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Comment by obblekk | Hacker News Reader

"Raising children in China is extremely expensive"

I do wish more countries thought about childcare as part of their industrial policy and engineered large social changes to make it easier for parents to raise children.

Basic things: free, organized weekend activities (give parents back some leisure time), free babysitter services from teens on wednesday nights (give parents back going out nights), free child care accessories like carseats, diapers, bottles, etc (stop the implicit massive tax on having a child).

Imagine if we lived in a society where public school didn't exist. It would be virtually impossible to raise children while earning income. We live in that world in many regards, and then wonder why people don't want to have kids.

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You're assuming that 1) we need more children, and 2) all countries should be making it easier. China is the perfect example to show how ridiculous this is - even with the 1-child policy for 30 years, China's population is 1.4 billion people. Imagine what that would be if such a policy hadn't been enacted. For many countries (and the Earth as a whole), making it easier and less expensive to have more children is exactly the wrong thing to do.

China is, to a large degree, still a developing nation. Fertility rates being very high is only a problem is developing nations, where infrastructure and sanitation can't support the rapidly growing population.

Look at a developed economy. Look at Japan. Their economy has been struggling for almost three decades, their central bank struggles to create a healthy level of inflation (it is historically too low), frighteningly large swathes of their population between the ages of 18 and 35 have little interest, time, or money for dating, marriage, and having children. Their fertility rate is well below replacement rate. And all of these things are interconnected (too expensive to have kids = no kids = fewer workers = fewer taxpayers and contracting economy etc).

Modern economies are still largely a Ponzi scheme that relies in there being more younger people than older. Technology is changing this to a small degree, but not enough and not fast enough.

If the US doesn't want a Lost Decade of their own, we're going to need to look hard at how we can keep our fertility rate at least at replacement.

Immigration is a potential solution but relies on being able to import the labor at all skill levels, and unfortunately at the higher end, I worry the US's monopoly on foreign university students is beginning to wane too.

Every single person on this earth has a right to children, not just the right kind of rich person. Normally it’s wealthier people who decide not to have kids anyway, so why not make it less economically straining for those who do!?

China's population count might be overreported by tens of millions by officials collecting "dead souls" to embezzle state funds allocated proportionally to headcount.

Apparently without the one-child policy the population would have been ... roughly the same? Looks like most the demographic trends were already locked in before and didn't change much after it ended either.

But really, the population-level malthusians have it wrong. Greater population has both helped drive innovation, economies of scale and innovation. What we need to do is direct our attention and fiscal polices to where this fails. Like pollution, carbon emissions, overfishing, etc ... If we can either tax these failures, or set up sustainable markets, or innovate our way out of them we should. We should be putting tremendous amounts of time and money to these problems (and we are, but clearly not enough). If the price the trust cost of the problems, you'll get behavioral changes throughout the economy. That will include choices like how many children to have, but also industrial policies and practices that probably have more direct impacts on our ability to sustainably thrive on this planet.

> But really, the population-level malthusians have it wrong.

They were not wrong at all if their goal was to stem all of what you listed. They just knew from the beginning that all of what they said is not true. What they were saying was a lie.

The Population Council, eugenics freaks, and other yellow menace panickers were funded by the very same people who were running natalist policies in the West, and were trying to ban abortion, and women rights movements.

It's not correct to call them "Malthusians." The best name for them will be Luddites, and massive beneficiaries of economic status quo classes.

You're making a big accusation / conspiracy theory: that the proponents of "population bomb" arguments were also domestically anti-abortion and womens rights to increase the number of births in the West and decrease it in Asia (and presumably, Africa) due to reasons of race and racism.

Such a comment needs a lot more supporting evidence to be considered anything but an outlandish conspiracy theory.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rockefeller_Foundation#Eugenic...

All on record, and US congressmen panicking daily on "yellow menace" was on record as well.

