charity of politicians or the tolerance of rich taxpayers) and did not need to work for income, they would be free to have more kids. Every child would of course get an equal share from birth too so could pay for their own upbringing. Children would not be a financial burden to anyone.

6. GDP is still rising in the countries mentioned, even while their populations and working age adults are shrinking. Technology makes up the difference, and with AI and robots, this is going to accelerate, as will new discoveries when AI supplements humans, and robots do some of the grunt work (at least until their collective AI advances to the point they rebel…).

   • That’s kind of like your plane has lost an engine and is headed for a crash landing in the sea, and you say, “No problem, we’ll build a new one on the way down, look here, I’m already working on it!”

     Maybe you’ll get it done in time, maybe you won’t.

7. In Shakespeare’s famous romantic play “Romeo and Juliet”, Juliet is 13 years old.
   This is the NORMAL age for women to be courting for marriage, NORMAL throughout human history for almost all cultures. As can be clearly seen, modern western feminist push for the elimination of teenage pregnancies, leading to demographic suicide. It is literally the FIRST thing that western societies push on every other society, to eliminate teenage pregnancies.
   Humans are animals, and the human female breeds best when in their teens, this is truth, cold hard truth.
   The solution to the modern demographic problem is to ENCOURAGE married teenage pregnancies!
   This does NOT mean that we eliminate the possibility of women getting educated and having careers, quite the opposite, we need to accept that caring for children is shared by society and assisting the mother is a societal priority.
   Daycare/childcare should be free. Paid for by society, just like elementary education is free for everyone. Medical, dental, and eye care should be free for everyone under 21.
   A teenage women with kids should be GUARANTEED an elementary education, the same way we guarantee that a handicapped person gets an education. If she needs a private tutor then one will be provided!
   No longer do governments get FREE citizens, now they need to PAY for them.
   Having children should NOT be seen as LIMITING a woman’s ability to participate in society.
   No longer should a married teenage mother be seen as a FAILURE by society, but should be seen as a success, contributing to a healthy growing society.

   • Huhhh. Never expected to read a comment supporting pedophilia on here but here we are.

     • Technically, “pedophilia” is sexual attraction to the PRE-pubescent. It’s relatively uncommon and widely agreed to be pathological.

       Sexual attraction to the early post-pubescent is “ephebophilia”, and by contrast is statistically normal among males, merely socially discouraged.

   • NO. IT WAS NOT NORMAL. It happened exclusively among aristocratic families where the balance of power was a multidecade project, and people were engaged/promised in marriage already at birth. That does not mean it was normal. Pharaohs married between siblings, but it did not make it normal, not even in ancient Egypt. Those who claim that women should marry very young conveniently disregard the menarche, the age of the first menstruation has significantly decreased in the last century and in the past the population was so starved in term of food that not only people were significantly smaller in size, but they became fertile at later ages, and in some very food-deprived populations like Inuits fertility was seasonal. In particular, this last aspect is not some mysterious relic of evolution found only in some populations: the cessation of menstruation is well documented due to lack of food (and is documented in prisoners in WWII and anorexic women). So in general, based on purely biological evidence and the fact that people were clearly undernourished throughout history, anthropologists suggest that the age of first pregnancy occurred later INDEED:
     -Based on parish and genealogical records in Pre-industrial Europe (1300–1800) Average Age at Menarche was 15–17 Average Age at First Birth 19–23.
     -Historical hunter-gatherers (ethnographic) Average Age at Menarche 15–18 Average Age at First Birth 18–20 Based on Kung, Ache, Hadza, Inuit, Agta, etc.
     -Early agricultural (Neolithic, Iron Age, etc.) Average Age at Menarche 15–17
     Average Age at First Birth 18–22 Based on pelvic development and skeletal analysis.
     SO:
     First births rarely occurred before 15–16, because cycles were irregular and girls lacked pelvic maturity.
     Pelvic bones (ilium and sacrum) continue to grow and widen until around 17–19 years old in females (even in the current age of full nutrition). Populations with chronic malnutrition show slower skeletal maturation, pushing reproductive readiness even later.
     So, while puberty may have occurred at 14–16 on average in ancestral humans, first successful pregnancies likely averaged around 18–20 years, aligning with skeletal and energetic maturity.
     The myth claiming that it is “normal” or “natural” and we should revert to social behaviours accepting that girls should get pregnant at 13 yo, is at best a position due to ignorance, at worst a myth spread to make socially acceptable behaviours on young girls that in truth never happened.

     • Learn to read. I said it is normal for 13 year old girls to be be courting for marriage. Nowhere did I say that they are having children at 13. Traditionally marriage occurs BEFORE children. I AM saying that our modern western society is perverting the natural coupling that should occur in teenagers and that this is messing them up bad. Conservatives believe that the family is the bedrock of society and the purpose of life; liberals believe that the individual is the bedrock of society and happiness is the purpose of life. Modern Western society is liberal. For liberals, children are a luxury that they have when all their needs are satisfied. For conservatives, children are the main focus of their lives and everything else is a luxury.

       I am NOT suggesting in any way that we rollback political, human, sexual, or economic rights. I AM suggesting that the education of children INCLUDE the idea that having children is GOOD, that marriage is GOOD, that the individual has personal responsibilities to their family and they should consider the consequences of their personal choices on their family (that they have or may have in the future).
       Western liberal societies are dying because their people value family less than their own happiness.

   • Nowhere did I suggest changing the laws to allow pedophilia.
     I AM saying that teenagers should be encouraged to court and then marry OTHER teenagers. It is INSANE that MOST people in rich industrialized western society will look at a 17 year old married couple with a child as a FAILURE of society, as if this is wrong. Young women are taught that having a child is the WORST thing that could happen to them. The number one political issue for young women is abortion… no other issue comes close… they have been taught that having a child leads to FAILURE.
     Oppose teenage pregnancy (young families are BAD and EVIL) and rejoice that you have won! As your society slowly ages and dies out.
     Young people in modern western societies have never been more unhappy, more depressed about their future, more lonely, and more sexually perverted than they are now. The percentage of virgins (complete virgins, never even kissed a person of the opposite sex) is increasing. There is a growing percentage of young men that have ZERO romantic involvement with women. Contrast this with the hyper-sexualism of a small group of ‘Chad’ men and a large percentage of young women (social media and dating apps facilitate this). Every single issue that liberal progressive feminist have fought for they have won.
     A lonely, dying, unhappy population is the world they have made… congratulations!

     • In the 50s and prior sex and relationships were often dictated by religion (see Ireland). During the 60s there was sexual liberation but women were then pressurised by boyfriends to have sex. The arrival of the contraceptive pill sort of gave women some control, but then made it harder to say no to sex “Hey babes just go on the pill”.
       Women had been struggling for voting rights and career rights throughout history. But to some extent the increase of feminism and women’s rights was stoked by the sexual revolution which put more pressure on women. This is just my quick take, but I am a male. Perhaps some of the female readers of this site could chip in?

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