Demographic Winter: Decline of the Human Family

[Michael_David]

Let’s say the birth rate was at 2.1,now it is down to 1.8… this is not a ‘negative’ population growth, it is a ‘decline’ from the previous rate of growth, but still growth. (Which direction is it “in” from the zero point, not from the last point of record?)

If, say we will live for 80 years, and each couple has only one child (as in China), that child in say 20 years has a child, and this child in another 20 years has a child, and this child in another 20 years has one child (the original parents are now 80). This would be equal population maintaining for the original parents on both sides. Now, to account for perhaps 25% death rate before child bearing years due to disease or crime and you do have a decline in ‘maintaining’ the population. We know the 25% death rate is high compared to reality, so population will still s l o w l y increase. So, if we are at a 2.1 for each successive generation, we are most definitely gaining, even with the high 25% mortality rate.

 

[manualman]

2.1 is widely accepted in demographic circles as the zero growth lifetime child number per woman.

 

[strngrnrth]

Let’s say the birth rate was at 2.1,now it is down to 1.8… this is not a ‘negative’ population growth, it is a ‘decline’ from the previous rate of growth, but still growth. (Which direction is it “in” from the zero point, not from the last point of record?)

If, say we will live for 80 years, and each couple has only one child (as in China), that child in say 20 years has a child, and this child in another 20 years has a child, and this child in another 20 years has one child (the original parents are now 80). This would be equal population maintaining for the original parents on both sides. Now, to account for perhaps 25% death rate before child bearing years due to disease or crime and you do have a decline in ‘maintaining’ the population. We know the 25% death rate is high compared to reality, so population will still s l o w l y increase. So, if we are at a 2.1 for each successive generation, we are most definitely gaining, even with the high 25% mortality rate.

Generation 1 is having children while the couple’s parents and childless siblings, aunts and uncles are alive. 28 years later (the average generation is 28 years because people who marry and have kids younger tend to have more kids, while those who have just one put childbearing off, keeping the average about 28 through the centuries regardless of age at marriage) a generation has died and one has been born. It takes two kids to replace Mom and Dad. Fewer than two kids means a dropping population, unless increased life expectancies make up the difference.
With life expectancies increasing and birthrates falling, the median age of Americans has gone up steeply in the last hundred years. This has altered people’s perspectives on life and caused them to feel like they’re just kids at 30 and not ready to be parents. After 30, fertility is lower. So the birthrate drops further. The economy becomes dependent on a few people of working age, supporting increasingly expensive elders and a handful of extremely expensive kids. It can’t go on. The working age people can’t produce all that’s needed.

 

[CatsAndDogs]

With life expectancies increasing and birthrates falling, the median age of Americans has gone up steeply in the last hundred years. This has altered people’s perspectives on life and caused them to feel like they’re just kids at 30 and not ready to be parents. After 30, fertility is lower. So the birthrate drops further. The economy becomes dependent on a few people of working age, supporting increasingly expensive elders and a handful of extremely expensive kids. It can’t go on. The working age people can’t produce all that’s needed.

Sounds like a very efficient satanic mechanism to inject anti-“what-the-Church-is-here-for” into the world, doesn’t it?

Suckered again, eh? Aren’t we just the SILLIEST bunch of people ever!?

Yeth ther ee! We thertanly am!

Uh-buh-dee, Uh-buh-dee, Uh-buh-dee, uh, datz ALL folkth!

:shamrock2:

 

[Dale_M]

But we are nevertheless entering a period unprecidented in human history, when the very old will out number the young, and the burden of their care will be overwhelming.

This is true of some of the developed countries, but it isn’t true if we consider the world overall. Wouldn’t increased immigration take care of the problem?

Add the demise of western culture and the situation gets even more grim.

I think it is far too premature to write off Western culture. We have a lot of life in us Awful as the scourge of abortion is, the west still offers more protection to the poor and powerless than any other culture, as well as more freedom and opportunity.
Agreed, and lots of folks want to move to Western countries for that very reason.

 

[Dale_M]

With life expectancies increasing and birthrates falling, the median age of Americans has gone up steeply in the last hundred years. This has altered people’s perspectives on life and caused them to feel like they’re just kids at 30 and not ready to be parents.

I think that is a very good point!

After 30, fertility is lower. So the birthrate drops further. The economy becomes dependent on a few people of working age, supporting increasingly expensive elders and a handful of extremely expensive kids. It can’t go on. The working age people can’t produce all that’s needed.

Yes, changes are needed in the US. Our population has increased during the past couple decades primarily because of immigration. Is that a bad thing?

