US Birthrate Plummets To Record Low 567
Hugh Pickens writes "The Washington Post reports that the U.S. birthrate is at its lowest since 1920, the earliest year with reliable records. The rate decreased to 63.2 births per 1,000 women of childbearing age — a little more than half of its peak, which was in 1957. The overall birthrate decreased by 8 percent between 2007 and 2010, but the decline is being led by immigrant women hit hard by the recession, with a much bigger drop of 14 percent among foreign-born women. Overall, the average number of children a U.S. woman is predicted to have in her lifetime is 1.9, slightly less than the 2.1 children required to maintain current population levels. Although the declining U.S. birthrate has not created the kind of stark imbalances found in graying countries such as Japan or Italy, it should serve as a wake-up call for policymakers, says Roberto Suro, a professor of public policy at the University of Southern California. 'We've been assuming that when the baby-boomer population gets most expensive, that there are going to be immigrants and their children who are going to be paying into [programs for the elderly], but in the wake of what's happened in the last five years, we have to reexamine those assumptions,' he said. 'When you think of things like the solvency of Social Security, for example, relatively small increases in the dependency ratio can have a huge effect.'"
OK, so... (Score:2, Funny)
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At least you'll get something back, geezer. I don't expect social security to be around when I retire.
Re:OK, so... (Score:5, Interesting)
At least you'll get something back, geezer. I don't expect social security to be around when I retire.
... and for less contribution. I once saw a chart someone compiled where it showed the average tax rate paid by people of each age. For example, someone born in 1950... they added up the median income for a 16-year-old in 1966, a 17-year-old in 1967, etc, to get an idea of how much money they've earned over their entire life (adjusting for inflation, of course). They then looked at how much tax they paid, on average, at each of those ages to figure out, over your lifetime, what percentage of your earnings went to the 'gummint'. What they found was that, for senior citizens, because they paid such low tax rates back before the 70's or so, their effective lifetime tax-rate was something like less than half of someone in their 20's today.
Yeah but (Score:3)
Re:OK, so... (Score:4, Informative)
I think you are mistaken unless you are not speaking about the US which would be odd. The marginal tax rate has been relatively stable and dramatically decreased on the highest earners over the time period you to which you refer (see this article [theatlantic.com]).
That's why you don't look at the highest earners (who actually enjoy some of the lowest rates, ever, right now). Back in 1928, people making less than $52k/year (in adjusted dollars) were actually in the lowest bracket, paying 1.5%. By 1935, those making less than $65k/yr paid 4%.
This lasted until the start of WW-II, when tax rates went up and the thresholds for the brackets went down... to the point where someone making $60k/yr was in a 30% bracket. But, someone who had appreciable income earned before WW-II would have enjoyed some ridiculously-low tax rates averaged into their lifetime average.
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That's because in 1960 corporations paid 40% of the taxes collected by the government and the wealthiest 10% paid tremendously more tax than they pay now. Corporations now only account for less than 5% of the total taxes collected so the entire tax burden now rests on the shoulders of the middle class. Also, by the way, when CEOs complain about the ridiculous taxes they pay call bullshit, most fortune 100 companies pay little or no taxes and energy companies got huge government subsidies even when they made
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Re:OK, so... (Score:5, Informative)
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Exactly. Well stated.
Anyone who insists there is actually SS Trust fund is just plain wrong.
One important Correction (Score:3)
All Government bonds, including those owed to SSI, are considered part of the Debt (well, if you are going with the $14 trillion number). The only way to pay off the debt is to buy back the bonds and when you lower the deficit you will by definition be selling less bonds to all customers, including SSI. So the trust fund was used to "fund" the deficit, but it never changed the apparent size of the deficit. One consequence of this is that paying less benefits doesn’t lower the debt or deficit in any
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There is no actual money in the SS Trust fund. Reagan took a bit of it, Clinton took most of it, and Bush Jr finished it off. There's only an IOU there with no economic value.
This can be hard to understand: why is it bad that there's one kind of bond there instead of another? Here's a very close analgy to explain. Let's say you had good retirement savings in your 401K. But then you borrowed the entire amount for some emergency. There's *still* a financial instrument in your 401K - the record of the lo
Re:OK, so... (Score:4, Informative)
This is not how intergenerational transfers work. This is no ponzi scheme, unless the people in the US collectively decide to produce no more children and forbid all immigration. In which case I guess you'll have other, more urgent, problems. Ponzi schemes break down because eventually, you cannot grow the base fast enough. Intergenerational transfers work as long as there are new generations, which there will be for as long as there is a US of A. There are transitions between demographic structures, but these are temporary problems and require no long-term fixes : you can smooth out problems through borrowing.