You perfectly described the reasons I don't have children. I'm a bit older and my spouse is reaching the age where she hits her fertility cliff. We both see a society that makes having children more akin to a luxury good.

Many of my friends and coworkers have decided to have children and I watch how it seriously mars their ability to do the things they would like to do in life. The costs associated with a child are so high (USDA put it at ~$250000 for a first child from age 0-18[1]) the incentives are aligned against having children.

Many commenters are pointing out that population decline might be a good (something I agree with) but your point still stands. My SO and I are in a stable loving relationship and would be fairly good candidates for adoption but because the incentives are aligned against having children, adopting a child is still off the table.

1. https://fns-prod.azureedge.net/sites/default/files/crc2015_M...

> organized weekend activities

Oh yes, we do have those in China, it's called Work ;)

>Imagine if we lived in a society where public school didn't exist.

This assumes the market wouldn't self correct and private schools became the norm.

Indeed, and the rise of charter schools shows that it is very doable to run a private school on less than the amount of tax money allocated per-child.

That's because charter schools intentionally decline expensive students- students who need occupational therapists, school psychologists, social workers, special education programs, remedial schooling, etc.

When you look into what it means to have a public school system it really means that the system is expected to support everyone, including the neediest and most expensive students. So of course by declining these students charter schools can boast being much cheaper.

That's an interesting proposal, could you link something that breaks down the numbers? Special needs schools are separate from normal schools, so I can see how such a calculation might be possible.

Normal schools educate a lot of special needs students. The standard for going to a special needs school is higher.

I listed a lot more than just special needs. I'm talking about students that need remedial lessons, more support for problems at home, too. These are all things that will be more expensive and charter schools can decline for.

What about poor people? I think there are 60 million of those in the US.

>>>> Imagine if we lived in a society where public school didn't exist.

>>> This assumes the market wouldn't self correct and private schools became the norm.

> What about poor people? I think there are 60 million of those in the US.

The invisible hand would decide, in its infinite and sublime wisdom, that society is better off if they get no education....which is as clear an illustration as any of what market failure is.

Public schools not existing does not imply that poor people would have to pay tuition or remain uneducated. State governments could easily provide tuition assistance, likely means-tested, to alleviate this issue.

The elite charter schools in my state just game the system. They enroll a large number of students at an early age, and weed the low performing students out through attrition. Then, they don’t replace those students. Each grade gets smaller and smaller, and more elite. By 12th grade, their graduates are equivalent to the top 10% of a normal high school, with similar test scores. It looks like these charter schools (which don’t restrict who can attend) are producing Ivy League capable graduates, while public schools are producing ditch diggers. In addition, parents are expected to “tip” the teachers each semester, resulting in significantly higher income for the teachers. The profit goes to the for-profit school administrators. Then, the “smaller government” state Governor/legislature will highlight these charter schools as an example of why there should be more charter schools and defund public education.

Any of the other charter schools in the state, not employing these tactics, produce gains on par with public schools.

Although it’s great for the students who graduate from the elite charters, it’s unscalable.

do you have some articles or books that I could read to better understand this phenomenon of charter schools behaving this way. Of the few charter schools locally that I have experience with, none of them work this way.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/03/...

Public schools did not drop out of the sky by surprise. We, as a society, intentionally created them because private schools (which predate public schools by hundreds of years) were not meeting society’s needs.

I think the scale of public schooling is not widely understood. A bit over 56 million kids attended school in the U.S. in fall 2020. Of those, almost 51 million attended public schools—-almost 90%. Private schools cannot take up that volume; they never could. Again, that’s why we created public schools in the first place.

It’s not so different from why we created public roads, even though private versions already existed.

You realize money is meant to be spent on supporting your life and, if you choose, your families life and not just a Tesla and video games, right?

These policies are primarily hurting lower class folks.

Be careful what you wish for. 25% of Norwegian men never father children, and 15% of Norwegian women too.

So in the end men who never father children are being taxed for other men's children. Is that moral?

