GDP and the Childfree
From Fortune: "Millennials choosing to be DINKs could push GDP down by as much as 4%."
Deciding whether or not to have children is a deeply personal choice for any individual, but an increasing resistance to becoming a parent now presents challenges to society as a whole.
The crude birth rate in the U.S. has dropped by more than half since the 1960s. Per the St Louis Fed, sixty years ago approximately 24 babies were born per 1,000 people, in 2022 that figure stood at 11.
This drop—combined with the fact that the nation’s population is living longer—is a serious concern for economists who question how economies will function with fewer people available to do the work.
Melinda Mills is a professor of demography and population health at Oxford University’s Nuffield Department of Population Health. Professor Mills explains: “Sustained low fertility combined with longer life expectancy results in aging populations.
“This causes strains in the labor market such as health care for older populations, the closing of schools, rethinking housing and infrastructure and rethinking pension systems and age of retirement.”
The resulting drop in GDP from this aging population could be as much as 4%, James Pomeroy HSBC’s global economist previously told Business Insider.
It's a scary proposition — but so is a future full of children whose parents are unable to care for them, either because of lack of funds, lack of time, or both.
The solution is categorically not to force people to have children who do not want to, through some combination of restricting reproductive healthcare including contraception, criminalizing abortion, and limiting no-fault divorces.
Instead, governments facing workforce shortages and dropping GDPs need to restructure their economies to support a fair distribution of wealth and social services for working families. Just for a start.
People need to see and believe in a viable future for themselves, their families, their country, and their planet to introduce a new generation.
When everything is a struggle, and everything seems to be falling apart, it's no wonder that an increasing number of people are unwilling to launch new life into such a mess.
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