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The Future of the West – Through Children
Elon Musk has said that the earth is basically empty, and he is right. We could fit the entire world’s population in New Zealand without exceeding the population density of Manhattan.
The problem is that richer countries are in deep, deep demographic decline. Here is Japan’s population pyramid (2020):
This is deeply troubled. The average Japanese woman is too old to procreate.
The healthiest Western country (in terms of population growth) is Israel.
Check out this website and enter your own country to see the results. Demographics is, at some point, destiny.
The alternative is to invite immigrants and hope they assimilate (the path most of Europe has taken to overcome its own domestic population crises). That is a risky proposition, to say the least. And one that countries like Japan and Korea are quite unlikely to adopt.
Published in General
Their resistance to importing the next generation might save them in the end. Any demographic decline ends, if it ends, when the fraction of the population willing to have significant numbers of children become the majority. By attrition, if other factors are held at bay. Refusing immigration gives the future fecund majority a chance to form.
This is enhanced by the older generations’ expressions of regret over their lack of fertility.
A recent traveler to Israel said that the two most striking things he remembered were all of the building cranes in the air, and the sounds of children.
There is a great article by David P Goldman that addresses this issue and the economic impact. It’s from 2009 but still rings true as we are still living through the unwinding of the easy-money policies out in place in an attempt to avoid the consequences of the financial crisis.
https://www.firstthings.com/article/2009/05/demographics-depression
Whoa, Jewish plot to take over the world!
/tinfoil
I did not know this about Israel. Yay! I hope demographic is driven by no-kidding Jews and not just any ol’ body who happens to be there.
I gnash my teeth when people glibly gazette demographic numbers like “US birth rate” and “world population” without digging into just who is having kids and who is not. In France, it is illegal to even ask. A sly survey of neonatal maladies specific to some immigrant populations reveals that France is disappearing faster than we thought. The French pandas can’t be bothered to procreate for dear life. “Oh, that’s okay, they make up for it with immigrants!” That doesn’t make France sustainable. That makes Europe Mogadishu.
Two months ago Parisians (“Parisians”) rioted over cost of living (bread). Two weeks ago they rioted over sport (circuses). Two days ago, they began rioting over race (demos). The whole thing is on the table.
Yup. “GET BUSY WITH THOSE GRANDKIDS!”
Why is that a problem? Please be specific. Don’t give us the Social Security is a Ponzi scheme line, because the fix for a Ponzi scheme is not “find more suckers”.
I have three so far. I really need three more just to break even.
Do we get poorer as result of demographic collapse? If the terms of measurement are per capita income, the aftermath of great plague of the 13th century would suggest otherwise. Farm labor wages increased dramatically as a result of the scarcity of labor. That was a real demographic collapse.
The same thing is occurring with the retirement of the boomers.
There are two large population blocks in Israel, and one isn’t Jewish.
Hence.
“The future belongs to those who show up.”
If the future doesn’t concern you personally, then I cannot imagine why any aspects of the future would.
If shrinking the denominator is the goal, we should be able to shoot ourselves into wealth. Productivity as a zero-sum game is the road to Marxism.
From the article …
I am not too worried about numbers but about quality. Has anyone here seen Idiocracy?
If I recall correctly, a study was done on the surveys that the Palestinians take of their population, according to Caroline Glick. A surprising “correction” is that the Palestinians are not multiplying the way they used to do. Which means they are less of a threat of overrunning the number of Jews. I wonder if that’s the influence of the West.
I think it’s an increase in education and birth control. Lower birthrates are happening throughout the Middle East and they are starting to happen in Africa.
In the future, everybody will be Nigerian for fifteen minutes.
From Proverbs 8 -speaking of Wisdom personified:
He wants the world to be inhabited by people and He likes kids.
Interesting early 1970s spike:
https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/JPN/japan/birth-rate#:~:text=The%20current%20birth%20rate%20for,a%201.3%25%20decline%20from%202019.
Big picture, we will all be replaced. The question is — by whom? And therefore to whom shall the proceeds of our efforts, our lives, accrue?
Demographics is Destiny.
In Florida, everyone is born Hispanic, and dies Jewish.
Are Hispanics converting?
How else would you explain the disparity between births and deaths?
/ tongue in cheek
Peter Zeihan posted a great clip on YouTube today about demographics:
God’s first command to humanity was to reproduce and fill the earth. He also gave dominion over creation to our care.
Modernity commands humanity to depopulate the earth and leave it pristine. It gives dominion over creation, humanity included, to nature’s care.
It’s another way in which Western Societies have become perverse.
Indeed, *per capita* income matters, not just *aggregate* GDP. But, social security aside, there are still some fixed national expenses that get more costly on a per-capita basis if there are fewer people.
The most obvious of these is Defense…military costs, both personnel and procurement, don’t get any lower if there is a lesser population, so the costs per taxpaying person get higher.
Also probably true of some infrastructure costs…the cost of keeping rivers and ports navigable may be somewhat dependent on traffic, but there is surely a large fixed-cost component. Partly true of railroads, also, I would think. Roads? Again a fixed/variable cost mix that would take some work to disentangle.
I wonder if any economists have looked at this.
Israel is the only country in the world where secular (non-religious) women are averaging 3+ children apiece.
Who do you plan to have feeding you and changing your bedsheets in the nursing home?
Personally, I have no intention to let things get that far. Quite the opposite.