Ross Douthat, in his latest The New York Times column, offers a fairly balanced view of why birth rates might be declining in the United States (outside of the immigrant population) and what can be done about it.
He raises the familiar alarm about the dangers of declining populations, and worries that the United States, normally reliable for having a birth rate at or above replacement level, might start to go the way of countries such as Germany and Japan. We have been buoyed in recent years by the higher birthrates of immigrants, but falling rates in Latin America might spell trouble for us as well.
There are problems when a population shrinks, particularly when older people live longer and a society provides expensive healthcare and some kind of taxpayer-funded retirement income to its aging population.
That being said, in the United States, the developing problems of Social Security and Medicare are not primarily due to the increasing size of the retirement population relative to younger working Americans. Instead, the problem is primarily political in nature-- an unwillingness to adopt the three or four tweaks to Social Security and Medicare that would extend the life of these programs and enhance their affordability, even if the population of younger Americans remained the same or even shrunk a bit.
As for the birthrate itself, another primary problem is a continuing lack of gender equality matched with a lack of true societal support for working mothers-- in other words, the promise and encouragement of careers outside the home without the support necessary to prevent the combination of mothering and career from being a dilemma. Ironically, in many countries, Italy for example, there is just enough feminism to cause birthrates to decline.
Credit Douthat for recognizing this problem in the United States:
At any rate, it is a thought provoking read and I recommend it.
Links:
Ross Douthat column in The New York Times (December 1, 2012): More Babies, Please
Pew Research Center report (November 29, 2012): U.S. Birth Rate Falls to a Record Low; Decline is Greatest Among Immigrants
For a previous Pew Research Center report that concludes that economic downturns affect birth rates, see the following report (October 12, 2011): In a Down Economy, Fewer Births
He raises the familiar alarm about the dangers of declining populations, and worries that the United States, normally reliable for having a birth rate at or above replacement level, might start to go the way of countries such as Germany and Japan. We have been buoyed in recent years by the higher birthrates of immigrants, but falling rates in Latin America might spell trouble for us as well.
There are problems when a population shrinks, particularly when older people live longer and a society provides expensive healthcare and some kind of taxpayer-funded retirement income to its aging population.
That being said, in the United States, the developing problems of Social Security and Medicare are not primarily due to the increasing size of the retirement population relative to younger working Americans. Instead, the problem is primarily political in nature-- an unwillingness to adopt the three or four tweaks to Social Security and Medicare that would extend the life of these programs and enhance their affordability, even if the population of younger Americans remained the same or even shrunk a bit.
As for the birthrate itself, another primary problem is a continuing lack of gender equality matched with a lack of true societal support for working mothers-- in other words, the promise and encouragement of careers outside the home without the support necessary to prevent the combination of mothering and career from being a dilemma. Ironically, in many countries, Italy for example, there is just enough feminism to cause birthrates to decline.
Credit Douthat for recognizing this problem in the United States:
Government’s power over fertility rates is limited, but not nonexistent. America has no real family policy to speak of at the moment, and the evidence from countries like Sweden and France suggests that reducing the ever-rising cost of having kids can help fertility rates rebound. Whether this means a more family-friendly tax code, a push for more flexible work hours, or an effort to reduce the cost of college, there’s clearly room for creative policy to make some difference.He also asserts economic and cultural explanations that are rather less plausible: a current lack of "a more secure economic foundation" and "late-modern [cultural] exhaustion." If these were important variables, then we would expect to find uniformly lower rates in peer countries that have, or have had, similar economic and cultural conditions. I'm not sure the evidence is there.
At any rate, it is a thought provoking read and I recommend it.
Links:
Ross Douthat column in The New York Times (December 1, 2012): More Babies, Please
Pew Research Center report (November 29, 2012): U.S. Birth Rate Falls to a Record Low; Decline is Greatest Among Immigrants
For a previous Pew Research Center report that concludes that economic downturns affect birth rates, see the following report (October 12, 2011): In a Down Economy, Fewer Births
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