Yep, declining birth rate is an inevitable result of children becoming an economic burden rather than benefit.
We’re not going to be going back to an unmechanized agriculture society anytime soon.
Any attempt to drastically shift tax burdens from families to the childless more than they already are is going to be political suicide for the party that attempts it, as it will enrage the childless.
And some sort of religious theocracy that bans the pill would also be futile. Nothing would be easier to sneak across the border.
Well, not intentionally, anyway, but it is the unintended consequences which could make that a reality.
Declining birth rate is the way we're locking in economic decline.
Totally agree Strategerist. More and more people of my generation are definitely seeing offspring as an economic burden. It is not an American phenomenon ...it is happening in any country that is starting to see wealth of some sort creeping in. For instance I am talking about my peers in Nairobi, Kenya, who have a job earning at least 150,000 US$ per year, in the early 30s, and all of us don't have kids ...apart from a couple here and there. Yet in the rural areas, and among the poor, many kids are very normal (until about a decade ago Kenya had one of the highest birthrates in the world).
As median incomes increase the number of children goes down as more and more people put off children until a 'more convenient' time. Add to these considerations the fact that a 'proper' education (which, in my circle, is taken as having the child in a high-class private school with an international curriculum) can be quite expensive (some of the upper-tier schools in Kenya, at Grade level, can be up to US$24,000 per year per child). Then there are lifestyle considerations ...the type of car you drive is very important, as is the location you live in. In a certain demographic living in an apartment would be looked down upon, thus people opt for stand-alone houses. This has made Nairobi (capital city of Kenya) and Mombasa (second city of Kenya) as the number 1 and 2 fastest growing prime real-estate markets in the world! (Talk about a bubble - see the following links: http://edition.cnn.com/2012/06/28/business/kenya-luxury-housing-boom/index.html and http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-23765/luxury-residential-market-startling)
What does all of this mean? That among the well-to-do children have become a low priority, with most who are having kids having one (at most two, with more than that being among the truly wealthy). Yet, in the lower income echelons, many kids still remain the rule.
There is also the rise of 'SINKs' and 'DINKs' (single income no kids, and dual income no kids) set-ups, where in the case of a DINK two professional people marry and decide to not have children as a way of enhancing lifestyle.
Thus, this is a phenomenon that is being seen everywhere in the world. From the developed world; to emerging markets like (upper income) India and (wealthier places of) Brazil; and now even in (wealthier segments) of frontier economies in Africa and Asia.
The critical issues may be many, but economics and the way people view necessities from a financial perspective (i.e. the child or the nice house in a nice location) is definitely one of the big ones. The way things look it appears that the tradition of having many children has been relegated to the poor (for the most part), and (at a lower level) to those who, out of personal choice, decide to have many children. Most people in both developed/developing economies simply do not see children in the same manner that prior generations saw them, and as you mentioned the shift away from an unmechanized agricultural society changed several societal rubrics that simply shifted how children are seen by the majority.
This is why, even in staunchly Catholic countries in (say) Latin America, birth control is a given. Going forward a lot of the population growth will be amongst the poor.
If the government on the federal, state and local levels didn’t take as much of our money, it would be an incentive to have more children and it would also mean more money floating around in the ecomony meaning more wealth and jobs which would encourage more people to have children. It might start a trend. Maybe people will begin in rebel against the sixties craziness and there will be a swing of the pendulum. I hope so.
I think we should push against the perverse liberal culture by putting in a good word for parenthood whenever possible. I am going to tell my granddaughters that twenty is a good age to start thinking about looking for a husband. I am not talking about pressuring them but giving them a timeline to work from. Starting to seriously think about finding a mate by twenty is a good time. They can start looking around and taking notes...what do I want in a spouse, what do I not want.