Basically, the US is broke exactly when people stop wanting T-bills, and not a moment before. The moment that happens is when people stop believing that the US will produce stuff in the next 3-10 years. And the rest of the planet offers significantly better prospects with very little risk.
This will not happen. At least, not in the forseeable future.
It doesn't matter that there is no money in the fund. In fact, it is a good thing: it is a terrible and wasteful thing to have large sums doing nothing in a bank account, and at the kind of scales we are talking about, this is nothing short of criminal. Because the ability to keep paying SS depends on the promise that the US is a place where riches are created (by which I mean goods and services, not bullion) it is an excellent strategy to invest the money in the fund to pay for whatever stuff makes Americans happy and productive.
You want to know what happens when people start thinking like accountants? Look at Europe! Or think about outsourcing of IT departments, to give an example dear to the slashdot crowd. A country is not a household.
Re:OK, so think of it like this. (Score:4, Informative)
Now just before Bush came into office in 2001, as an example, 1 American dollar was worth about 1.75 British pounds...After Bush left office...1 American dollar was worth about .55 {cent/pent} in British currency.
You are clearly mistaken about the exchange rates. The USD has never been worth anywhere near 1.75 GBP, at least going back to 1953 [fxtop.com].
The rate was 1.48 GBP to 1 USD in Jan 2001 (when Bush takes office) , and 1.45 GBP to 1 USD in Jan 2009 (when Bush leaves office). It did go as high as 2.10 in the interim, but there was no trend even close what you are suggesting.
Not that I'm defending Bush, nor do I think that any of the rest of your post is remotely accurate, but those figures just stuck out to me as being entirely wrong.
Re:OK, so... (Score:5, Insightful)
Stop your whining. It was your generation in power that decided that starting multiple wars, deregulating the financial system, and then cutting taxes at the same time was a good idea. Your generation doesn't deserve shit for retirement compared to how your generation looted and pillaged the country thinking that your kids would clean it up.
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Stop your whining. It was your generation in power that decided that starting multiple wars, deregulating the financial system, and then cutting taxes at the same time was a good idea. Your generation doesn't deserve shit for retirement compared to how your generation looted and pillaged the country thinking that your kids would clean it up.
Except that it wasn't the OP's generation that did all of that, at least not alone. It was all of the voting generations. Oh, and you forgot to include massively expanding entitlements (particularly Medicare) and bailing out the banks in your list of fiscal irresponsibilities.
You're making a bad mistake.... (Score:3)
Not just the overall rate... (Score:4, Informative)
The linked article displays population projection from now to 2050, broken down by segments. It also shows the education levels of each segment. What it imply is we will end up with a less educated work force moving forward unless we are doing some heavy investing now.
So, your $20 in 1969 may turn into $0 (albeit in 2050) unless we can somehow shore up "the kids these days".
Thoughts from my great uncles and aunts... (Score:4, Interesting)
They would always comment about how, when couples back-in-the-day got married, the first thing on their list of wants was children. Now, the list of wants usually starts with a house, two cars, living in a nice neighborhood, better insurance, a bigger TV, a good living room set... One's take on the matter: "America's so selfish nowadays it doesn't deserve children."
Re:Thoughts from my great uncles and aunts... (Score:5, Interesting)
The old generation mentality is wrong, and unsustainable. lower birth rates should be encouraged. It makes for a higher standard of living for all, and a higher quality of living for all. who knows, maybe fewer people could help create more social-cohesion and community:something many people lament this era is lacking in.
the only downside is the current social programs have been geared for continual exponential growth (more young-ens sustaining the geezers) and they look a little scary with a low to negative growth rate.
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The problem is that our economy is predicated on growth and has been engineered to be that way for decades.
Lower population growth = lower economic growth
There are ways to fix this issue, but we need to change the way we look at business and economics to do so.
Re:Thoughts from my great uncles and aunts... (Score:5, Insightful)
The world's population doesn't need to be as big as it is now. There are benefits to large populations (certain cultural output that can be replicated cheaply scales almost perfectly with population), but there are also downsides (natural resources must be divided). Exponential growth must eventually hit a limit, and presumably there is some optimal range for population. Why does everybody always assume that it's "what we have now, forever", for every value of now ever?
Anyway, I don't think the United States population is even on a decline, even with a 1.9 birthrate, because of immigration.
http://news.slashdot.org/story/12/11/30/187246/us-birthrate-plummets-to-record-low# [slashdot.org]
(How is it selfish to not have children until you live in a nice neighbourhood with good insurance and creature comforts? Why isn't it considered selfish to have the kid first and then have to scramble to provide for it?)
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The old generation mentality is wrong. We are not an agrarian society anymore. Cities are overcrowded as it is.
