Over_ed said:

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K2-HMFIC said:

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BonfireNerd04 said:

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Logos Stick said:

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One big issue is that the decline won't be geographically isolated. That means all the current infrastructure - electrical grid, roads, bridges, water, sewage, etc... - will have to be maintained with fewer people to do it. That's a disaster in the making.

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Look at Detroit: A city of 650k people with infrastructure left over from 1950 when it had 1.8 million people.

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I think this could be a big deal if fertility rates continue but I think there's some reason for optimism that the "delayed" birth model will kick in the next few years and slow things down.

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Little chance. Average age of woman's first child continues to go up. 27.5 now. And will continue to go up (e.g., rising housing costs). higher age of first child demographically almost certainly means lower fertility rate over a woman's lifetime.

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Sure, lower fertility levels over time but we're closer to maintaining replacement levels as opposed to just bottoming out.

Urban Ag said:

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Gilligan said:

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I'm ok with less people.

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Ask yourself, if your primary motivation is not a better future for your kids and grandkids, than what is it? Why would you really care about the future of your country if you're convinced you'll be fine until death and there is nothing more for you to be invested in after you're gone?

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I'm sure there are some childless nihilists out there, but at the same time I think there are plenty of good people out there without kids who care deeply for the fate of their countrymen, their species, and their planet.

Conversely, when people preface a statement with the "the kind of world my I want my kids to grow up in", I mentally buckle in for some wild, heinous takes to follow.

K2-HMFIC said:

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Over_ed said:

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K2-HMFIC said:

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BonfireNerd04 said:

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Logos Stick said:

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One big issue is that the decline won't be geographically isolated. That means all the current infrastructure - electrical grid, roads, bridges, water, sewage, etc... - will have to be maintained with fewer people to do it. That's a disaster in the making.

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Look at Detroit: A city of 650k people with infrastructure left over from 1950 when it had 1.8 million people.

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I think this could be a big deal if fertility rates continue but I think there's some reason for optimism that the "delayed" birth model will kick in the next few years and slow things down.

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Little chance. Average age of woman's first child continues to go up. 27.5 now. And will continue to go up (e.g., rising housing costs). higher age of first child demographically almost certainly means lower fertility rate over a woman's lifetime.

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Sure, lower fertility levels over time but we're closer to maintaining replacement levels as opposed to just bottoming out.

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Is that with or without the influx of immigrants? I'd hope without.

I'm a little more optimistic than most here. I feel like this self regulates itself, once the population decline really begins, low birthrates will reverse and the population begins increasing again. Seems like basic human nature has to kick in at some point.

ntxVol said:

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I'm a little more optimistic than most here. I feel like this self regulates itself, once the population decline really begins, low birthrates will reverse and the population begins increasing again. Seems like basic human nature has to kick in at some point.

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It's an unprecedented issue so it's kind of difficult to game out, but it seems like it could be a self-reinforcing cycle. Population plateau and decline is certain to lead to at least some degree of economic and cultural upheaval, both of which would seem more likely to worsen the trend than to reverse it. If people don't want/feel comfortable having kids now, are they going to want them when we're in a state of perma-recession? I'm sure we'll reach a floor; but it certainly seems right now like that floor is well under replacement level.

njohn87 said:

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Urban Ag said:

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Gilligan said:

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I'm ok with less people.

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Ask yourself, if your primary motivation is not a better future for your kids and grandkids, than what is it? Why would you really care about the future of your country if you're convinced you'll be fine until death and there is nothing more for you to be invested in after you're gone?

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I'm sure there are some childless nihilists out there, but at the same time I think there are plenty of good people out there without kids who care deeply for the fate of their countrymen, their species, and their planet.

Conversely, when people preface a statement with the "the kind of world my I want my kids to grow up in", I mentally buckle in for some wild, heinous takes to follow.

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No kids and I do. We do still have skin the game with 5 nephews and nieces.

Everything is a ruse to increase slaves to work in companies.

The real owners of companies know AI won't do it. They need people. So they want people to make more people.

The other scam is to fill the atmosphere with feminism in white women, so they are obsessed with their careers and make no babies. So the capitalists can import Muslims, Indians, and other people from outside (more slaves)

Urban Ag said:

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I was in Costco yesterday and this gal in front of my son and I had four boys probably between the ages of 3 and 10 and she was pregnant. I wanted to high five her but decided that might be weird.

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The only time you should hi-5 her is if you were the one who put the baby in her.

Are these competing scams, or somehow the same scam

Not even on my radar of give a damn. There are too many people as it is.

infinity ag said:

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Everything is a ruse to increase slaves to work in companies.

