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Half a million fewer children? The coming COVID baby bust:
The COVID-19 episode will likely lead to a large, lasting baby bust. The pandemic has thrust the country into an economic recession. Economic reasoning and past evidence suggest that this will lead people to have fewer children. The decline in births could be on the order of 300,000 to 500,000 fewer births next year. We base this expectation on lessons drawn from economic studies of fertility behavior, along with data presented here from the Great Recession of 2007-2009 and the 1918 Spanish Flu.
[...] When the public health crisis first took hold, some people playfully speculated that there would be a spike in births in nine months, as people were "stuck home" with their romantic partners. Such speculation is based on persistent myths about birth spikes occurring nine months after blizzards or major electricity blackouts. As it turns out, those stories tend not to hold up to statistical examination (Udry, 1970). But the COVID-19 crisis is amounting to much more than a temporary stay-at-home order. It is leading to tremendous economic loss, uncertainty, and insecurity. That is why birth rates will tumble.
[...] There is ample evidence that birth rates are, in fact, pro-cyclical. This is shown, for instance, in the work by Dettling and Kearney (2014) described above. Their analysis of birth rates in metropolitan areas finds that all else equal, a one percentage-point increase in the unemployment rate is associated with a 1.4 percent decrease in birth rates. Schaller (2016) analyzes the relationship between state-level unemployment rates and birth rates, and finds that a one percentage-point increase in state-year unemployment rates is associated with a 0.9 to 2.2 percent decrease in birth rates. Other evidence shows that women whose husbands lose their jobs at some point during their marriage ultimately have fewer children (Lindo, 2010). This suggests that transitory changes in economic conditions lead to changes in birth rates.
[...] What are the likely implications of the COVID-19 episode for fertility? The monthly unemployment rate jumped from 3.5 percent to 14.7 percent in April and to 13.3 percent in May. Note that the BLS also indicate that technical issues in collecting these data likely mean that the actual unemployment rates in those months were likely 5 and 3 percentage points higher, respectively. That would bring them to about 19.7 and 16.3 percent. Although it is difficult to forecast the 2020 annual unemployment rate, assuming a 7 to 10 percentage-point jump to 10.6 to 13.6 percent seems reasonable. Based on the findings presented above, this economic shock alone implies a 7 to 10 percent drop in births next year. With 3.8 million births occurring in 2019, that would amount to a decline of between 266,000 and 380,000 births in 2021.
On top of the economic impact, there will likely be a further decline in births as a direct result of the public health crisis and the uncertainty and anxiety it creates, and perhaps to some extent, social distancing. Our analysis of the Spanish Flu indicated a 15 percent decline in annual births in a pandemic that was not accompanied by a major recession. And this occurred during a period in which no modern contraception existed to easily regulated fertility.
Combining these two effects, we could see a drop of perhaps 300,000 to 500,000 births in the U.S. Additional reductions in births may be seen if the labor market remains weak beyond 2020. The circumstances in which we now find ourselves are likely to be long-lasting and will lead to a permanent loss of income for many people. We expect that many of these births will not just be delayed – but will never happen. There will be a COVID-19 baby bust. That will be yet another cost of this terrible episode.
Journal References:
1.) Melissa S . Kearney, Phillip B . Levine. Subsidized Contraception, Fertility, and Sexual Behavior, (DOI: rest.91.1.137)
2.) Melissa S. Kearney, Riley Wilson. Male Earnings, Marriageable Men, and Nonmarital Fertility: Evidence from the Fracking Boom, Review of Economics and Statistics (DOI: 10.1162/rest_a_00739)
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 03 2020, @09:41PM (33 children)
So lower birth rates are the result of more uncertainty in people's economic circumstances.
Tell me how this meshes with the propaganda that advanced economies tend to have lower birth rates because somehow that's due to people wanting it and being happier than people in countries with backward economies...
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday December 03 2020, @10:21PM (18 children)
A bit of perspective can be found at this messy URL: https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/fertility-rate#:~:text=United%20States%20-%20Historical%20Fertility%20Rate%20Data%20,%20%20-1.100%25%20%2067%20more%20rows%20
Scroll down the page, and see when was the last time the US had a "sustainable" birth rate, of about 2.1. (I don't remember the exact number, but it's real close to 2.1 births per female.) 2.0 and below means the population is declining.
So, even if fertility goes up and down marginally, and that fluctuation correlates to economic factors, it doesn't change the fact that the US is in decline, and has been for over 40 years.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 04 2020, @01:46AM (17 children)
Does it, now? And you explain the overall US population increase with immigration?
Baseline: 1980 U.S. population: 226,545,805
Total number of U.S. Immigrants in 2015: 47 million, 14% of the population.
US population 2015: 320,289,273 net rise from 1980: 93,743,468
Where, pray tell, did the other 46 million new US residents come from, if not immigration or fertility?