I am not having kids, and here are my reasons:
1: The US's best days are in the past. I don't want to give a kid a life in a country where the only future he has to look forward to is either a worker overseas, a minimum wage slave, or (God forbid) another inmate in a private prison. After the older generations took their stuff [1] and companies have moved their wealth to BRIC countries. Banks
Re:Thoughts from my great uncles and aunts... (Score:5, Informative)
Why do you think it worked for so many thousands of years and yet we will somehow sustain a population with nobody having kids anymore.
It didn't work very well, though. Infant mortality was very high. Lifespans were shorter. *People* were shorter due to not getting enough food as kids. That is not a better world than what we have today.
Furthermore, why do we need to sustain a population of 7+ billion, as opposed to some lower number? A century ago there were fewer than 2 billion, and it certainly wasn't the end of the world.
Re:Thoughts from my great uncles and aunts... (Score:5, Insightful)
They would always comment about how, when couples back-in-the-day got married, the first thing on their list of wants was children. Now, the list of wants usually starts with a house, two cars, living in a nice neighborhood, better insurance, a bigger TV, a good living room set... One's take on the matter: "America's so selfish nowadays it doesn't deserve children."
I suppose "One's" never stopped to consider that maybe those Americans who make fiscal security a priority over popping out offspring do so for the benefit of said potential offspring.
Sure, the wife and I could have had kids as soon as we got married - and those kids would have grown up in abject poverty as a result. Instead, we decided to focus on getting financially stable first, so any children we do end up having get a better start than either of us did.
Sounds to me like "One's" is the person who doesn't deserve to procreate.
Re:Thoughts from my great uncles and aunts... (Score:5, Informative)
"One's" is probably 70 or 80 years old, and grew up and raised children at a time when economic realities were totally different. When it was normal to support a family on a single salary. When you didn't have to go to college to break into (or stay in) the middle class. (One of my college professors told me that when he was in college in the 1940s, he earned enough money in his summer job to pay tuition for the year!) When the median house cost 2x the median annual salary, not 8x. When employees had job security and strong unions and could expect a pension, and medical costs were not 20% of the GDP.
The bigger TV and even the second car are small expenses compared to the costs of establishing economic security in modern America.
It's a conceit of the old that because they had it hard, we somehow have it easier. But it's understandable.
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I suppose "One's" never stopped to consider that maybe those Americans who make fiscal security a priority over popping out offspring do so for the benefit of said potential offspring.
When those older people grew up "popping out offspring" was the route to fiscal security. Maybe they didn't think of it that way, exactly, but it was. Lots of hands to help work the farm, and lots of kids to help support the parents when the parents got old. A larger family was a wealthier family.
And, interestingly, when you have a national Ponzi scheme like Social Security running... more kids is also the path to fiscal security for people in their old age, except on a collective rather than individua
Re:Thoughts from my great uncles and aunts... (Score:5, Interesting)
Another take on it is that people who are responsible, and realize how much children cost and how much investment it takes in them, wait a long time to have kids and don't have many. Having a house and a two car garage, and having them paid off is SMART, it's how you can live your life without being a slave in someone else's salt mine (and making the kinds of decisions that slaves make).
I don't see this trend as "bad", it seems pretty good to me. We have too many people, we consume too many resources, we don't really have enough to go around for any length of time. Let the population shrink to what it needs to be given the level of technology we have available.
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They would always comment about how, when couples back-in-the-day got married, the first thing on their list of wants was children. Now, the list of wants usually starts with a house, two cars, living in a nice neighborhood, better insurance, a bigger TV, a good living room set... One's take on the matter: "America's so selfish nowadays it doesn't deserve children."
Perhaps for a select few. However, I believe it is the financial squeeze put on families that is the bigger issue.
In the past you would work most of your life at a single company and collect a pension. With security like that it was much easier to have a child, knowing they would be taken care of. With the economic uncertainty now why would you want to have more than 1 or at most 2 children.
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In the UK a couple where only one person works can't afford kids any more. Even with two working parents it is hard, and some people feel they should be full time parents.
I have a pretty good job but kids are out of the question for the foreseeable future, even if I did want them.
Re:Thoughts from my great uncles and aunts... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Well, my out of touch old people think Obama is personally going to break into their houses at night and steal their guns. All I can do is shake my head sadly and look to the future. If
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Judging by your account ID, I guess you couldn't be TOO much younger than I am.
Back in the day, what the hell else was a woman going to do with her time? And how else were they going to get financial security for their old age?
http://www.ssa.gov/history/hfaq.html [ssa.gov]
Social Security was created in '37. Medicare in '65. If you didn't have kids, you were looking at a pretty hard retirement.
And, of course, the more kids you had, the more farm hands you had - if that was your life (as it was, to a fair extent, fo
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Actually, I suspect it's geared more towards the female spouse wanting a career first and foremost.
