Posted on 02/17/2025 8:56:37 PM PST by SeekAndFind
One of our current cultural mantras is “you do you” - putting your personal desires over the greater good of others and society. In other words, living selfishly instead of selflessly.
The manifestation of such a philosophy and its implications for our society is particularly acute when it comes to the institutions of marriage and family.
As the late James Q. Wilson, former professor of government at Harvard University, wrote in his book, “The Marriage Problem”: “It is not money, but the family that is the foundation of public life. As it has become weaker, every structure built upon that foundation has become weaker.”
I pondered this after I read last month about the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) releasing troubling new numbers regarding current fertility rates in the United States.
While numerous articles have been written about the “birth dearth” over the past few years and its implications for our future, this report clearly illustrates that what was once a matter of concern is rapidly becoming a full-blown crisis as the CBO forecasts significantly lower population growth over the next three decades.
Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Paul Kiernan states:
“As a result of these changes, deaths are expected to exceed births in 2033, seven years earlier than the nonpartisan agency projected a year ago.”
The report shows the population receiving Social Security will grow from its current total of 342 million to 383 million by 2054. The current ratio of people aged 25–64 compared to those over 65 is 2.9-1. By 2054, it will be 2.2-1.
While better health care has resulted in longer life expectancies, thus increasing this ratio, the nation’s current population growth rate is 0.2 percent, with much of that driven by immigration rather than births. In fact, the CBO projects that the fertility rate will be approximately 1.70 percent, below the replacement level of 2.1.
So, while people living longer is one contributing factor, it is just that: one factor. There are more and greater factors in play. Perhaps the most important one is this: Americans are not getting married or forming families, or if they are, it happens later in a woman’s prime childbearing years.
For instance, in 1970, married couples made up 71 percent of all American households. By 2022, that percentage had decreased to just 47 percent. In 1962, 90 percent of all 30-year-olds were married, with that percentage dropping to 51 percent in 2019.
Dr. Peter H. Schuck, professor emeritus at Yale Law School, perhaps put it best when he wrote in his book, “One Nation Undecided: Clear Thinking About Five Hard Issues That Divide Us”:
“The family is the essential core of any society, and the steady decline of two-parent households is probably the single most consequential social trend of the half-century.”
Decisions not to get married or have children are often driven by choices to pursue so-called “personal fulfillment,” such as money, travel, and a career.
Last year, the Pew Research Center reported that 57 percent of adults under 50 who say they’re unlikely to ever have kids say a major reason is they just don’t want to; 31 percent of those ages 50 and older without kids cite this as a reason they never had them.
The implications are ominous—the rapidly growing aging population that becomes dependent upon younger generations for their care will be like old Mother Hubbard, who goes to the cupboard and finds nothing more than a bone.
According to Pew, even those who have chosen not to marry or have children worry about what their lives will be like as they age, without children or younger generations to provide the financial and familial support they will need. In addition, this will only increase government dependence for the elderly.
But there are also other societal considerations beyond caring for an aging population. Across the nation, we are already seeing schools beginning to close because of decreased enrollment (down 5.5 percent by 2031). Businesses are having a much harder time finding young, skilled, able-bodied workers, and when there are less children it will likely mean a continued drop in fertility rates as there will be even fewer young adults getting married and having children in the future.
It is a death spiral as the lack of marriages and children continues to weaken our nation’s foundation. You can only remove so many bricks, in this case families and children, before the entire building comes tumbling down.
What is the solution? We need to become a society that once again emphasizes the importance of marriage and children, putting sacrifice over personal ambition and family over autonomy. Without such a reversal from our current societal philosophy of “you do you” and a return to these values, our birth dearth will become our societal death.
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Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times
Civilizations end when women refuse to have children.
And what of the men who choose sex with themselves?
All have sinned IMHO.
It’s A mess out there. The current generation doesn’t even know there are two genders. They don’t know how to socialize. They don’t believe in God or his institutions, like marriage. And yeah, they are selfish.
As DOGE is exposing, the globalists wanted tax slaves. Instead, Atlas shrugged.
Remove the personal income tax. That the Fed can print money at will proves the income tax was only about control.
