Posted on 11/27/2005 2:48:58 PM PST by Imnotalib
The Baby Bust In the 1970s, sociologists warned that overpopulation was the greatest threat facing humanity. Today, birth rates are dropping around the globe, and experts speak darkly of “depopulation.” What’s wrong with fewer people? 11/11/2005
How quickly is the birth rate declining? The global fertility rate now stands at 2.9 children for every woman of child-bearing age—a decrease of nearly 50 percent since 1972. According to the latest U.N. projections, the world’s fertility rate will fall below “replacement” levels by 2045, meaning that the human population will start shrinking. For a population to remain stable, the fertility rate must be 2.1 in nations with low infant mortality, and higher where more die in early childhood. Some 60 countries are now operating below replacement levels. “Never in the last 650 years, since the time of the Black Plague,” said sociologist Ben Wattenberg, “have birth and fertility rates fallen so far, so fast, so low, for so long, in so many places.”
What’s causing the decline? A variety of factors. Contraception is more reliable and readily available than ever. In the developed world, large numbers of women are pursuing higher education and careers, delaying marriage and childbirth, and having smaller families. In recent decades, developed countries have also seen a major migration from the farms to the cities. On farms, children’s labor benefits the family, but in urban areas, the high cost of raising children provides economic incentive to keep family size down.
Why is this a concern? The decline in birth rates isn’t universal. About 99 percent of the projected population growth from 6.5 billion to 7 billion people over the next seven years will occur in the Third World. Birth rates in the Middle East and sub-Saharan Africa are nearly triple that of the industrialized world. That means the gap between rich and poor nations—and between the West and Muslim nations—will grow wider, causing deeper resentment, greater friction, and more international instability. “The countries which are experiencing rapid population growth are countries that are really in trouble,” said Peter Kostmayer of the pro-population-control group Population Connection. “They’re not stable.”
What are the other implications? The economies of the U.S. and Western European nations could be hobbled by a shortage of workers, and safety-net programs such as Social Security will face a crisis. As older people in the West live into their late 70s and 80s, there will be fewer young people to fill important jobs—and pay the taxes that fund Social Security, Medicare, and other programs. Western Europe is particularly vulnerable to this “graying” phenomenon. The average fertility rate in Europe is 1.4 children per woman, far below the replacement rate. In Italy and Spain, it’s just 1.3. Japan has population woes too. With a fertility rate of 1.3 children (and a mere .99 in Tokyo), Japan this year is projected to experience its first population decline. In Russia, due to a combination of lower birth rates and higher mortality rates, the population has been shrinking by about 750,000 a year.
What about the U.S.? Compared to the rest of the developed world, the U.S. is holding its own. The U.S. birth rate dropped to a low of 1.7 children in 1976, and then started inching back up to its current mark of 2.1. But the picture gets more complicated when the numbers are broken down by race and region. In 2002, the birth rate for white women was 1.83 babies. Birth rates among blacks (2.2) and Hispanics (3.0) are above the replacement rate; combined with steady immigration, it means that America is progressively becoming a browner nation. Since 2000, Hispanics have accounted for half the growth in the U.S. population. The U.S. Census Bureau projects that whites will become the minority in the U.S. at some point between 2040 and 2050.
What’s wrong with that? Some conservatives argue that America’s strengths flow from its traditional European Protestant values, and they worry this will be a weaker country if those values are heavily diluted. Many economists, though, contend that with white birth rates low, the growth in the Hispanic and other minority populations may provide the workers that will save both the economy and the social safety net. “If we didn’t have these elements, we would be moving into a situation like Japan and Europe,” said Lewis Goodman, a Latin America expert at American University.
Why are whites having fewer babies? Actually, not all whites are. Whites in the West and the South have more babies than those in the Northeast. Birth rates among whites are lower in urban areas than in suburban and rural areas, and higher among the religiously observant than in non-churchgoers. People who describe themselves as socially conservative are having far more babies than those who consider themselves liberal. One recent study found that differences in fertility rates accounted for 70 percent of the decline in mainline Protestant church membership since 1900 and the simultaneous rise in conservative church membership. The political implications of this phenomenon have already been felt.
In what way? The segments of the white population that are growing are in the “red” states, and lean heavily Republican. In the last presidential election, in fact, George Bush carried the 19 states with the highest white fertility rates. John Kerry won the 16 states with the lowest. Democrats dominated in the low-birthrate urban areas such as Manhattan and San Francisco, but fared poorly in places like the outer suburbs, where families are bigger. “Conservative, religious-minded Americans are putting far more of their genes into the future than their liberal and secular counterparts,” says Phillip Longman, author of The Empty Cradle. “If Metros don’t start having more children, America’s future is Retro.”
What is really amazing is that the birth rate of Mexican women has dropped below replacement.
In as little as 20 years, we may not be able to get as many illegal aliens as we need. Congress will have to do something about this....
Hmmmm, the liberals are (non-)breeding themselves out of existence?
Self-hating, caucasian nihilists are failing to reproduce? This is a problem just how? And, conversely, conservative caucasian individualists who believe in god are reproducing above replacement rate? Sounds like a positive development to me.
Of course, all the media gets out of this is that America is becoming "browner." The big story is that white socialists are birth-controlling themselves out of existence. Whatever will all the poor, disadvantaged minority groups DO, without liberal, white busybodies to dictate every aspect of their lives? Oh me, oh my.
Nothing like ending an article with a nice politcal stab that has little relevance to the subject of the article.
"The global fertility rate now stands at 2.9 children for every woman of child-bearing age—a decrease of nearly 50 percent since 1972."
is that accurate?
I don't fall for media scare tactics. The conservatives and religious people will outbreed the libs in the end.
While whites in red states are reproducing more than whites in blue states, it is not that big of a difference and only in five states are whites reproducing above replacement level (2.1).
Where do you get that from? It's not in the article.
This is why I support abortion. I only want to restrict the abortion 'rights' of healthy white women.
Everybody else is entitled to a taxpayer funded abortion on demand, even late term.
Now before anybody hammers me, that statement cannot be racist if abortion is a social good.
And in defense of the taxpayers who would be on the hook for all these abortions, perhaps we can work out some public/private partnerships. We can get the Neo-Nazis, the KKK, etc. to raise funds for minority abortions.
Wouldn't that send the LibDems over the edge!
It is not abortion so much as birth control. White women abort at a lesser rate than Hispanics and especially blacks but they have a lower birth rate. White women are avoiding pregnancy more often than blacks and Hispanics.
Read it somewhere, maybe on FR. Should take better notes, I suppose.
But it seems likely enough. It would be typical for the stage of industrialization and income they've arrived at, in the current environment. It's not like the 19th century, when people kept reproducing out of habit when it was not economically beneficial to do so.
Yep, just convince liberals that breeding is Politically Incorrect and you are on the way.
Actually, I think the correlation is fairly high. Clearly religious families that have lots of kids go out of their way to impart those same religious beliefs to their children.
Impregnate the illegals who work for them?
Ironically, if the tendency to religious belief has a genetic basis, then religious families having larger families will end up with a large percentage of children whose religious upbringing sticks with them.
I've often wondered if something like that helps explain Islam. Islam imposes many daily rituals on the "submitting" believers. Plus, in many (most?) muslim societies, the family has a big say in who the children are allowed to marry. So, if an almost obsessive/compulsive attention to ritual is a sign of godliness, then the most obsessively ritualistic children will be most highly prized & will be most likely to get shopped around by their parents for marriage. But a child who's an independent thinker will tend to be rejected by their fiance's family, & so will have a harder time producing offspring.
Then, couple this with the prevalence of inbreeding in Arab culture...
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