Not a sexist thing at all, mind you - back in the day, women usually got married young, moved into the new home, and started having kids. Now, a typical woman fully expects to have some sort of good career going first before even thinking of having children (which also explains why women have their first/only kid later in life in recent times). These days, it seems the only females who have kids before 25 are
must be my son's school then (Score:2)
they built a new addition over the last 3 years to handle more students and they are still getting more applications than seats. this is for kindergarten. 160 some seats and they got almost 200 applications. this is for a NYC public school
PANIC! (Score:2)
the average number of children a U.S. woman is predicted to have in her lifetime is 1.9, slightly less than the 2.1 children required to maintain current population levels
Oh my GOD! It's like we'll have to allow some people to migrate into our country just to sustain ourselves! QUICKLY, let's open the floodgates of and bring more people in before we all just wither and fade away!
Seriously? This is an issue?
That anyone feels this is newsworthy is why we have a distruct of sociologists. They have serious discussions over "well, duh" type findings.
All that said, I see what they're trying to say: "Social Security if fucked". And while that's an important thing to say, it
Re:PANIC! (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously? This is an issue?
It's an economic bubble. Our country is based on debt, which is based on inflation, which is based on population expansion. More hands out means more hands to put money into which means more debt which means more money in the money system which means you can keep collecting interest. Issued debt grows and grows, but work gets done.
Now when people start working their way out of debt and paying on assets, stop taking loans, etc, that fails. Stop taking mortgages? Credit crunch, recession, depression. Stop taking student loans? Credit crunch. With a credit crunch, we don't have as much money in the system. That means less money flowing around to pay off loans, making it harder for people to get high-paying jobs to pay down their debt, meaning defaults on debt, meaning people are foreclosed on and banks are left with worthless assets and lose money. Loss of money means the federal government doesn't get paid back, and banks fold, and the taxes go up--or the banks raise interest rates and add fees to take more money away from people. Economic damage.
The whole system is based on population expansion. More population, more credit issue, more debt, more money flow. Stable population means suddenly a lot of things don't work. Thing is the population is basically an economic bubble--it grows, it shrinks. It can't grow and grow and grow any more than the spot price of AAPL.
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Because it never left. [wordpress.com]
That's right, robots, computers, and better manufacturing processes have automated away the manufacturing jobs. And that's a good thing. We may not be able to have a society without people, but we can certainly have a manufacturing industry with a lot less people then we did before.
So if you talk about "bringing jobs back", you're going to have to look somewhere other than manufact
ahhhhh! now it make sense! (Score:3)
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Honest question: Do the misinformed leaders [freakonomics.com] who advocate this in the US really represent a material segment of the population?
Why I'm not having kids (Score:5, Interesting)
And let's not get into how expensive children are, or how hostile work environments are to parents of either sex (but especially women.) I believe both parents deserve equal maternity/paternity leave and for a far longer period than most employers are willing to give them. We'd have to both be comfortably working from home to even consider it.
So, we're not quite the couple in the beginning of Idiocracy, but we're close enough.
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Playing with nieces and nephews can be a lot of fun, but there is no feeling comparable to the joy of raising your own child.
Re:Why I'm not having kids (Score:5, Funny)
Thank you for not having children.
Re:Why I'm not having kids (Score:5, Insightful)
This is not a critique of you, I don't know you or your situation personally so obviously I cannot and will not judge, but:
This is a kind of selfishness. You indicate that you think of having children entirely around how it would impact you, personally, and what you want. The problem with this is that having children is fundamentally not about you. It's about the potential children you could have, and about their well-being and prosperity, even if it is extremely costly and a tremendous sacrifice to you personally, and at a slightly higher level the economic and demographic well being of the country, which relies on a steady stream of young people to work and produce for society, and of course at the highest level it is simply about the continuation of the species and making sure humanity survives and prospers. That is why animals, all animals (humans included) have children. It isn't for your own pleasure or well-being, although I should point out that having kids actually does make you live longer, and happier, and in the long term more stably, since you have children to support and help you once you grow old.
The mindset you exhibit is extremely common. It's the whole reason the US isn't having enough kids to sustain itself, and the reason the Japanese are probably going to collapse in a few decades from a population implosion. That attitude will destroy the country in which it becomes widespread, almost inevitably (hell, it's part of what destroyed Rome all those years ago).
Re:Why I'm not having kids (Score:5, Insightful)
I say this as someone who just had a child, but I think those who have children do it out of selfishness, too. You want to be the one to improve the world and help humanity (and make yourself feel good about yourself and boost your ego), so you do it by having a child. There is also the even more selfish ones who do it out of longing to have a family, the joys of parenthood, and maybe even so they hopefully have someone to take care of you.
Most people have selfish reasons for their decisions, that is just human nature (as is altruism).
