Posted on 06/15/2005 9:16:40 AM PDT by quidnunc
Europe as we know it is slowly going out of business. Since French and Dutch voters rejected the proposed constitution of the European Union, we've heard countless theories as to why: the unreality of trying to forge 25 E.U. countries into a United States of Europe; fear of ceding excessive power to Brussels, the E.U. capital; and an irrational backlash against globalization. Whatever their truth, these theories miss a larger reality: Unless Europe reverses two trends — low birthrates and meager economic growth — it faces a bleak future of rising domestic discontent and falling global power. Actually, that future has already arrived.
Ever since 1498, after Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape of Good Hope and opened trade to the Far East, Europe has shaped global history, for good and ill. It settled North and South America, invented modern science, led the Industrial Revolution, oversaw the slave trade, created huge colonial empires, and unleashed the world's two most destructive wars. This pivotal Europe is now vanishing — and not merely because it's overshadowed by Asia and the United States.
-snip-
All this is bad for Europe — and the United States. A weak European economy is one reason that the world economy is shaky and so dependent on American growth. Preoccupied with divisions at home, Europe is history's has-been. It isn't a strong American ally, not simply because it disagrees with some U.S. policies but also because it doesn't want to make the commitments required of a strong ally. Unwilling to address their genuine problems, Europeans become more reflexively critical of America. This gives the impression that they're active on the world stage, even as they're quietly acquiescing in their own decline.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Europe: See Eurabia.
You are right on the mark, never was a truer statement made.
Well, we can dream, can't we?
First things first, the Hildabeast MUST be defeated in 2008.
The decline in Europe started with the spread of democratic socialism at the beginning of the 19th century. This was in imitation of the American revolution. But what worked here until 1860s (and has been in obvious decline since the 1940s) never worked in Europe because it always developed a radical nature.
500 years shot to hell.
Not to worry! Gay marriage will cure what ails them.
< /sarcasm>
I disagree. The decline of Europe started about the same time as birth control, abortion and massive liberalism.
Quite correct.
The same demographic problem that Europe faces is also faced by America. The native US population is below the replacement rate in fertility. For American whites, it is well below the replacement rate. This is true in all of the industrialized countries of the world, from Europe through Russia to Japan. There aren't any exceptions, and what it tells us is that there is something lethal about the structure of modern industrial economy for its native population.
Fertility below the replacement rate means that a nation will depopulate, and depopulation, once it begins, occurs at the same geometric proportions that growth does (and for the same reasons), unless something causes people to dramatically reverse the fertility decline and start having 4 children per couple on average (do please note that, since children come only in whole units, a replacement rate of 2.2 children per couple means that most couples have to have THREE children, not two, just to meet the replacement rate for the country. To reverse depopulation, many, many more people would have to start having FOUR or MORE children, and this is considered economically impossible to most middle class people across the industrialized world, the US included).
So, the whole industrialized world including the US is depopulating with regards to its native population. And yet a handful of those countries are increasing in population overally, specifically the US, France and the UK.
They do so through massive immigration.
In each case, the immigration brings with it new problems, in particular a problem of political stability and the preservation of the existing country.
In the United States, it is very difficult to see how a rapidly expanding Spanish-speaking population, tied culturally and by family and language to a neighboring nation that bears strong historical grievances against the US, will simply integrate as Italians and Germans once did.
It is far more likely that the rising Mexican minority, eventually will become a plurality and renegotiate the entire American social contract.
The same issue is at work in France, but with considerably less urgency, because the North African population in France is smaller as a proportion of the total, there is no land border, and France has become quite aggressive about stopping illegal immigration. Also, the French are much more willing to impose cultural norms on children in school, and to outright forbid the expression of ideas considered hostile to the Republic. In France, a movement of Arabs who vocally sought the conquest and conversion of France to Sharia would be prosecuted. In the US, there is a strong Reconquista movement that makes no bones about its intent to repopulate the American southwest with Mexicans, and to cause the primary loyalty of that region of the United States to formerly transfer back to Mexico.
Indeed, the eventual threat to the national TERRITORIAL integrity is considerably greater in the United States than in France, when all is considered. However, the degree to which there is a threat of actual national dismemberment is very much ignored by Americans at the present time.
"Ever since 1498, after Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape of Good Hope"
I think one his descendants, Fiasco da Gama, is the captain of the good ship Europa.
Oh come now, don't start dragging the good name De Gama down. Why if Europe had the kind of leadership it used to, with its crusaders and explores, instead of the democratically elected mediocrities it has now, we would not be talking about any kind of western decline.
Old Europe's current crisis is a crisis of spirit and belief far more than it is a crisis of economy. I don't believe it's yet at the point where it's irreversible, but it's getting dangerously close. The next generation will be absolutely critical, but Europe has faced a crisis such as this in the distant past and recovered once before.
All possible because of a previous decline in religion.
Yes, probably should have left it in the 'change is constant mode'.
"Italy permits dual citizenship."
Can you summarize the requirements?
You are correct. Europe has a head start on the fall.
The bright spot is that the illegal immigrants here are Hispanic Christians. In Europe they are Arab Muslims.
In Japan, syndicates control prices of everything. Melons cost $40 or so, people live in tiny apartments, real estate is ridiculously expensive, and thus their standard of living, after looking at relative costs, is lower than that of the average American.
In Europe, things aren't as expensive as in Japan, but they're still more expensive than in the states. Gasoline costs over $5.00 per gallon. Real estate is, for the most part, more expensive. Taxes are higher. And then there's the little things. Store hours aren't as good, customer service isn't as good.
In Africa, life pretty much sucks for everyone, but not because of high prices. Latin America is a bit better, but not that much.
Australia looks decent, but I've never been there. Any country is probably fine if you're loaded, but I'm talking about if you're say at the 80th percentile. Would you really want to live anywhere except the US, except for a limited period of time?
Middle class families only have two children because they can only afford to send two to college. They have no desire to be put in the position of performing socioeconomic triage on their own children.
"Middle class families only have two children because they can only afford to send two to college. They have no desire to be put in the position of performing socioeconomic triage on their own children."
Right you are.
And when most people have only two children, a nation is in a demographic death spiral.
So, how can the middle classes be encouraged to have more children?
Assuming that college expense drives this in the US, three ways:
(1) Make college cheaper
(2) Allow people to keep more of their money, so that they could afford to send a third child to college.
(3) Make a college degree less important for hiring and high income jobs.
(1) can only be accomplished by the state shouldering some of the burden of college costs, since places like Harvard are not going to cut expenses, and landlords are not going to cut rents for college students.
(2) can only be accomplished by DRAMATICALLY cutting taxes, but that would entail a dramatic cut in what government does which may not be democratically sustainable.
(3) would require employers and holders of capital, who themselves are probably holders of degrees and advanced degrees, to hire outside of their own academic milieu, and trust their own abilities to train people without college educations to do what they want them to do.
(3) is by far the cleverest.
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