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 4, Touché) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday December 04 2020, @02:06AM
WalMart. You can pick up a ten pack of new residents for around $75.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Friday December 04 2020, @03:23AM (12 children)
There's a bit of a trick that I think you are missing. Starting in 1972, white, black, and Native American's fertility declined. However, we were already being told that Latinos were the fastest growing demographic.
a. We had our own already native Latino population.
b. We had a massive surge of Latino immigrants.
c. We saw a pretty massive increase in Latino citizens, through naturalization, and through anchor baby programs.
Add that together, and now, today, you have a rather robust birth rate among Latino citizens today - while white, black, and Native Americans continue to decline.
I don't make the mistake of Democrats, in that, I don't expect Latinos to be a monolithic bloc, politically, religously, or even ethnically. But - the end result is, Latinos are displacing white, black, and Native Americans. We have fewer babies, they have more babies.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 04 2020, @03:42AM (10 children)
So, it's an "Us vs Them" thing?
"Us" having fewer abortions isn't a good answer for any of that.
I watched Central Florida move from migrant workers hiding in the fields in the late 1990s to openly moving into the cities in the 2000s, there was quite the boom then and while it was easy to say "oh my how things have changed so much in such a short time," looking back not much really changed besides the fact that the latinos are more visible than they used to be. Drug problems, illiteracy problems, underemployment of white layabouts problems - they're all about the same today as they were back in the 1980s.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Friday December 04 2020, @03:51AM (6 children)
It always has been something of an "us vs them" thing. What do you think the whole anchor baby game was about? "They" found a loophole in our legal system, and took full advantage of it.
Note that I don't blame Latinos for taking advantage. I blame the idiot Americans who "interpreted" the 14th amendment to allow it. The author of the 14th was very careful to exclude the children of illegal aliens from citizenship, but lib/progressives had thir own ideas.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @04:08AM (1 child)
Yeah, like defeat the Nazis. Of course we had to be attacked first, so I guess we'll see how many domestic attacks it takes before we purge the domestic Nazis.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @07:41PM
You're not going to purge shit, you stupid Bolshevik's bitch.
(Score: 0, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @06:44AM (1 child)
Like goddamned Polacks, coming over here just to escape poverty and, well, Poland. And then they started dropping bambinos like there was no tomorrow! One of them, a few clicks down the road, was our own Anchor Baby, Runaway1956. Time to call the gig, and deport him back to his ancestral European (almost) homeland!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @02:48PM
Yes the US has a lot to answer for, not the least is its treatment of White Negroes of Europe. The ways in which the US fucked my country by letting it languish behind the Iron Curtain are huge. Add to it the nonsense that is EU and we have a present day disaster.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 04 2020, @03:00PM (1 child)
One man's loophole is another man's intended result.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Friday December 04 2020, @05:21PM
Can't argue that.
Historically, the congress and senate have promised almost every year since 'Operation Wetback' to address immigration. And, historically, congress and the senate have kicked the can down the road.
I've made this statement in the past, I'll repeat it here:
Had congress ever bothered to pass legislation that codified a real immigration policy, it would actually be law. Some of us may like or dislike such a law, but it would be law. Quotas would have been set, and policies given for exceptions, policies for asylum, etc ad nauseum. There would be a working protocol for any and all to follow.
My PRIMARY complaint regarding immigration is, we have few laws and few clear policies, and we are generally unwilling to enforce those laws and policies that exist. That leaves our borders wide open for anyone who cares to walk across. We can't reject known criminals, because we don't know who walks across the border. We can't document those people, so we have no idea who is desirable, and who is not. As a rule, documentation only exists when that outsider wishes to conform with documentation laws, OR, that individual runs afoul of the law.
However much I might like or dislike any particular law or policy, the law should be observed and enforced all around.
No matter how liberal or conservative our immigration policy, I can't understand any position that approves of undocumented people just wandering in, and doing as they wish, with a total disregard for the rule of law.
We don't even know how many immigrants have entered the country in the past 50 years. Since we don't know how many have entered, we can't possibly know how many have left, how many have stayed, how many live legal lives, how many are full time criminals. We can't possibly address human trafikking effectively, because we can't know who came willingly, or who came under threat of - whatever.
The most liberal minded, progressive person in America should agree with me that every immigrant should be documented, screened for health, screened for criminal background, and questioned about why he/she even WANTS to be here.
Liberals are all for the census - why wouldn't those same liberals want to carefully document every person who crosses the border?
Congress has failed us. Each and every congress for the past fifty years has failed to address immigration, they have failed to reform immigration into any sensible set of laws and policies.
Being a conservative minded person, I want to limit immigration, of course. More importantly, I want to see that immigration is handled in a lawful manner.