Re:Why I'm not having kids (Score:5, Insightful)
Having children just to sustain the US is selfishness (and ultimately unsustainable). Having children to support you once you get old is even more so. Having children if you don't want them, is stupidness. Most people have children because they are supposed to, just like animals. Actually choosing to have or have not children seems thoughtful. That you disagree, and call it selfish, is thoughtless.
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It's the whole reason the US isn't having enough kids to sustain itself, and the reason the Japanese are probably going to collapse in a few decades from a population implosion.
No, the problem with Japan's birth rate is that more and more males no longer want to even bother dealing with the opposite sex [wikipedia.org].
And I wouldn't blame them. The "traditional" social expectation (and this isn't exclusively a Japanese thing) is for men to work day and night (as a salaryman), while the wife stays home.
Some woman will probably chime in how hard it is to clean the house and take care of the kids, and those jobs are just as important. Well, if it's so hard and important how about we switch?
Ah, but
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depends on your job. there are high and low paying jobs where you have to be on site to work. my wife and i are lucky that we can work from home if need be
and you think you have it good now, but wait a few decades. people's kids will grow up and they will forget about you since the kids can watch themselves. people will always spend time as a family with kids and grandchildren and cousins and others. you and your wife will be alone and bitter in your old age.
or you will end up like some of the dummies i see
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I get it and I don't disagree with your POV. But that is nothing like actually having kids. They change your life in ways you can't imagine. There are pros and cons, and perhaps you think you're getting many of the pros without the cons. If so, you're badly mistaken. The process of raising
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Most rewarding to some, maybe most....absolutely not all. I personally highly dislike kids, and everyone around me knows it. The reasons aren't important, whats important is that since it is known that I hate kids, a lot of people will tell me things they wouldn't say out loud..generally out of shame.
While i fully believe the VAST majority of the population loves their kids more than anything, a small, but significant percentage are just not meant for it (I've read a few studies that say about 10%....plus o
Re:Why I'm not having kids (Score:5, Insightful)
As a father of an unplanned daughter, who at one point thought a lot like you, I can tell you that there's simply no practical reason to have kids. It's purely emotional. That being said, It's hard to put into words why you might want to have kids, but I'll try.
There's the times when I pick her up at daycare, and she runs into my arms and says "daddy daddy!" That just makes any bad day better. :-)
Other times, I get to thinking how maybe she'll get married one day, or have her own baby. I imagine when that time comes, I'll look at her and feel something like I felt when I held her right after she was born. I'll think how she's just this little girl that we brought to life, that we gave a chance to. When I get time to think of it, I'm deeply fufilled in knowing that my wife and I brought someone into this world. That we gave someone else a chance to know what life is all about, begining to end.
At night, when she's not doing well or is sick, and calls for us, it's an overwhelming feeling of dependance, of importance. It's not replicated anywhere else in my personal or professional life. The notion that someone else's life depends entirely on us, gives me a sort of peace and direction I never otherwise had.
Don't get me wrong. Having kids is hard, sleepless, exhausting work. No one tells you how hard it really can be. But, you know, I just started to embrace the challenge. And I realized it's the most important thing I'll ever accomplish. It's very hard to describe how that feels.
Personally, I would'nt have it any other way.
Re:Why I'm not having kids (Score:4, Insightful)
You titled your post "Why I'm not having kids" and the only reason I can tell from your post is that you don't want them.
Which is a perfectly valid reason.
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There's a difference between "valid", "logical" and "persuasive." Essentially the post is just personal preference dressed up as logic, by taking what are lifestyle choices and casting them as non-negotiable requirements.
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And if its not, you can't change your mind.
I'm not going to risk it.
Over-population red herring? (Score:2)
I do remember many times seeing the reports of how over-population was going to put such stresses on resources that it would be catastrophic to the globe. Well, looks like the problem has been solved. Yes it will be painful for a moment in time, but once population stabilizes, or even falls, there will be more for folks.
Frankly, the Govt can keep what I've paid into SS and the like. Just stop taking it out of my paychecks. I will take care of myself thank you very much.
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I do remember many times seeing the reports of how over-population was going to put such stresses on resources that it would be catastrophic to the globe. Well, looks like the problem has been solved. Yes it will be painful for a moment in time, but once population stabilizes, or even falls, there will be more for folks.
So over-population and global warming aren't intertwined at all? Carbon emissions are only half the problem. The other half is ALL THE FREAKING PEOPLE using the technologies which emit carbon!
If you are young(ish), save for yourself (Score:2)
I think within 20-30 years, social security will be just about tapped out and unable to pay more than a small percentage of people that paid in.
What will end up happening is only the needy will be given social security money, anyone who has any amount of savings will not be allowed to draw out of it.
