Posted on 06/01/2007 11:27:39 PM PDT by Sleeping Beauty
What causes low birth rates? I have debated this issue at some length with blogger Conservative Swede. Among the reasons frequently cited are the welfare state, feminism and secularism. However, if you look closely at the statistics from various countries, the picture gets quite complex, and there doesn’t appear to be an automatic correlation between low birth rates and any one of these factors.
The United States has the highest birth rates in the West, but this is largely due to ethnic minorities. If you compare white Americans to white Europeans, the American birth rate is somewhat higher than those of the Scandinavian nanny states, but still lower than replacement level. Scandinavian countries such as Norway and Sweden do have elaborate welfare states, high degrees of feminism and are not very religious, yet have some of the highest birth rates in the Western world (though still below replacement level.) They are certainly much higher than those in Catholic Poland, perhaps the most conservative religious country in Europe. And they are much higher than those of South Korea, which has more traditional sex roles and where Christianity is booming these days.
The gap between the Western world and the Islamic world in birth rates is clearly caused by religious factors, but the differences between industrialized nations are far more difficult to explain. If the cause is not welfarism, feminism or secularism, then what is it?
are possibilities.
I agree with your premise that in today’s post industrial welfare state, children are now an economic liability for the working class. Despite the Bush tax cuts, the tax burden is very high for working people. Federal taxes of 20-30%, state and local income taxes of 6-10%, sales taxes of 6-8%, plus property taxes provide a real financial incentive for both members of a new marriage to work particularly in urban areas where the cost of living is high. This results in couples having children late which in turn means there will be fewer children.
Over the last 10 years other social and economic factors have made the economics of having children even less attractive. The private pension system has been destroyed, meaning a responsible young couple now has to save enough money during a 30-40 year career to pay for a basic standard of living during a 30 year retirement. The private health care system is coming unraveled and every year fewer workers have employer supplemented health insurance so they face rapidly inflating medical costs. Wages are under downward pressure due to global free trade and uncontrolled immigration. Add to all of these factors less job security in the global economy and high debt from college loans as young people begin their careers.
The welfare class breeds due to lack of moral inhibitions and because government transfer payments and programs cover their child rearing costs. Globalization and high government taxation mean many young working people see childbearing as an unbearable cost.
Another factor is the atrocious education system. Working families pay for the education system through taxes. They pay again when they sacrifice to send their children to private school or lose one income to home school.
Job income stability is also important for establishing and sustaining a nurturing home environment for children as well as realizing the income stream required to cover the costs of maintaining the family and raising the children. Over the past two decades jobs at all levels and every type of employment (except possibly government) have become much less secure. This makes it difficult for the family to plan its economic future and therefore discourages large families.
The cost of raising children is substantial in a post industrial economy, given other financial issues the family faces. The meager tax incentives do not come close to offsetting these costs.
My wife and I are beyond childbearing age. We wish we had more children as we are concerned about the long term death of our culture and society due to declining birthrates. However, if we were starting out in life today, I wonder if we would have any children at all.
nice tagline
birth control, causes low birth rates, and a society that doesn’t value its’ children, but values selfish behavior.
Taxes. when you’re taxed hard, less children. People give up family to maintain a basic lifestyle. The Gov’mt pretends that they’ll care for you in your old age to justify confiscating your earnings. Whites are the hardest taxed people in the world. Especially in Europe. A country without immigration, on the wrong side of the tax curve, sees declining birthrates and population.
Well put.
Causes? High tax rates. High cost of living. Both parents need to work in order to make it. Silly-ass tax deduction for each child that is so low that is nothing more than a joke. No welfare for Christian folks descended from Europeans. Christian folks descended from Europeans like to work and don’t want to lob around collecting welfare. Anti-fertility feminism.
Corrupt politicians bringing people into the country who don’t contribute to society and who cost us money so that we have to work more to pay for them.
Of course it works. We pay the welfare classes to have kids. They have plenty of kids. We tax the middle class up to its eyeballs. They don't have (enough) kids.
The financial penalities aren't the whole story but they're a big part of it. I'd favor a much larger child tax credit but it would need to be targeted to working parents, not welfare, so that it doesn't become an inducement to dependency. In major metro areas where the publick skools are a problem, school choice and vouchers would work wonders. I live in D.C. and private school has become a perceived necessity for the middle and upper middle class. It's a big bite.
The schools and employers need to do their part too, especially on time management. We get run ragged, as do all the other parents, with the schools taking every holiday known to man plus all the random half days and teacher training days, etc. Workplaces also need to adjust. Many, probably most, employers pay lip service to being family friendly but the reality is otherwise. 24/7 connectivity makes it worse. Like the schools, workplaces haven't really adjusted to the reality of two-worker families. I don't have a clue how the single moms manage at all. (A lot of them don't.)
In a thousand and one ways, most of them subtle, societies organize themselves around templates based on ideas of the "normal" or "typical" situation. The normal or typical implicitly becomes the preferred or favored. Today society is normalized for the single or childless person. That's what has to change.
This will take a conscious effort. I don't quite know how to do it. I've often thought that if I were an employer I'd call all the young singles into a room and explain to them that life is a cycle, that most of them will have kids sooner or later, that parents will be treated preferentially, and that their turn will come. I suppose I'd be sued.
It could be this.
For a generation we’ve been warned about over population. Somehow, we don’t hear that from the libs so much anymore. Now they’re off on to “climate change”.
I agree, It was Paul Ehrlich, The Population Bomb. the social engineers propagandized us to limit our families. Then they opened the borders and let in immigrants, instead. Frankly, I would rather have had more children of my own. Also, having lived the feminists” dream, myself, I have always thought it was a man’s idea, someone at the Labor department. My daughter said she watched me and decided that career is just not worth it. So, she’s a rich trophy wife having babies. Fortunately, we seem to be developing resistance to manipulation by propagandists.
Things haven’t changed since Maggie’s day. Six illegal aliens go into a Wal-Mart and ten come out.
Worldwide, the poorer the country the higher the birth rate. This is called the rabbit defense. The only defense rabbits have against their many enemies is to multiply faster than their enemies can kill them.
Think of it this way: Usually a mother and father combine their resources to support and sustain their family and have more children.
Now the model has changed due to liberal taxation. Mother and father have to combine their resources to support and sustain every welfare recipient, every third world nation reaching for a handout, 30 million illegal aliens sucking our subsidy and healthcare system dry, retiring baby boomers who've had their SS savings sacked by the government and so on.
If there's anything left, they can have children.
Isn't that special? Thank you Democrats and Republicrats.
Of course it works. We pay the welfare classes to have kids. They have plenty of kids.
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These are not the people we want our nation repopulated with.
**What is the Cause of Low Birth Rates?**
Killing babies through abortion is the cause of low birth rates. The scourge of the nation. And we will have to answer to God for it.
What if YOUR mother had decided to abort you?
Overpopulation, Y2K, Global Warming...........LOL
Birth Control has allowed families to limit their size. It’s a contributing factor.
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