The real owners of companies know AI won't do it. They need people. So they want people to make more people.

The other scam is to fill the atmosphere with feminism in white women, so they are obsessed with their careers and make no babies. So the capitalists can import Muslims, Indians, and other people from outside (more slaves)

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These contradict.

njohn87 said:

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Are these competing scams, or somehow the same scam

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Corps get creative so no one rule fitting all.
Everything is kosher as long as they can make money.

No Spin Ag said:

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K2-HMFIC said:

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Over_ed said:

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K2-HMFIC said:

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BonfireNerd04 said:

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Logos Stick said:

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One big issue is that the decline won't be geographically isolated. That means all the current infrastructure - electrical grid, roads, bridges, water, sewage, etc... - will have to be maintained with fewer people to do it. That's a disaster in the making.

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Look at Detroit: A city of 650k people with infrastructure left over from 1950 when it had 1.8 million people.

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I think this could be a big deal if fertility rates continue but I think there's some reason for optimism that the "delayed" birth model will kick in the next few years and slow things down.

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Little chance. Average age of woman's first child continues to go up. 27.5 now. And will continue to go up (e.g., rising housing costs). higher age of first child demographically almost certainly means lower fertility rate over a woman's lifetime.

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Sure, lower fertility levels over time but we're closer to maintaining replacement levels as opposed to just bottoming out.

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Is that with or without the influx of immigrants? I'd hope without.

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Right now, our total fertility rate is 1.7, that has dropped by half a point in the last 30 years

According to the data, middle class and upper class whites are the ones keeping the total fertility rate high.

So I guess to answer your question, those rates are currently dropping with existing immigration levels.

Don't worry. Fauci and the chi-coms already created a solution that has a high morbidity rate in people over 60. It just got out before they had it perfected to 90%.

Version 2 should do the trick, then no more wasting resources on the elderly.

Of course we could go down to age 30 like Logan's Run.

Edit: waiting to wasting

DTP02 said:

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I keep asking every time this subject comes up, whether on here or elsewhere, whether the rise of AI and automation doesn't mitigate or even fully offset the population losses in terms of striking the proper balance socioeconomically.

That doesn't change the fact that as a Christian I believe we are generally designed for marriage and family, but in terms of the secular concerns I wonder if people are overly concerned about something in depopulation which may be a partial solution to an even bigger concern in the rise of AI and automation.

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What are the robots going to build?

Who is going to buy the stuff the robots build?

BadMoonRisin said:

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I'm pretty sure the rising cost of living as a least a little bit to do with it, especially housing.

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"Suck it up!"

"Excuses are for the weak!"

"Pull yourself up by your own bootstraps"

- Boomers who bought new cars for $2k and homes for $50k just a few decades ago.

There are too many people in the world. We'd be better off if we dropped down to <1 billion.

Hardcore Greg said:

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BadMoonRisin said:

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I'm pretty sure the rising cost of living as a least a little bit to do with it, especially housing.

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"Suck it up!"

"Excuses are for the weak!"

"Pull yourself up by your own bootstraps"

- Boomers who bought new cars for $2k and homes for $50k just a few decades ago.

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While earning $20,000 a year

BusterAg said:

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DTP02 said:

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I keep asking every time this subject comes up, whether on here or elsewhere, whether the rise of AI and automation doesn't mitigate or even fully offset the population losses in terms of striking the proper balance socioeconomically.

That doesn't change the fact that as a Christian I believe we are generally designed for marriage and family, but in terms of the secular concerns I wonder if people are overly concerned about something in depopulation which may be a partial solution to an even bigger concern in the rise of AI and automation.

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What are the robots going to build?

Who is going to buy the stuff the robots build?

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Yeah, it seems like the whole high tech big corp thing pretty much implodes. Big corp becomes terribly inefficient when the manufacturing pipeline can't be kept full.

flown-the-coop said:

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TexAgs91 said:

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If humanity lost 90% of its population that sounds pretty devastating right?

That would put us back to where we were in the 1800s.

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Which 10% are we keeping. That matters a lot in this thought exercise.

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I had great hopes for COVID.

The Black Death killed about 40% of Europe. It took the weakest and poorest disproportionately. And it left Europe ready to take over the world.

COVID could have solved the Social Security funding crisis. Just let it rip through society and clear out all the people with excess morbidities. But noooooooooooo...

The biggest danger that AI poses to humans is not any of the issues people actually talk about. It's that it will help hide the population decline for a while and keep us from recognizing what a problem it is until it's too late.

