Storks Don't Take Orders from the State

> The amount of money required to trigger even these small effects is enormous. In "The Economic Consequences of Family Policies," published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives in 2017, researchers found "one extra percentage point of GDP spending" on early childhood education and child care programs was "associated with 0.2 extra children per woman."

Average EU fertility is 1.53 [1], which is 0.57 below the replacement level of 2.1. So it would cost 2.85% of EU GDP to reach replacement level. The US (easier to find data than for EU totals) spends 3.4% of its GDP [2] (10.9% of the government budget) on defense, 1.6% on debt interest, and 0.3% on international affairs [3]. So securing the continued existence of a nation seems comparatively affordable.

And calling mere replacement level fertility "forced birth", or as The Guardian put it, "baby machines" [4], is hyperbolic. Though given its importance to the survival of a people, I am tempted to use a stronger term.

[1] https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php...

[2] https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/gdp-...

[3] https://old.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/pkxowz/oc_...

[4] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/04/baby-bonuses-f...