Immigration in the US sucks ass all around, I think that almost all of us can agree on that.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 1, Troll) by crafoo on Friday December 04 2020, @03:16PM (2 children)
"So, it's an "Us vs Them" thing?"
That depends entirely what you believe a country is and if you share Values and Culture with the illegal invading latinos or not.
(Score: 3, Informative) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 04 2020, @03:53PM (1 child)
Growing up, I wanted to own/operate an orange grove.
After growing up, as I looked into the proposition of actually owning/operating an orange grove I came to the realization that: in order to make the operation financially feasible (even slightly profitable, rather than a hobby/money loser) it would have to be approached at scale: 10+ (preferably 100+) productive acres, financing, insurance, etc. and to make all that float a key component of the entire system was harvesting labor. Without using "illegal" harvesting labor, no citrus groves in Central Florida in the 1990s would have been even break-even profitable. This was due to competition among grove owner/operators which drove the margins down until "illegal" harvesters were a required component of any profitable operation, even break-even.
It's not a choice. The grove owners and operators, most of them 6th generation and later 'Muricans, all of them considerably wealthy, have dictated the necessity: anyone who grows citrus for profit at any kind of scale requiring hired harvest labor must support the presence of illegal migrant farm laborers in their groves.
Furthermore: the State (at the urging of the citrus industry) has repeatedly taken actions to wipe out "backyard citrus" further ensuring that the only significant citrus grown in Florida is grown in large scale commercial operations, or by those who "swim upstream" and spend far more growing their own citrus than it can be purchased for at retail.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @07:48PM
Whites should kill every White company owner who hires non-whites, after one warning. Kill any politician that tries to allow non-White competition in.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @06:42AM
Racist motherfucking Runaway asshole! Get back in yer hole, you idiot! No one is fooled by your fake statistics. We are going to vote to give Arkansas back to Mexico, but not all that confident they would accept it.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Socrastotle on Friday December 04 2020, @04:41AM
The overall population has a temporary lag behind fertility, due to life expectancy. But he is correct that anything below 2.0 results in a declining population. Imagine we have a group with a fertility of 1 that has their babies when they're 20, and dies when they're 50. And we start with a population of 100:
----
(100) Year 0: 100x newborn
(100) Year 10: 100x 10
(150) Year 20: 50x newborn, 100x 20
(150) Year 30: 50x 10, 100x 30
(175) Year 40: 25x newborn, 50x 20, 100x 40
(75) Year 50: 25x 10, 50x 30o, RIP 100
(75) Year 60: 12x newborn 25x 20, 50x 40
(37) Year 70: 12x 10, 25x 30, RIP 50
----
You see a seemingly increasing population until the first generation starts to hit their life expectancy, at which point you see the "real" result. The US fertility rate only dropped below 2 in 1973 which was "only" 47 years ago. And so, relative to the above table and assuming a life expectancy of around 80, we're at about the 47/80 * 50 = 30 year mark on the above table which means we're still seeing relatively large increases in population. The rapid and *real* (as opposed to relative) falloff of 'native' population will go into overdrive starting in about 30 years.
So in other words, you need to look at fertility in times of a single life expectancy. It's why fertility changes are a sort of hidden issue. They take a complete life-cycle to really show their impact, and we naturally tend to view life in terms far shorter than a life-cycle since that is, by definition, the point at which you're expected to have already died.
(Score: 2) by cykros on Saturday December 05 2020, @06:09AM (1 child)
Heightened life expectancy. Fewer people today smoke 4 packs a day, drink 3 martinis at lunch, and/or work in coal mines than in 1980, among other things. This could be verified by looking at median age in 1980 and 2015, but it's 1 am and I can't be arsed.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Saturday December 05 2020, @02:22PM
And we've hit the end of the life expectancy expansion? I know the great U.S. of A. is plateaued at the moment, and we're fucking the majority of the population's access to proper healthcare, but how long do you think the U.S. is going to keep that up?
Besides, the U.S. is less than 5% of global population, and you can hardly expect the other 95% to mimic our behavior closely enough to make these razor thin distinctions between population expansion and contraction. Global population continues to expand, grinding poverty is hardly disappearing and if it does, it too will face a huge life expectancy expansion - far greater than what has happened in the U.S. post 1972.
Boomers are starting to die, and that will put some downward pressure on population but not much, boomers had plenty of children and boomers' children weren't as hard drinking, smoking, work yourself to death types as their parents.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 03 2020, @11:25PM (10 children)
Easy: in existing "advanced economies", more women have the capability to choose not to have babies.
I.e. it is a correlation, while causation is neither direct nor immediate.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @03:12AM (3 children)
Easy: in existing "advanced economies", more women have the capability to enact revenge upon men.
There, FTFY.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @06:46AM
Coming for your balls, incel! Gunna cut them right off. You get to keep your worthless penis, however. Falanger!
