China's birth rate drops for a fifth straight year to record low

I've always found it fascinating that governments have such a hard time increasing the birth rate - many have tried and most have failed miserably. I guess some things you just can't "nudge".

And how different is the situation in Korea, Japan, most of Europe, North America, ???

Short-term capitalist optimization - where you squeeze as much work as you can out of almost all healthy adults in their prime decades - does not lack for long-term downsides.

Not that it helps when parents, especially mothers, are held to brutal standards in many non-economic ways. But my impression is that that's also rather universal...