Persistent Drop in Fertility Reshapes Europe's Future [The Death of the West]

NY Times ^ | 12/26 | FRANK BRUNI

[GovernmentShrinker]

Actually, if one isn't totally obsessed with expensive doo-dads and recreational pastimes, sequencing is the simple answer. With modern reproductive technology most women can safely put off child-bearing until their mid to late 30s and in many cases even later (and inexpensive tests can tell you in advance how your fertility level is holding up).

I don't believe for a second that a couple in which one parent works full time from college graduation to age 60-65 and the other works full time from college graduation to age 35-40, can't raise 2-3 children while maintaining a very high standard of living. They're not having children because they like their expensive cars, electronics, parties, and vacations better.

[stuartcr]

Perhaps this is the way things are supposed to progress.

[stuartcr]

There is a big difference between what people can do, and what they want and will do. You said it yourself, why they are not having more children. Coupled with the fact that it is more expensive, they just don't want to.

[LeftCoastLurker]

My own family's recent history illustrates this trend.

I am the eldest of 5 siblings, born in 1951 to staunch Roman Catholic conservatives in SoCal. They had a child every 2-1/2 years for mor than a decade ('50s-'60s). My sister and I (the oldest) have 3 children each. My next brother has 2 children, and the 2 youngest brothers (though married) have none. Since all the wives are now well into their 40s, more children for the extended family are unlikely.

8 children out of 10 adults sounds a lot more like Italy than the America I grew up in a half century ago.

[Godel]

This makes me want to cry. Are we so selfish a culture that we commit cultural suicide rather than have a second or third child?

[Godel]

Those Hispanics may saveconquer us yet...

[friendly]

Are we so selfish a culture that we commit cultural suicide rather than have a second or third child?

Yes we are that selfish a Western culture. The government, especially the socialist professional bureaucrats of the US and Europe, are ferociously discriminatory against children, all under an astonishingly brazen cover-up that they do it all "for the children."

This explains the Left's lust for high taxes, amorality, abortion on demand, their systematic removal of all trace of religion from public life, etc.

There is an overwhelming pressure against children here, worse in the more socialist states of Europe. I remember this de-population problem first appeared in communist Eastern Europe in the 1960's. It has spread, like the plague it is, ever Westwards. Actually the Black Plague will ultimately be shown to be less deadly that this new plague of cultural suicide.

[Godel]

There is an overwhelming pressure against children here, worse in the more socialist states of Europe. I remember this de-population problem first appeared in communist Eastern Europe in the 1960's. It has spread, like the plague it is, ever Westwards. Actually the Black Plague will ultimately be shown to be less deadly that this new plague of cultural suicide.

I know, its SICK. We are taxes so much and women have to work instead of staying home to build a family, and we have to pay for college etc so that children become an economic burden. Meanwhile in the third world, they have 6-8 children, and they dont even have to worry about supporting them, because good ol USA and Europe will feed them. No matter how many kids the third world has, we'll ship them enough grain, medicine, etc to take care of them, while our own nation goes extinct. When I hear leaders talking about the AIDS "crisis" in Africa which doesnt even make a demographic blip, while ignoring the genocide of historic proportions occuring here and in Europe, it makes me sick. I'm glad to see the New York times reporting this, I've been banging the drums on this issue for over a year, ever since I started reading UN birthrate statistics and realized the truth. I feel like Cassandra from Greek Mythology, destined to know the future, but ignored and powerless to alter it.

So many horrible events have come to together at once to wipe us out, birth control, abortion on demand, massive taxation/socialism making children a burden on those who work, radical feminism encouraging women not to have children, selfish materialistic men determined not to start a family, massive third world birthrates, a liberal media telling us we're morally obligated to work even harder, having less kids, in order to feed and clothe the third worlds 8+ kids per woman, massive immigration hiding the problem from us so that we don't realize it until it's too late.

[aristeides]

What about all the illegal immigrants to this country from Latin America? Couldn't we send a lot of them to Europe? They are at least Christian and speak a European, Christian language.

[aristeides]

Western people are too steeped in this culture of narcissism and materialism to be extracted in any other way but by cold, ugly reality.

Germany was turned around by military defeat in 1945.

[friendly]

So many horrible events have come to together at once to wipe us out...

The Perfect Storm is set upon us.

[PLK]

fertility rates have plummeted over the last decades,

This is misleading terminology. I doubt that "fertility" rates have dropped, the Italians are probably just as "fertile" as they have ever been. It's the birth rate that has actually dropped as more people in developed countries practice birth control and abortion to prevent and eliminate pregnancies caused by their "fertile" state of being. The opposite of "fertile" is "sterile."

[TomSmedley]

****WHERE THE HECK IS THE OVER-POPULATION everyone always bleats about??

By definition, this issue only applies to non-white "human weeds." Margaret Sanger's heirs focus a lot of their abortion "service" marketing on minority communities, in faithfulness to her eugenics vision. The irony is -- the sword she forged to wield against the "lesser breeds" has decimated the liberal sophisticates.

[Tax-chick]

the sword she forged to wield against the "lesser breeds" has decimated the liberal sophisticates

Interesting point, Tom! The "religious fanatics" (us! ... and the Moslems) and the immigrants are still having children, while the "superior" types are disappearing from the landscape.

And I have to object to the "both parents must work" and "can't afford a large family" explanations. I know too many large families with one income (including us) to buy into that. They don't have everything the people with two jobs and one child have, but we all have homes, vans :-), food and clothing, zoo memberships, books for our kids, college scholarships when it's time for college ...

I sympathize, though, with the people who think it's impossible, because often a couple doesn't know anyone with more than two children. I was fortunate during a critical time, when we had our girl and boy and everyone expected us to be "done," to meet families with 6, 8, or 10 children who were happy and comfortable.

Three children is the hardest; after that it gets easier. I'm looking forward to having a full "staff" of 10, before I retire from the Baby Thing!

[Tax-chick]

It's the averages that make history. A few rich men have multiple wives, while some poor men have none. There aren't enough women (with sex-selection abortion, illegal or not) for even all the men who can afford it to have more than one wife.

The problem is in the average birthrate of the average married couple, not in the exceptions, either the few naturally infertile, or Osama bin Laden and Abdulaziz al Saud.

[First Amendment]

****The irony is -- the sword she forged to wield against the "lesser breeds" has decimated the liberal sophisticates.****(sorry, haven't firugre out italics here yet)

Call it poetic justice? Karma? As you sow, so shall you reap?

[briant]

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=fertility%20rate

[Aric2000]

When the governments answers continue to be throw money at it, there is going to be MAJOR problems.

Quit taking so much of your producers money for these programs, and they may actually have MORE children on their own. Why? because they will have more money to raise them.

Why didn't they think of that? Because they don't!!

[FITZ]

They are at least Christian and speak a European, Christian language.

Plus Spanish isn't all that different from Italian ---those who won't learn English would be better off in Italy where they wouldn't have that much to learn.

[FITZ]

Quit taking so much of your producers money for these programs, and they may actually have MORE children on their own. Why? because they will have more money to raise them.

That's the part that doesn't make any sense. The producers have to pay for all the immigrants and their children that they can't afford children of their own. Ending all welfare programs and lowering taxes would go a long way in solving the problems.