 

[Sam_Maloney]

This is true of some of the developed countries, but it isn’t true if we consider the world overall. Wouldn’t increased immigration take care of the problem?

As I mentioned earlier in this thread, a surprising number of third world countries are below replacement levels, including Vietnam and Algeria. Future generations may count America’s proximity to Mexico [and points south] as it’s greatest blessing: unlike Europe, we needn’t take in refugees from cultures that are openly hostile towards us in order to fill out our labor force.

I think it is far too premature to write off Western culture. We have a lot of life in us

The most popular name for male babies in almost every city and country in Europe? Mohamed. Honor killings go unprosecuted, and none dare speak against ‘The Prophet’, or even draw his picture.

 

[Dale_M]

The most popular name for male babies in almost every city and country in Europe? Mohamed.

Really? I poked around the web a bit, and Mohammed (in its 14 variations of spelling) was number 2 in Britain, but number 7 in Belgium, although it was number 1 in Belgium’s capital.

Honor killings go unprosecuted

In the countries of Europe or other developed nations? I find that hard to believe.

And none dare speak against ‘The Prophet’, or even draw his picture.

You’ve got a point there. Muslim radicals are pretty violent in Europe.

 

[Sam_Maloney]

Let’s say the birth rate was at 2.1,now it is down to 1.8… this is not a ‘negative’ population growth, it is a ‘decline’ from the previous rate of growth, but still growth. (Which direction is it “in” from the zero point, not from the last point of record?)

If, say we will live for 80 years, and each couple has only one child (as in China), that child in say 20 years has a child, and this child in another 20 years has a child, and this child in another 20 years has one child (the original parents are now 80). This would be equal population maintaining for the original parents on both sides. Now, to account for perhaps 25% death rate before child bearing years due to disease or crime and you do have a decline in ‘maintaining’ the population. We know the 25% death rate is high compared to reality, so population will still s l o w l y increase. So, if we are at a 2.1 for each successive generation, we are most definitely gaining, even with the high 25% mortality rate.

Birthrates are calculated in terms of children per woman, not per person. 2.1 represents replacement level, the .1 indicates that roughly one in 20 won’t reproduce at all.

Imagine a society where each of 4 generations has only one child per woman. That one child would have 2 parents, 4 grandparents, and 8 great grandparents to support and care for, all by themselves, no cousins etc. to help. This is the situation China is already trying to come to grips with…

Workers create the goods and services individuals consume. This implies that ‘retirement’ as we know it is going to dissappear, and we will once again need to work practically from cradle to grave. That’s only the begining of the societal changes we’ll face.

You may say ‘Then Great gramps had better be putting some money away’, but that actually doesn’t matter. If the economic wheels stop turning, the investments will be worth nothing. Money put in banks or investments isn’t stuffed in a mattress somewhere, it’s re-invested to create future growth. If growth stops, the pension checks stop, too.

A wheelbarrow of currency isn’t much good if the store is out of food.

 

[thomfra]

Honor killings go unprosecuted, and none dare speak against ‘The Prophet’, or even draw his picture.

Not sure where you got that from. The rule of law is alive and well in Europe. Unless you know something I don’t.

 

[Geremia]

But this doesn’t address Thomfra’s point - that world population is still growing. You can criticize, as the Pope did, contraception, abortion and sterilization, but their effects on the world are still outweighed by the world’s population growth.

Right now it is growing, but this is not the likely prediction of the UN and independent demographers, who say that it will peak at 9 billion.

Resources:

• Summary of the “demographic transition”
• The UN’s “World Population to 2300” report
• [:803-805)Nature387 (http://ace1.ma.utexas.edu/users/davis/375/reading/worldbirthrate.pdf)

 

[thomfra]

Right now it is growing, but this is not the likely prediction of the UN and independent demographers, who say that it will peak at 9 billion.

isn’t 9 billion enough???

 

[Geremia]

isn’t 9 billion enough???

The world can easily support at least 9 billion people. Poor governments and intergovernmental organizations like the U.N., which not only support injustices like abortion but also support an unjust distribution of resources (economy), cause famines.

 

[thomfra]

The world can easily support at least 9 billion people. Poor governments and intergovernmental organizations like the U.N., which not only support injustices like abortion but also support an unjust distribution of resources (economy), cause famines.

Do you have any opinion over the maximum number of people the world can support?

 

[buffalo]

Do you have any opinion over the maximum number of people the world can support?

The entire population ot the world can fit in the state of Texas.

 

[Sam_Maloney]

Not sure where you got that from. The rule of law is alive and well in Europe. Unless you know something I don’t.

