What's to be Done about Plummeting Birth rates?

There's a lot you can do about it, but I think there's too many people in the world as it is. The current trend is to import a bunch of Muslims for you, Mexicans and South and Central Americans for us, but there's big problems with that line of attack and if they ever assimilate, they adopt the current mores. Fail.

The social safety net will collapse with these numbers - here, Social Security really is a mandatory pyramid scheme where you need lots of workers per retiree, especially when people live to be 100. SS was not designed for the twenty-first century.

Outlaw abortion and other forms of birth control, discourage women from working outside the home, increase tax incentives for large families, move back to farms, just a blast from the past.

 

Social Security would be in good shape if presidents hadn't raided the trust fund. This was done primarily by Reagan to try to cover his deficit spending and GW Bush to pay for the two longest wars in U.S. history "off budget."

 

The shrinking Middle and lower upper classes can't afford to have children. Wealth is increasingly being concentrated in the top 1%. The bottom 90% has has a flat income curve in real terms for the last 30 years.

 

Half a century ago, the great concern was overpopulation. Now all of a sudden, after implementing some of the worst policies imaginable, "they" see the opposite problem. Perhaps "they" were wrong then and are now. I would say who "they" are, but their spectre should be obvious enough. The problem isn't the population's size but its general practice. I have to agree with the author's closing words:

‘Progressive’ policies of the past 50 years, from easy divorce to on-demand abortion, sexual liberation to anti-man and anti-motherhood feminism, have all undermined a culture of marriage, family formation and fertility. The idea that this cultural and demographic shipwreck could be salvaged by yet another progressive policy, rather than a wholesale reversal in the direction of travel, is a clear example of inability to see when a prized project has failed and needs to be abandoned.

Whatever the details, the only solution is to be a lot less ‘progressive’ and a lot more ‘conservative’ in family and social policy than we have been accustomed to since the 1960s. That would be real progress.​

 

A lot of the problem is just plain old ordinary selfishness. Raising children is is demanding, time consuming, and expensive.(but not as much so as people make out)

In a me first society,a lot of people don't want to be bothered by having kids.

 

I'm inclined to agree with the following, to start with:

There is only one way babies are made and apparently (according to many studies) people aren’t participating in it near as much today.

I just read a long article about this the other day. It was kind of an eye opening and interesting perspective that was backed up pretty well. It talked about there is a broad withdrawal from physical intimacy and not only in the states but many other places in the world as well. People prefer to socialize through the web and talking to someone in person is often frowned upon in today’s society, especially in light of sexual harassment accusations. There were several other reasons given and it addressed several issues related to the rise of porn, such as young people feeling they don’t need a partner, toys, insecurity, how it programs the brain differently including causing infertility, it mentioned aggressive painful and unappreciated experiences due to reenactment, and other trash behavior that discourages intimate relationships. Then there is a decline because children are staying at home at a later age. Many are too busy playing video games and involved in social media preoccupation. Many are more concerned about their career and are putting off relationships which are thought to complicate their focus on getting ahead. – Then they get older and lose interest…

The article was on Google news and went into a lot of details, discussed several studies and statistics explaining today’s attitudes and habits that seemed to fit, although not vulgar it was pretty matter of fact and would generally be considered adult content, therefore, probably not suitable for me to post the link on this forum but someone could Google, Why are young people having so little sex, by the Atlantic if they want to learn more.

A couple other things of note, it said more people are preferring to stay single and abstinent, but unfortunately not for moral and religious reasons but rather because of alternatives and lack of commitment while there is a growing anything goes kind of mentality. If these people want to “hook up” they typically go to dating sites like Tinder for casual affairs and with easy and free access to birth control pills and non-prescription morning after pills they can easily avoid the complications of pregnancy.

In conclusion, the article reminded of a movie I saw some time ago where some guy was frozen or something and ended up in the future where they only participated in virtual reality activities and if they wanted a baby they’d custom order one from a laboratory. This information made me wonder if the world is really going that way…

 

This reminded me of this song:

 

Just a few thoughts:

In general, yes, the population is growing, BUT the people that should be obeying God to be fruitful and multiply the most, …His children, …believers, …Christians, …those who would raise their children to be God fearing…are being bred out of existence or better said into a small minority destined to be greatly outnumbered. So what I am saying is to suggest we have fulfilled God plan and been fruitful is to ignore the trend that is currently overwhelming our numbers. In fact, in the free and Christian leaning U.S.A. the population would be in great decline if it weren’t for the immigrants moving in and having children that barely keeps over the threshold. That said, I don’t think we are currently being fruitful as per the purposes of God but rather have dropped the ball and have good reason to be concerned that our own people are not reproducing at a sustainable rate. I would think multiplying would be to add to but we, God’s children, are in a subtraction phase.

As per the blame game, although I believe feminist movements have played a role in the deterioration of the family unit I think the bigger picture goes way beyond trying to put the responsibility on women and if anything this mere suggestion (scapegoat) coming from “men” helps demonstrate their lack of the necessary qualities to be the kind of “head” that God intended.