So for anyone working now - just treat social security as a black whole, money taken from you never to be seen again. Save enough for your own retirement to be comfortable. It's not hard to do, even just a few
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Note that according to the latest Trustee's report the trust fund will pay full retirement benefits until 2033 [ssa.gov], and thereafter will still be paying 75% of scheduled benefits through 2086 -- not a "small percentage". It's been proposed that the deficit could be completely wiped-out by means-testing OASDI payouts...
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I don't know anybody under the age of 55 who is planning on receiving benefits from SS when they retire.
Kids cost money (Score:2, Insightful)
Why would you want tonnes of kids when you can find a job and they want to cut your food stamps?
You can't even get a living wage at Walmart!
the birth rate has smoothed out (Score:2)
if you read the article they have a nice chart going back to the 1800's. the last 50 some years the birth rate has been flat since peaking in 1960.
right about the same time as women going into the work force and becoming independent and having children later. instead of peaks and valleys like before we will probably have a nice smooth birth rate going forward as people have kids later in life
This isn't a bad thing. (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, the social security problem is easily solved by actually making the wealthy pay their proportionate share of the taxes. It isn't even a significant factor compared to the effects of uncontrolled population growth on the human race.
Our population is far too high as is and it going shrinking some isn't a bad thing. Just because we've been planning for overcrowding, increasing resource usage, etc doesn't mean should not demand that our population continue it's horrible growth increase to fulfill our fears.
People often like to claim that humans consume without bounds and replicate until all resources are used up and will eventually move on. A stop in population growth would indicate an equilibrium with our environment and disappoint them. Is that really so bad?
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most wealthy people don't get their money from salary, but from investments.
fat chance on taxing everyone's investments that haven't been turned into cash
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Money collected from any means other than Social Security withholdings cannot be used fro Social Security payments, nor can money collected for Social Security be used for any other purpose.
=Smidge=
Re:This isn't a bad thing. (Score:4, Informative)
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The problem is that you can't make people fit for work for longer just for the sake of making of numbers working out. It won't work as well as you think anyway. Our SS retirement age is already far higher than employers will actually tolerate and the result is pressed early retirement.
Basis of the US economy (Score:5, Interesting)
This is a problem with the US economy in general - it is based on growth. Those European/Asian countries that have been around for thousands of years are more stable, and have economies based more on sustainable goods and services. One of the main economic numbers that drives the US stock market is "new housing starts" - a number based solely on having the population continually increasing. Once that slows down - and can't even be propped up by the banks fudging mortgages - the entire country is headed for a depression.
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there is no asian/european country that has been around for thousands of years in a stable condition. they all have been invaded and their populations killed off to make room for the invaders.
mongols invaded china
the romans pushed the gauls into england and then ireland. the current french are franks, who were invaders in the early part of the last millenium. same with most other europeans. they were the barbarians who invaded the roman empire and settled down.
Re: (Score:2)
kill off the old people?
Wouldn't say 1.9 is "slightly" less than 2.1. (Score:2)
blame modern medicine (Score:3)
used to be you had 5 kids and 2 of them would die by 5 or 10. smallpox, typhoid, cholera, polio, death in child birth. add in your normal bacterial infections spreading and making your kids blind or some other disability because anti-biotics weren't available.
these days we have vaccines, antibiotics and other drugs to treat conditions that used to kill.
my older kid had pneumonia a few years back. a little zithromax and he was ready for day care in 2 days.
one of my school teachers once said that pneumonia put her in the hospital for a month
before that it wasn't that unusual to die from it
How Does a Woman Have 1.9 Children? (Score:2)
Who's having those babies (Score:5, Interesting)
I suspect that people with education and stable incomes continue to have children at the already low rate that they have historically.
That immigrants are also reducing the number of pregnancies hints that they understand the consequences and costs of raising children. Or maybe it hints that with access to free medical services (and yeah, lets not kid ourselves, for them it is free), they have managed to throw off the traditions of the third world of having many children even when living in squalor in the hopes that some of them will survive to take care of them in their old age.
(You would sort of expect this, since anyone willing to abandon their homeland and go on a long and dangerous journey risking arrest, and sometimes life, in the hopes of improving their conditions, would seem unlikely to fall back into the trap that they left).
Its been a long time since this country had a depression lasting 5 years, (with another 4 years on the horizon). Long enough for even the clueless to begin to understand the costs involved of feeding kids while out of work.
So who is still having those kids? I suspect the least able to support them. Unmarried teen age girls living in poverty [prb.org]. Despite nationally declining rates, teen birth rates in the United States remain persistently high, at 34.4 births per 1,000 women ages 15 to 19. And these rates are dramatically higher than in other developed countries. Twice as high as Canada.
Also those living on public assistance, of one form or another, where having another kid means another increase in their assistance check.