Do you know about the UK’s real and binding Sharia Courts?
timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article4749183.ece

In fact, 40% of British Muslims want Sharia law:
telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1510866/Poll-reveals-40pc-of-Muslims-want-sharia-law-in-UK.html
And the political class is too politically correct to stand up to them.

To be fair, though: so far as I know, there aren’t any cases-- yet-- where the known perpetrator of an honor killing hasn’t been prosecuted.

But many such cases aren’t brought to trial becase it is so very difficult for the police to penetrate the conspiracy of silence surrounding such murders.

From Telegraph.co.UK:

“The official figure of 12 [honour killings] is but the tip of a very big iceberg,” says Miss Sanghera, who has written an autobiography, Shame, based on her own family experiences of “honour” violence.
Her charity sees almost 1,000 women each year who have been threatened with death, beaten, starved, kidnapped and brutalised by their families for refusing or escaping forced marriages.
“Often women are forced into committing suicide,” she says. "Or they are murdered and the killing is made to look like suicide, which is the verdict recorded.
"It’s very significant that the numbers of young Asian women between the ages of 16 and 24 who take their own lives is three times higher than the national average.
“But since the jailing of Banaz Mahmod’s father and uncle for murder we are facing a major problem in that it is becoming increasingly difficult to convince Asian women that British police will take them seriously.”

Full article here:telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1554764/Revealed-rising-toll-of-deaths-before-dishonour.html

 

[Geremia]

The entire population ot the world can fit in the state of Texas.

That would be awfully crowded! If Texas is 696,241 km² (TexasAlmanac.com), that would mean you would have to squeeze about 100 people into each square meter or than each person only gets 0.01 m²!

If ⅛ of the world’s area is inhabitable, this corresponds to about 60 million km². It would take about 2 years to visit all of these km², one per second. The earth is a very vast place. With the world’s population being about 6.7 billion, the average population density of inhabitable land is currently about 100 people per km². (Actually, my back of the envelope computation was not too far off: cf. “List of countries by population density.”) For comparison, fitting everyone in the United States, with its most fertile land and abundant resources, would make the population density about 700 people per km², about 23 times what it currently is. If each human needs 0.02 km² (“How many people can the earth support?”) of land and water for food, we would currently need ~15 United States to feed the whole world.

 

[Michaeljc4]

First, thank you for the link to the movie. I’ve been wanting to see it, but I thought I’d have to fork over $25!

Second, populations are rapidly aging and shrinking in Western European countries (among the native born.) The only reason their populations show any signs of life at all is becaue of immigration, or the children of immigrants. How that second generation will perpetuate itself is anyone’s guess. If they remain bound to their traditional cultures (their home cultures), they will have more children. If they become Westernized, they will have fewer.

But think for a moment: which culture–based on demographic growth–will influence W. European governments in the future? If North African, Middle Eastern, and Pakistani immigrants and their children begin to make up a larger percentage of the European population (which, based on what I’ve read, is the prediction)…what sort of governments will they elect? The children of the Enlightenment are becoming fewer and fewer, while the children of the Prophet are becoming more numerous. We may see a situation where, through democratic means, democray itself is removed from a place of political primacy. If people who don’t share Western values are in a position to vote on limiting those values…what do you think is going to happen?

In the US, those who are the descendents of the Europeans are having fewer and fewer children. Hispanics, and I believe African-Americans, are having more. Add to that the fact that fully 20% of our current population is not native born, and you can see how our culture may be changing as well. European culture and its cousins, the Americans–the ‘Western cultures’ (once upon a time known as Christendom) are dying. What will they be replaced with?

Short solution: start having some babies! The Mormons certainly are.

 

[Geremia]

The entire population ot the world can fit in the state of Texas.

Yes! If Texas is 696,241 km² (TexasAlmanac.com), that would mean you would have about 100 m² for each person!

If ⅛ of the world’s area is inhabitable, this corresponds to about 60 million km². It would take about 2 years to visit all of these km², one per second. The earth is a very vast place. With the world’s population being about 6.7 billion, the average population density of inhabitable land is currently about 100 people per km². (Actually, my back of the envelope computation was not too far off: cf. “List of countries by population density.”) For comparison, fitting everyone in the United States, with its most fertile land and abundant resources, would make the population density about 700 people per km², about 23 times what it currently is. If each human needs 0.02 km² (“How many people can the earth support?”) of land and water for food, we would currently need ~15 United States to feed the whole world.

 

[Geremia]

If ⅛ of the world’s area is inhabitable, this corresponds to about 60 million km².

Correction: I meant “habitable.”