We need to start talking about population decline

[user4567890754]

The first signs of it are starting to show in the UK, with primary school closures. Secondary school closures will follow.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/11158f12-0133-11ee-a364-04e704863f75?shareToken=5ef47b2b4776be376153089146c8bacf

Italy is a few years ahead of us.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/may/01/plunging-birthrate-threatens-italian-schools

Japan shows where every country is headed - towards a crisis where they are on the brink of being unable to maintain social functions.

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/04/13/asia/japan-population-decline-record-drop-intl-hnk/index.html

And yet there are still people who think that we have a problem with overpopulation. It’s the opposite.

Overpopulation and capitalism go hand in hand. It relies on eternal growth, which is the very definition of kicking the can down the road.

In Poland it is a lack of babies compounded by emigration. Their fertility rate is even lower than the Uk at 1.3. Their population is already in decline today.

Aha, so it’s just other people that need to “stop breeding” to save the planet then? It’s funny how those who say the Earth is overcrowded always want to reduce other people and their children rather than themselves!

It’s the young people that are reducing though. The people moving into the older groups are increasing.

That is precisely why I asked

i just knew she’d have children and sure enough two.

I have asked whether she’d be upset if her children GASP decided to have children. Tumbleweed.

I’m also curious whether she spouts all this to her children now ie please don’t have children, as you’d be contributing to the end of the world

Me and DH have our 2 adult DC living with us. Neither of them are able to obtain the lifestyle that they grew up with on their own wages, so both have decided not to have children - ever.
We will never have grandchildren.
While that is sad, I can’t help but feel angry that their wages now, at above minimum wage, are only 90% more than what I earned in the 1980’s in an “entry level” job, and DH as an engineer, while prices (of housing, rent, utilities, food Etc.) have increased by 600+%.
IMO the introduction of the minimum wage was the start of the biggest race to the bottom that society has ever seen. Couple that with the selling off of the country’s gold reserves and the commodification of property as the only way to make interest on capital and you realise that the situation we are in currently is as a result of these two facts.

How old are your children?

Me and DH have our 2 adult DC living with us. Neither of them are able to obtain the lifestyle that they grew up with on their own wages, so both have decided not to have children - ever.

presumably they’re not in relationships?

chances are… if they fall in love and their partner would love a child… their stance re no children may change. I suspect you’ll have a grandchild one day!

@Successstory82 late 20’s early 30’s. Both resolutely anti-coupling!

Ok so it’s a bit more than they don’t want children because they can’t afford it.

they don’t want love, a partner, a family.

nothing wrong with that but doesn’t sound like finances drives that stance

Surely we need to look at population on a global scale?

@Successstory82 Well, they have spoken to us about it. They can’t even move out, rents being more than their monthly take-home pay around here) so having a partner or family is something that they can’t aspire to (we don’t have room to accommodate partners or families in our small 3-bedroom semi…) so yes, it’s very finance-driven, sadly😟

No one decides not to have a partner because of finances only.

for a start doesn’t even make financial sense! A partner would mean two incomes in all likelihood and possibility of moving out of mum and dads! If they actively don’t ever want a partner, it’s not financially driven

@Successstory82 Both have other reasons, too, but that isn’t the point of my post. At their age, we were in our second property (mortgaged) with 1 DC.
That we were in our own property and able to survive on our wages/salary was key to our having DC - much to my extremely RC DM’s horror, we chose when to have DC rather than just irresponsibly let nature take its course.
They don’t want to have DC that they can’t provide for - I think that they are both eminently sensible in that, but yes, it is financially driven.
I’m also seeing this trend with my peers, whose DC’s are choosing childless marriages, or even moving back home in their 40’s (single) as rental prices increase, so it’s not just me…

I can’t help but feel angry that their wages now, at above minimum wage, are only 90% more than what I earned in the 1980’s in an “entry level” job, and DH as an engineer, while prices (of housing, rent, utilities, food Etc.) have increased by 600+%.

This is such an important point that if often forgotten & was ignored during the period of low interest rates because I guess for some they still made lots of money. Wage stagnation is a real issue.

35k in the early 00s is the equivalent of approx 60k today yet plenty of those 35k jobs don't now pay 60k.

Aha, so it’s just other people that need to “stop breeding” to save the planet then? It’s funny how those who say the Earth is overcrowded always want to reduce other people and their children rather than themselves!

It's always the way just like it's the other people who should pay more tax.

Globally we have an over population issue.

The problem is that the people who worry about declining population in western nations are also the most loud opponents of immigration 🤷🏻‍♀️

This isn't true. Lots of recent primary school closures London.

I find it funny when people loudly claim that the country is full and we can’t take anymore refugees but have 5 kids and 12 grandchildren.

I don’t think anyone is surprised we’re having fewer children. Lots of reasons why.

If the main concern is who will pay to take care of us when we’re old, my solution to that is legalising assissted death. If I get diagnosed with dementia, I don’t want to suffer through it until I go naturally. I’d rather have the option to go sooner.

At least we can expect a continuing boom in dystopian novels.

All this reminds me of The Heart stops Last by Margaret Atwood, when anyone who is not pro-social (so, protestors, the old, unemployed etc) are humanely put to sleep.

Lionel Shriver’s The Mandibles is another great book about societal collapse in the USA. Young people book pods in a facility where they can be given a sort of ketamine style drug and pass some time asleep so that time passes.

Thank you to the person that posted the links about sperm quality and male fertility. A 50% reduction in sperm counts in the past 50 years! Yikes!! I did not know that.

On the video they were saying it is due to environmental chemical exposure in utero, and the deleterious effects to male fertility may be passed down through 3 generations. But the good news was that if the sons and grandsons were not exposed then fertility returned to normal after that.

The problem is that the people who worry about declining population in western nations are also the most loud opponents of immigration

I think it's the opposite. The ones who oppose immigration think that the developing world should stop "breeding" & ignore the fact they are living longer & have a bigger carbon footprint than those they blame for breeding.

There also the same people who think primary schools in their areas are packed because of the "boat people" or the feckless having 5 babies.

This is the point I made upthread, there’s lots of evidence of falling demand for school places and yet lots of people still seem to refuse to believe it. It’s really weird!

My youngest starts school next year and I have to bite my tongue with other mums when the conversation at toddler group turns to school places. They’re all so worried about it even though the stats are out there to show that most schools in our town aren’t filling all their reception places (i.e. you can get a place at any school you want no matter where you live).

I know it’s only one aspect of the issue but I think it shows how people are unable to look critically and acknowledge the reality especially when they have a vested interest.