The easier, ethical way to increase fertility back is to bring morality back to society. If you make sure your kids are raised near other people like you, you cheat the system that the most advantaged people in society have (better looking, better finances etc). Why isn't the character of a person a valuable trait? It's because people who have those traits take it for granted, and those with other traits want character as a trait to be devalued. Imagine if every man would taught their daughter/son/wife to judge people by their character. Taught that loyalty is a virtue.

And then only let their children hang out with people who also value those with character.

Current society is bad for men and women. Men who would also want sons? What if your son is ugly? Women who would want both daughter and son? Can they ensure that their son will have a nice life? They cannot. Even if those women/men go for someone with model tier looks, they will likely be less good lookin than them. And someone else will always be better looking than them. Better finances than them.

There is no winning for anyone longer term like this. It doesn't matter if you're the richest person. Or the best looking one. Someone must lose in today's game. And if you don't lose today, someone from your descendants will. Why?

Humans are intelligent enough to understand these things, and we're likely the end of prime biological evolution. The next step is obviously not humans. What's there to fight for?

Nothing. Maybe bear the fruits of the collective hard work ancestors have done? As peter thiel said, competition is for losers. Stop competing in a rat race.

> So in the end men who never father children are being taxed for other men's children. Is that moral?

In most Western states, care for the elderly (and especially childless elderly) is funded by the working age professionals, and those need to be born. So unless that 25% doesn't plan on growing old it’s not only moral but essential for them that the other 75% do have kids.

The problem takes care of it's self when those people who cannot have kids' can have because their hard work has value. Because current welfare society over values looks. Undervalues other aspects of humans.

This is unethical, and will bite your decedents back in the ass even if it doesn't bite you. You think your so good looking? Imagine if your grand son was in that place where he wasn't that good looking. Would you want him to end up like that? Is that really fair to him.

Aren't we supposed to make the world a better place? When we realize that some things are wrong?

You're doing every man who does hard work injustice. You can defer the problem by importing women from 3rd world countries, but for how long?

Not only is it unethical, but immoral.

Remember, no matter how privileged you are, there is no guarantee that your decedents will have the privilege'. Even if you're the most selfish man/woman, it's in your interest to advocate for it.

There's no woman/man who is a better human except for their character. We need to put incentives for these traits in humans. Not discourage them.

This particular comment feels more like a rant that's not aimed at anything in particular. But with the previous comment you tried making a clearer point:

> So in the end men who never father children are being taxed for other men's children. Is that moral?

Don't those kids grow up, enter the working force and contribute with taxes? Rough math would suggest a father with 2 kids will contribute together via taxes over their lifetimes more than a single person (no kids) would. I'm sure most governments already made the same calculation.

If at 50 or 60, when some parents have their offsprings already contributing, they got 2-3 times more than you get from the state (pension, welfare, subsidies, whatever else you can imagine) you'd probably not be happy with the explanation "you contributed alone, they contribute together". If you don't care for contributing for someone else's kid, why would someone else's kid contribute anything for you?

This can be taken further with anything that works based on pools of contributions like insurance, pension, schools, public transport, internet, etc. They're all working exclusively because not all contributors actually need to benefit equally from all services. Some need more education, some need more health services, some need more transportation. Trust me, you get plenty of things you didn't pay for.

In my Western state (and probably yours too), the government spends that tax revenue faster than it comes in. It then secures further loans against that revenue stream in the expectation that my children will be helpless to forfeit even more, and my grandchildren after them.

My government is currently desperately trying to paper over this pyramid scheme by importing as many foreigners as possible under the apparent misconception that they will be instant net taxpayers (the opposite is usually true), compounding our economic collapse with a social and cultural collapse as well.

I'm quite sure the average young man here would do better with that cash in his pocket than the government is doing with it. It borders on overtly hostile.

In short, there is no money. It's gone. If anything, there's a moral obligation to avoid contributing.

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