Concerned about depopulation

[Shawlshare]

AIBU to think the threat of depopulation is being massively underestimated in the UK?

I am early 50s, 3 kids and have lots of friends, young professionals in their 30s involved in the same hobby as me and nobody is having kids. Nobody wants them. People can’t afford accommodation big enough for kids, cannot afford childcare and find day to day life trying to stay ahead of the cost of living crisis tiring enough. They want to spend the weekend doing what they want to do, which is fair enough, but the UK will rapidly become extinct if this goes on for long.

South Korea is likely to become extinct as a country within 4 generations do to similar issues. I can see the UK going the same way. It’s scary and sad. I can’t see it reversing though as any hint of free childcare / flexible working etc etc is politically unpopular with so many. Anyone else concerned? What’s the solution?

There are too many people in the world. There will be no massive apocalypse it will be a steady horrendous decline with survival of the fittest and richest. We have become too good at surviving.

Plus as soon as women have a choice with contraception and education they have less children. There will be an awful hump at some point where the older population will be huge but then there will be a natural adjustment. What I notice is places that have huge amounts of children have far worse attitudes to women, not always but overall.

I remember when the world population hit 6 billion , I think it’s 8 billion now.

Immigration is a thorny issue. At the heart is that there are many very crap places to live so who wouldn’t want out. But unless you have a required skill and are not a net contributor then you are a drain. I’m all for a points system for immigrants and I write that as the daughter of an immigrant.

Europe is pretty liberal still but the move to the right that is currently happening. It’s going to get a lot worse unless some much tougher legislation is brought in.

No it’s not. Population growth has slowed and will likely be zero before the end of this century.

https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/the-fiscal-impact-of-immigration-in-the-uk/

Migration is not quite the economic benefit that people declare it is.

The net fiscal effects of immigration depend on migrants’ characteristics
Whether migrants are employed and how much they earn greatly affects their estimated net fiscal contribution. The OECD (2021) compared estimates of net contributions to the tax and benefits system across 25 OECD countries over a 13-year period from 2006 to 2018, and found that the age of migrants (specifically, being of prime working age, i.e., 25-54) was the single most important factor explaining differences in their net fiscal contributions compared to the native-born population. A key reason for this was that migrants in this age group were most likely to be working.

The OECD also found that migrants’ skill level was likely to be one of the main determinants of their fiscal impact, because migrants working in high-skilled, highly paid jobs pay more taxes, on average, than migrants in low-wage jobs.
Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) (2024) projects hypothetical migrants’ lifetime fiscal impact, and also finds that earnings are a crucial factor (Figure 1).

They find that a migrant arriving at age 25 and earning the UK average earnings has a more positive lifetime fiscal contribution than a UK-born worker on the same salary, because the UK does not pay the cost of education and other public services they received during childhood. However, they found that low-wage workers had a negative lifetime fiscal impact, while high-wage workers had a positive one.

But my street is currently overcrowded as adult children can’t find homes to move out into. And there are too many people in my GP catchment that getting a GPs appointment is already difficult. Reducing the population is unlikely to make it worse, maybe just equal.

I’m not expecting a state pension, and so I won’t need current workers to fund my pension via taxes.

If depopulation becomes too big of an issue, governments will need to introduce policies to encourage higher birth rates (eg better paid parental leave, lower child care costs, more available housing, immigration incentives).

I think climate change is a bigger and more imminent risk than falling birth rates though.

But I’m childless, likely to stay that way and not worrying about anything I can’t change.

It sounds lovely. We can't go on having more and more children just so that they can take care of the ageing population...where would that end?

The human race only has a few hundred years left at best, so who cares if our culture is wiped out a bit early? I'm sick of it all and wish I'd not brought children into this.

The changing demographics are concerning because financially we will all have to contribute a lot more. Lots don't seem interested though but cynically I think it's one reason for the assisted dying bill.

depopulation isn't necessarily bad but economically you want more young people and less old ones.

So in other words, inequality and poverty is the problem (which along with climate change is why people migrate in the first place).

There'll be millions of climate refugees in the upcoming decades.

cause immigration is super popular?

IMO it’s a good thing. Past generations had kids as it was the expected thing to do. A lot of children were raised by parents that didn’t really want them. There’s a lack of suitable housing and resources for everyone to have multiple children so people are making the sensible decision to have fewer children.

I’m not sure to what extent the immigrants boosting our population
we need immigrants hence why no government has reduced them

Poor and workless people are having as many children as they want. It’s working people who are scaling back.

Is this on the back of Farage's speech?

I think the current model of ‘let’s not help people have kids, but just import more immigrants’ could create that situation, to some degree.

the ship has sailed though, no country has increased declining birth rates

Plenty of working people are poor.

If they are I agree it's wonderful. But I think its not always the case. I'm not in UK but I read threads here all the time about people who have less children than they want because of financial restraints. I think that's incredibly sad. A loving couple with a safe roof over their head and healthy bodies who want more children should be able to have them. That's easily rectified by government policy, maybe in time changes will be made.

I will work longer than my parents (by quite a margin)

yes, state pension will increase & perhaps he means tested

I will likely die younger than my parents without my years of ill health being dragged out to a ridiculous degree.

healthy life expectancy hasn't increased and working longer will likely mean a sicker &
more stressed you

It’s on the back of the comments in response to Farage’s speech. I’m no reform fan but there were a lot of people outraged at the suggestion that we encourage people to have more kids (see the BBC article, lots of ‘your kids, you pay for them’ comments). I think a lot of people have their head in the sand about the multitude of issues that follow from a declining birth rate.

Migration isn't the easy answer as much of the west will be fighting over the same immigrants so the best ones will go to
where they get the most benefit. Portugal are looking at reduced income tax under 30s and other countries will start using similar incentives.

I'm not good with maths but it can't understand these worries. I fully appreciate that because I can't understand it doesn't mean it doesn't exist however 🤣.

The logic for me is we have never been more populated than we are now, globally, and resources are sparse
Wouldn't seeing a dramatic natural fall in global population be a good thing more houses, space on roads less greenbelt eaten up more school places, smaller classes and so on!

I think it’s another consequence of not addressing ludicrous house prices in this country. Young adults can’t comprehend having children when living in insecure housing.

But my street is currently overcrowded as adult children can’t find homes to move out into. And there are too many people in my GP catchment that getting a GPs appointment is already difficult. Reducing the population is unlikely to make it worse, maybe just equal.

How so? It's not the reducing population that's the issue it's more old people.

In the 60s there was 5 workers to 1 pensioner, now the ratio is 3:1 and the I believe in the next decade or so it will be 2:1. That's the issue

I’m not expecting a state pension, and so I won’t need current workers to fund my pension via taxes.

Not going to use any healthcare?

We are already feeling the impacts of an ageing population fiscally

We can't go on having more and more children just so that they can take care of the ageing population...where would that end?

But why do you think anyone is suggesting that? It's the fact the drop has happened so quickly, there are already more over 65s than under 15 yr olds...