The birth rate for women 15 to 50 years old receiving public assistance income in the last 12 months was 155 births per 1,000 women, about three times the rate for women not receiving public assistance [census.gov]. See page 15.
With no skills, and no prospects, there seems to be an entire population of breeder-class individuals. And they are not necessarily the immigrants that we all thought they were.
I can see it now .. Everyone, we need more fucking (Score:2)
Isn't that the point of kids? So you have someone to look after you when you get old? ;-) I jest, I jest.
End the pyramid scheme (Score:5, Informative)
Frankly, I view population growth as akin to deficit spending... you can only get away with it for so long. So, rather than wait until we've exceeded the earth's capacity to support us, let's bite the bullet now. Let's embrace policies which encourage either zero-growth or population reduction and just accept the fact that it means that we'll all have to work a longer % of our life-expectancy.
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say you have a 401k with mutual funds. who is going to buy the stock from you when you're old if there are less people? what if there are less people to buy less products? less profits and less money for your retirement in your supposedly non-pyramid scheme plan
Not so fast! (Score:5, Funny)
Except for Hawaii. Their earliest year with reliable records was 1962 apparently.
Exactly why we need a more open immigration policy (Score:5, Insightful)
2. Advanced material wealth and higher education attract immigrants.
3. Emigrating is difficult under the best and most legal circumstances. Therefore, immigrants tend to be more ambitious and harder working than average.
4. Consequently, immigrants can supplement native birth in broadening the economic base, while simultaneously adding economic dynamism via their own ambition and the more generalized effects of cultural diffusion.
5. Profit!!!
6. GOTO 1.
Thanks everyone who decided not to have kids (Score:3)
For making more resources available for mine.
Re:Immigrants... right (Score:5, Insightful)
...who said they were illegal, and why would you assume simply refering to an 'immigrant' would result in only illegal immigrants?
Wow, just...wow.
Re:Immigrants... right (Score:4, Insightful)
Most white people in the USA are illegal immigrants. Just ask any American Indian.
Re:Immigrants... right (Score:4, Insightful)
Illegal immigration is the vast majority of current immigration. No need to assume, when you can measure.
However, most immigrants, illegal or otherwise, pay Social Security taxes! It's amazing how often that's overlooked in debate. The number of cash-only dayjob workers is statistically small, and most immigrants (legal or otherwise) have some social security number associated with their job! Given that social security is the primary tax most people pay these days, the notion of the "illegal working tax-free" is unfounded.
Re:Immigrants... right (Score:4)
Bullshit. And why bother measuring, when you can just make up numbers?
According to Wikipedia [wikipedia.org], there is 7 to 20 million illegal immigrants in the US.
According to the US census bureau [census.gov], there are 40 million immigrants in the US as of 2011.
Doesn't quite seem like a "vast majority", or actually any kind of majority, does it?
Seriously. 2 minutes of googling. But why bother if you already have the wrong answer in your head?
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Even if you are here illegally, you get payroll deductions. In fact, since you're afraid of the government you may decide not to file a tax return and claim your refund. You might consume more services at the local level, such as going to the ER for medical care which is expensive. There's a lot of data sloshing around; but it's clear that illegal immigrants pay some taxes. They definitely can't avoid sales tax which is pretty high in California now. For the types of jobs immigrants work, that sales ta
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You forgot those who use fake IDs and someone else's social security number for work. They get the full deduction, but not a cent of refund.
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You do know there are millions of legal immigrants flooding into the country right? The bar for legal US immigration is low and it is intentionally made easy to immigrate. That is why some people don't think we should be giving a free pass to the illegals. They essentially bypassed taking a couple days to learn the Constitution and a basic English test and an oath of loyalty to the US. People who have a problem with those requirements aren't our kind of people.
And the article didn't say they were depending
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
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"You do know there are millions of legal immigrants flooding into the country right? "
Stop listening to Rush Limburger and the other members of the idiot brigade.
there are NOT millions of them FLOODING into the country.
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Yes. There. Are.
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_legal_immigrants_does_the_us_take_in_per_year [answers.com]
People with mod points. Please stop modding people up informative when you can paraphrase their argument as "nuh uh" just because you agree with their politics.
America, home of the Immigrants (Score:4, Insightful)
If the bar is that low, then why are people coming here illegally? Perhaps you are buying into some sort of illusion of how easy it is to get in, because based on the number of people sneaking in, I don't buy it. You do realize that sneaking in isn't easy or safe, right? Why would anyone sneak in if getting in legitimately is really that simple? I call bullshit....
People who have a problem with those requirements aren't our kind of people.
You know, I actually would welcome those people. Because to sneak in, you have to deal with possibly dangerous characters, risk injury, imprisonment, or even death sneaking across miles of desert. Anyone who wants freedom that badly is OK in my book. These are the people who will appreciate its value, because they had to earn it. The people I don't think we need are the lazy, self-centered assholes already here who expect that freedom is safe, easy, and free.