This is going to be a "very slowly then all at once" scenario, where AI stems the tide of an aging work force and declining population long enough to allow us to cross the threshold of no return before realizing what is happening. Thankfully none of us will be around when it all hits the fan everywhere sometime in the 2100s, but we probably will get to watch it happen in China in our twilight years.

It's way way more likely that aliens from planet mooyah slather us in flesh eating hamburgers whilst they raise a gang of recreated dinosaurs dressed as ******** midget wrastlers.

What crazy newsletter you subscribing to that outlines a global population collapse in 100 years?

How many bizarro micro potential scenarios does one have to string together?

Plus, I have been assured our debt is killing us all in 20 years.

It's why Trump just postponed the inevitable with Iran. We will be begging to have our grandkids vaporized if you doomsdayers had your way.

The population collapse has already happened in some places, that's the point. Places like China are past the point of no return and are now just waiting for the "all at once" moment. How far they are able to advance their AI tech within this window will determine when that is. The rest of the world is then just varying amounts of time behind them.

China as we know it will cease to exist in the lifetimes of some here.

4,000 years and some computer code is going to end them. Got it.

Nope, not what I said. Go read up on the history of China, it's a regular series of societal collapses killing millions or tens of millions before a new societal norm stabilizes things for a time and the cycle repeats. Also, AI isn't gonna be what does it this time. AI will actually stave off the collapse for a time. It's as if you aren't reading anything being posted.

China as we know it in living memory will cease to exist.

China going through one of its historic molts is not what you were seeming to indicate. Thanks for clarifying.

But it's much much more likely there is a coup within 20 years and potentially economic collapse, civil war, famine that will cause the molt and not a gradual population decline.

And I still have seen no support for the world nor the US needing more people (outside of socialist concepts$.

The simplest answer is that we've constructed a world based upon the idea that the population will continue to increase or, at a minimum, not decrease. The entirety of the modern world and how it functions is at its roots based on that premise whether people recognize it or not.

Again, it's not that humans will go extinct or that we will return to the Stone Age. It's that our current systems will change by necessity, and it will happen either because we recognize and plan for it generations in advance or because we continue on as is until it all collapses and we have to rebuild something different under much more stressful circumstances.

Simply wrong on the first paragraph.

The second paragraph just says that things change over time, just using more words.

Ogre09 said:

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There are too many people in the world. We'd be better off if we dropped down to <1 billion.

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This is crazy talk.

The advances in technology alone are worth the extra 9 billion people you are wishing to disappear.

fc2112 said:

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flown-the-coop said:

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TexAgs91 said:

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If humanity lost 90% of its population that sounds pretty devastating right?

That would put us back to where we were in the 1800s.

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Which 10% are we keeping. That matters a lot in this thought exercise.

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I had great hopes for COVID.

The Black Death killed about 40% of Europe. It took the weakest and poorest disproportionately. And it left Europe ready to take over the world.

COVID could have solved the Social Security funding crisis. Just let it rip through society and clear out all the people with excess morbidities. But noooooooooooo...

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Well, there's always hope that Thanos is real.

Can we settle on 6 billion? I got some ideas on where to cut first.

flown-the-coop said:

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Simply wrong on the first paragraph.

The second paragraph just says that things change over time, just using more words.

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What do you think the useful life of all electricity generating assets in the US is? How about the manufacturing plants used to make new generating assets?

Shrinking populations create a ton of orphaned assets, which destroys value, which is bad. So, I disagree with your first sentence.

flown-the-coop said:

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Can we settle on 6 billion? I got some ideas on where to cut first.

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Just requires a few infinity stones and a magic gauntlet to decide on who to cut.

With South Korea's current birth rate, the generation of the grandkids of the current fertile-age generation will only be 4% of the current generation. A 96% drop in population for that generation. So as the current generation ages into their 70s and 80s, there will be essentially no one of working age available not to just support the welfare state, but to maintain services. Need garbage men or any other number of jobs needed to keep a society moving? Workers in hospitals and clinics? Tough, those people no longer exist in numbers sufficient to keep up services.

It's a very interesting topic when you get into the statistics. For example, amongst women that become mothers, the birth rate is shockingly basically unchanged over the past few decades (I believe it factors in 'children that survived to adulthood' as the historical birth rate). The main difference is that the number of women who do not become mothers has increased dramatically, not that women in general are simply having fewer children. Also shocking to me is that, according to polls, women as a whole continue to want to have an average of 2.1 children. What it boils down to is that people on a population level are simply not forming relationships. And then when you get into the why of that, it is a bunch of mostly unintended downstream effects of the feminist movement, women's equality, etc. (not saying that any of that is bad).