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday December 04 2020, @11:03PM (1 child)
"Exact revenge upon men?" What kind of delusional incel persecution fantasy is this?
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by https on Saturday December 05 2020, @01:25AM
It's the standard type.
Offended and laughing about it.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @05:36AM (5 children)
The one thing I wonder, though, is whether women are consciously choosing such or being indoctrinated into such? What I mean is that we have not even reached the first era of people dying off childless. All the way until the 70s, the birth rate was > 2 and single households were relatively rare. How are people going to feel about their life decisions when their post-menopause, their family is mostly dead, friends have done as friends do over time, and they are ultimately left with nothing and nobody?
Being a strong empowered women (or a man "going their own way", as well) sounds nice and empowering when you're young. But as these people age and find themselves alone, while others surround themselves with the families they've created, are they genuinely going to be happy with their life decisions? It's just such a weird society we've created where being a meaningless cog in a corporate machine is somehow some empowering behavior, while raising a family - literally the one and only thing that keeps humanity alive, is some quaint desire? Not exactly the makings of a healthy, sustainable, civilization.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by barbara hudson on Friday December 04 2020, @03:07PM
People get older. They die. News at 11.
Given that men die younger, what's needed are more cougars to restore the balance. And more lesbian couples.
Because who wants to spend their days changing the diapers of some old demented coot, and then spending them final years alone?
It's simple math - men want younger women who will be able to look after them when they are older. So why shouldn't women be thinking the same? Looking for someone who won't be a burden, then croak and leave them alone? Because what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. And men with Alzheimer's are a physical danger to their caregivers, or others in old age homes. They've repeatedly physically assaulted or even killed other residents and not been charged because they are not competent.
SoylentNews is social media. Says so right in the slogan. Soylentnews is people, not tech.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @04:58PM
And then came the 80s, technical progress got squashed, things that were steadily improving before, stagnated and then started degrading. The murkier the future, the riskier was the gamble of having a child; when one too many means irreversible poverty in perpetuity, anyone with any sense will err on the side of caution.
Those who would have 3 children on expectation of growing prosperity, limited themselves to 2 on observation of it stagnating; to 1 noticing it falling; to 0 seeing politicians extra busy creating a catastrophe.
Children are about future; future is about hope. Creating hopelessness, for whatever political reason, results in less children. Easy.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @07:51PM (1 child)
It's pretty goddamn clear that every White person is being brainwashed to self-destruct the race from birth by the Jews and their White race traitor minions.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @11:11PM
We're all human you bigoted fool.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2020, @10:33PM
There are massive amounts of regretful, miserable parents, and that includes old people in nursing homes. It is a myth that your children will necessarily be around to take care of you in old age; in fact, the opposite is commonly true.
Having children you don't want just because there's a small chance they might hang out with you when you're old is incredibly selfish and a recipe for absolute misery. Being a parent is a 24/7 thing, and should only be done if you really want to do it.
I don't understand why it's so hard to understand that having children would be absolutely miserable for people who don't want them. It's such a simple concept.
There's no guarantee you'll be alone if you don't have kids at all, and far from a guarantee that you won't be alone if you have kids. What brings one person meaning might bring another person abject misery.
Having children is a good way to make yourself a "meaningless cog in a corporate machine." You have kids? Well, then you can't leave the job that you hate and pursue what you're actually interested in, because that's not financially feasible! If you have kids, corporations have you by the balls.
So if you're against being a cog and want freedom, family life isn't for you.
Plenty of people are still having children. But there's nothing inherently bad about humanity ceasing to exist, if that's what people choose.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 04 2020, @03:04AM
Nope. The stork fleets are dealing with maintenance issues and parts supply shortages.
(Score: 2) by wisnoskij on Friday December 04 2020, @04:09AM (1 child)
I am not sure you understand what that word means? Are you suggesting that every first nation in the world is manipulating their birth statistics? Births are inversely correlated to economic success, this is a well documented fact.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 05 2020, @03:36PM
Propaganda doesn't necessitate lying. It's just the active advocacy for a given position. The untoward implications of propaganda (which you're probably think of) are certainly part of the connotation (as opposed to denotation) but they are also what I was referring to here. In particular do capitalist societies genuinely want people turning into corporate cogs because it's good for society (or the people doing so)? Or might it be that the people that directly benefit from a larger labor force, in large part due to reduced wages for higher skill levels, are largely the exact same people running the widescale propaganda to try to turn being a corporate cog into some sort of an empowering and fulfilling life?
In the off chance I misunderstood you and you're instead simply suggesting correlation = causation instead, see any of the countless counter-examples. E.g. - Israel = developed + high fertility, Thailand = "less" developed + low fertility. When many developed nations share similar cultural values, you'd expect to see the same effects from issues where the causation is driven by culture/propaganda.