Still, I don’t see us fulfilling the multiplying along with being fruitful the way God would have us do to expand His kingdom, therein we are missing the mark and by definition I would call that “sin”.

That said, you may have some legitimate gripe that the Op article points out feminism as the cause of the disease rather than a symptom of a much more in depth problem. Men surrendering their honorable masculine traits, the culture that teaches their are no differences between the sexes, discounting marriage and traditional family values and I'd say most of all overlooking God's instructions and examples for politically correct values while people conform to the world's wisdom instead of His (Romans 12:2) all play a part in the ever declining preferred "birth rate" that I believe we, as Christians, should be striving to improve for the well-being of our future.

 

Many point the finger at modern men: self-absorbed and wary of commitment. But what about modern women – are they really all ready to settle down and have their 2-3 children before the biological clock ticks out, if only men would do their bit?​

I suggest you may have misunderstood the article. First, did you read the link criticizing men (see above reference)? It is bizarre, and this article is countering that. Then, did you carefully read the conclusion (see excerpt below)? It is against yet more progressive (aka wrongheaded) policies, but lists some failed ones, including specific aspects of feminism. Then, did you read the details? Again, they are a challenge to the other article.

‘Progressive’ policies of the past 50 years, from easy divorce to on-demand abortion, sexual liberation to anti-man and anti-motherhood feminism, have all undermined a culture of marriage, family formation and fertility. The idea that this cultural and demographic shipwreck could be salvaged by yet another progressive policy, rather than a wholesale reversal in the direction of travel, is a clear example of inability to see when a prized project has failed and needs to be abandoned.​

 

My original response (post #6) was that the premise is false. There is no birthrate crisis now (headed for underpopulation), and there was no birthrate crisis before (headed for overpopulation).

Biblically, there is nothing wrong with having or not having children, nor in marrying or not marrying. The problems lie elsewhere, e. g., abortion, sexual perversion, denying a spouse, forbidding marriage, etc.

 

This seems only to be happing in high tech nations with a high standard of living, and I am sure artificial birth control has also had a great deal to do with this.

 

All spending originates in the Congress. It was Democrat led Congresses and Presidents who raided the so called "trust fund" way before Mr. Reagan became the Chief Executive. Now couple that with the fact that the system is really a "pay as you go" scheme, where the people currently working pay for those who are not. At this point there are only like 4 workers paying for 10 retirees, not like in the past when there were many more.

When first started the SS system was just for actual retirees. Thanks to Democrats, it expanded to include payments to surviving minor children, then SSDI payments, SSI etc. Medicare and Medicaid were added to the program by President Johnson in the "Social Security Act of 1965" part of LBJ's "Great Society" (Yeah, that really turned out well).

It was also LBJ who first raided the SS Trust Fund to help pay for his war in Vietnam. It's time you put the blame where it belongs (on your adored Democrats) for the debacle we are now in, not the Republicans.

 

The only amount that can be raided from the fund is the current surplus. Reagan converted the money he took out into a special kind of bonds which cannot be sold on the open market. They can only be bought b y the FED. There are currently $2.8T of these worthless bonds in the fund. Really, it was GW Bush who did the real damage. He used these funds to pay for the two longest wars in U.S. history, Afghanistan and Iraq.. These were not budgeted for. The money came from Senior citizens.

 

"Today, the federal government automatically puts all of the money that should be set aside for the Social Security Trust Fund into the General Fund. Raiding the Social Security Trust Fund was a precedent set in 1968 by another progressive president, Lyndon B. Johnson, to help pay for the Vietnam War. To date, the federal government has borrowed over $2 trillion from the Social Security Trust Fund to spend on other programs.

Contrary to what many Americans believe and what progressives love to say, there is no money in the Trust Fund to pay future benefits. Furthermore, the fundamentally flawed program faces a severe demographic crisis as members of the baby boom generation begin to retire. The mess we face with Social Security, a program so many are now dependent on, is yet another example of a failed progressive policy, where the potential for unintended consequences was ignored at the program's inception."
Lyndon Johnson on Social Security

"LBJ was running an expensive war in South East Asia while also attempting to launch social engineering through programs which began with his 'Great Society'. Lacking the means to pay for both, he had the Social Security Trust Funds moved into the general fund. As these funds were removed they were replaced with an IOU. Since Social Security was developed as nothing more than a Ponzi scheme, pulling the funds has proved to be particularly disastrous. The political left continuously points at these IOUs as proof that the Social Security system will remain solvent. Which is a joke; paying off old IOUs with new IOUs..."
Why did Lyndon Johnson put social security in the general fund?

 

The IOU should be changed to IAGN (I ain't Got Nuthin)

 

It all started with LBJ and that is a fact. All of them people in Washington (except for a very few) are destroying this country with a massive debt that is so big it cannot be repaid. We are currently paying over 300 billion dollars annually in interest on the debt alone for heaven's sake!

At some point this will all come crashing down and people will be in some shock let me tell you. More spending on this, more on that, people want free education, free healthcare, more money to illegals, more for "refugees" - good grief we cannot afford all of it any longer.

 

"What's to be Done about Plummeting Birth rates?"

Guess your parents never had, "the talk" with you. . .