As a man that raised a lot of other peoples kids.
The problem is giving women such power that they can force fathers to pay to raise kids while the woman has decided
she wants someone else.
Kids become a tool to get “even”. Been there done that.
My mother had 4 husbands and I never saw any abuse on the man’s part.
Just so you don’t think I’m being mean
I’m going on 48 years of marriage to the same woman.
We only knew each other 2 weeks before we married.
I learned what not to do. when I was a kid.
I’m not a pussy sort of guy.
That is to say, our society is composed of different subgroups; the major part of American society is not reproducing (and the more leftist you go, the more the birthrate plummets). But Amish/Mennonites and conservative homeschoolers are still growing themselves - the Amish alone would simply take over the world by sheer numbers if the trends never changed.
Of course, they will at some point. But in some cases the trends won't change until very rough things happen that force them to change. Like a collapsed society going back to the dark ages, and thus cancelling out amongst the survivors all the cultural factors that led to the birth dearth.
I have all kinds of scenarios running through my mind on this topic. Like the North Koreans overwhelming the South in a few generations, even if they remain backwards cultists. Or Africa, the last bastion of population growth, once again becoming the target of a new global slave trade as declining nations elsewhere make desperate grabs for workers with euphemistic "guest worker programs."
Boys are being trained up to have sex with a computer image..I mean it’s less messy with no necking and hugging and all that stuff...sex with an actual female is so old fashion let alone breeding.
Woman are begging for children...but they don’t have silicon breasts so the males don’t want them..
planned inflation has about reached its end game. Everything costs too much now for someone young starting off from zero.
Because of planned inflation, every 20 years every thing doubles in price at a minimum. So young people starting off with zero fall further and further behind. Yes, a handful of jobs that require massive investment in college pay more also, but those are the minority. For everyone else the vast majority, it is impossible for a young person with no college degree or only a little college to ever have a real chance anymore.
The American dream is over for most. And it is sad.
It is very much in one’s self interest to have kids. Everyone who gets old enough gets feeble. Having kids means you have people who know you and care about you. It is the natural order of things. Parents take care of children when the children can’t take care of themselves. Children take care of the parents as the parents lose the ability to take care of themselves.
the future wont need workers, they will have robots and drones.
its not the lack of huge breasts, it is because they are 300 pounds with an attitude.
Bra,
In the dark it only matters that you put your pecker in the right hole.
I would prefer a future in which Skynet hadn’t won. ;-)
There are far to many ILLEGAL ALIENS and unwed parents having children! Get rid of the the damned Invaders and their kids, and that solves one problem.
Then there is the group who have a LOT of no father/s in the home ( unwed, never married mothers), who rely on the government ( OUR TAXES ) to take care of them and are lousy mothers. We can't deport most of these, but do need to make it more difficult and less lucrative to be in this situation.
What this article is ignoring, are the Millennials and Gen Zers who are all for marriage and having kids, who are being ignored. So all we ever read/hear about the the other kinds, who probably should NEVER be parents anyway!
So here ARE a FEW questions to ponder: 1) How many children should people have, on average, and WHY? Do NOT use the Biblical "BE FRUITFUL AND MULTIPLY" as a reason! 2) How much is today's "culture" to blame for people not marrying and/or having children and how much is it the fault of the parent/s that these last two generations, as reported in the MSM, have to do with it?
Not all.
My oldest son has been married for two years now. My DIL had a miscarriage 6 months ago. They were devastated, but are trying again.
My youngest is engaged; the wedding is already set for 2027.
The middle one has several chasers but he’s finishing college first.
It helps that they saw their parents remain a loving, committed couple through thick and thin. When we said until death us do part, we meant it.
apparently, the future will be controlled by AI and Autistic people.
Yes it is sad.
I think housing costs are a factor. In many parts of the country , you can earn a comfortable six figure income, but still can’t afford a house. Young people today are handicapped financially, in ways previous generations were not.
And this financial issue may well keep people from marriage and family as life goals.
I am not at all familiar with the system, so am bewildered by the statement that the population currently receiving Social Security benefits is 342 millions, whilst the population of the United States is at this time 335 millions. Typo, or are there lots of double dippers?
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