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Author: onepoorguy 🐝  😊 😞
Number: of 48491 
Subject: Re: Overpopulation
Date: 07/26/2023 2:52 PM
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The flip side is not having enough young people to help support the old people. We're getting that a bit with the Boomers here. A surge in population (the Boomers) followed by a distinct decline in their children's and grandchildren's generations. Japan is getting that, too. Plus some other countries (I forget which ones...saw a news program a year or two ago). When SS was created, there were ~8 workers for every recipient of SS. Last I knew (about 20 years ago) that number as 4:1. I don't know what it is today, but that sort of system is problematic.

And, yes, the conservative side of the spectrum tends to want more "tradition". Mom stays at home raising a litter of kids, while dad goes out and supports them. In some places, lots of kids are necessary to support a family (and account for attrition, since not all of them survive). Eventually, that growth will overwhelm the planet. It already is. Some believe a god ordered it ("be fruitful and multiply"). Others, I firmly believe (but can't state as fact), want to see women subjugated**. There is some circumstantial support for that vis-a-vis the anti-choice movement is almost exclusively conservative, and to exercise control over someone's autonomy is a form of subjugation.

I won't belabor the history of women in the workplace. Suffice to say that since WWII, their presence and their roles in the workplace have been increasing and expanding (in the US). Today many women are opting not to have children at all, and many don't even want to get married (or partner-up for anything more than convenience). In the US today, only about 56% of women under 49 have had children. From my dusty memory, I'm recalling that number was about 90% when I was in my 20s (1980-ish). Japan is having similar issues that women want careers, not babies. Which causes real problems in terms of filling future jobs, and future economic support of care for the elderly population. The more extreme conservative position is that they belong home raising kids (or, to put it crudely, "barefoot and pregnant").

My personal opinion is that this will eventually even-out as AI and robots take-on more tasks. So the jobs will get done, but people won't be doing them. That won't solve the funding issues for government(s) (i.e. fewer workers means less revenue, which means taxes will have to be levied elsewhere).

Just to be clear, I fully support women's rights (and have since I was old enough to think about such things). Bodily autonomy, equality in the workplace, equality in society. But a declining birthrate is an economic problem that needs to be addressed (without subjugating half of the population), while simultaneously being better for the planet.



**Some, again, are "traditional". Some are threatened by women. There is a theory that because women generally know whom the father of any offspring is, that some men try to assert control to assure any offspring are theirs.
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