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Der gonna take er jerbs!!!!
We must allow immigration (Score:3, Insightful)
Why do you assume immigrants must be illegal? The law should allow the amount of legal immigration we need, and the immigrants that will help our country grow. Immigration is vital to our economy now, and will become more so as the population ages.
Young, vital, driven immigrants are just the sort of people we need, yet nativist know-nothings act as if immigrants are a blight, not paying taxes or contributing anything to the economy. If we shut off immigration, as the xenophobic fringe demands, we will
Your Local US Immigrant Reporting (Score:5, Informative)
Hi there. Immigrant to the US from Canada here. I figured I'd just respond to the parent (mostly a troll) and some of the siblings here.
Immigration to the United States requires a significant amount of money and time. First, you have to qualify for either one of the immigrant visa [wikipedia.org] categories, or come across on what's called a dual intent [wikipedia.org] visa and then adjust status to Permanent Resident [wikipedia.org]. These processes variously require interviews with USCIS [uscis.gov] and a significant wait for certain categories (more than a decade in a few, months to years for most), not to mention that the filing and other fees for the whole process can run into the thousands of dollars. (Did you know that USCIS, like the Post Office, doesn't take taxpayer dollars and instead is self-funded from filing fees? Good for you, not great for immigrants.)
If you came over on a nonimmigrant visa, like a visitor, work, or educational visa, you're likely going to have to return home before you can start the real immigration process, unless it's "dual intent" like the K-1 fiance(e) visa as I mentioned before.
Reason has a very good overview of the various paths available. [reason.com]
No, we aren't required to take a test on civics and English. That is required when one naturalizes [wikipedia.org], or becomes a United States citizen. This has a prerequisite of legally residing continually in the US for three or five years, depending on the visa category in which you entered. (Oh, and another thousand dollars, thanks.) The process, like other USCIS processes, takes about a year in wait and processing time. The process is also entirely not required; one can continue to be a permanent resident for as long as one likes, as long as one continues to file for an extension of one's Permanent Resident status (i.e. green card).
I personally plan to become a US citizen (well, dual citizen) as soon as possible though, because it allows one to obtain a US Passport (faster border travel), means one is done with USCIS forever (barring very specific, very rare circumstances), and allows one to vote.
So I guess what I'm saying is, the next time you want to make assumptions about legal immigration, look into it first. It's quite complicated, expensive, and not for the faint of heart.
"Give me your tired, your poor"? Not so much.
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Re:Not a record low (Score:5, Insightful)
It IS a record low (Score:2)
I'm curious to know this as well.
"Not a record low" might make sense if data was limited to the boomer generation, which it clearly isn't since they're (per TFS) reliable since 1920. In the context of a --widely documented-- plummeting of birthrates during the industrial revolution, I'd be hard pressed to think this is anything but the lowest record ever for the US. 1920, in case it needs reminding, was a year after the Spanish Flu pandemic, and in the midst of the economic depression that followed WWI -- s
Re:Not a record low (Score:5, Insightful)
However, it's the lowest it's been in 90 years. The US birthrate was very high before the 20th century. The population was relatively small, most people were farmers, and needed all those kids. My mother is 83 and the baby of the family, and she has three brothers and six sisters. Back then, that was normal. before 1900 the average family was even bigger.
This is only a record low for most of our lifetimes.
I'm confused, you claim this isn't a record low because it used to be much much higher 100+ years ago? Your post honestly doesn't make any sense to me. This really is almost certainly a low for the US, since as you yourself point out, before the advent of modern medicine and technology, many women would have 5+ children. They needed to: not only was the help around the farm vital to succeed, but with the death rate being so high, especially among infants, the population could only stay steady if everyone who could had a lot of kids.
Also, I should point out that it is a record low, quite literally: it's the lowest on record, which by definition is a "record low". It may or may not be the lowest ever for the US, but it quite likely is.
huge farm families in PBS Dust Bowl doc (Score:3)
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This is an issue that doesn't get enough attention. Let's face it, if we are to have any near future (20-50yrs) for entitlement programs, we need to be encouraging both immigration and reproduction.
There is a fixed amount of land and resources available to the US. If they would simply tax corporations that extract those resources appropriately there would be enough wealth to go around.
Adding more people is a band-aid solution to a failed system.
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The problem is, the only viable alternative is the stock market. Now, to scare you even further:
How is the entire stock market not a Ponzii scheme? It relies entirely on steadily increasing numbers of consumers to buy the goods, driving the sales growth that sustains all of those high P/E ratios. The whole system will eventually collapse in on itself, so every time I hear about a downturn in stocks, I wonder why everyone is panicking merely because it may or may not collapse sooner than anticipated....
S