They’ve spent decades if not a century globally to convince everybody material goods and careers are the most important thing in everybody’s lives and systems, entire countries, have been rebuilt to facilitate this
Now they’re shocked to find enough people chose or were forced to choose that lifestyle above children.
Every developed economy on earth has been through the same shit. They tried everything except fixing the root cause — wealth inequality, housing/economic security, cost of health care and education, no meaningful effort to address climate change and ecological destruction — the only ones improving demographics are the ones who chose to cheat through immigration. It’s win-win as they can continue with their ideological SOP while diluting the domestic labor market and suppressing wages.
There will never be a solution as long as we’re ruled by corporations-in-a-trenchcoat and oligarchs who refuse to redistribute wealth and improve the majorities quality of life.
One common trend in aging democracies is that it becomes increasingly exploitative of the remaining workforce as the retirement-aged become the largest voting bloc. This isn’t a “shock”, it’s just a consequence of extracting value from a generation.
I don’t know who the “they” you’re referring to is, but I bet “they” actually don’t even care enough to be “shocked”. You just like to imagine that they are, because if anything, they would be laughing.
The issue isn’t making babies. That we can do no problem. The issue is convincing people to spend money, time, and slow down their careers to raise the babies.
Capitalism raises the price of childhood. Birth control gives people the choice of when to raise kids. Education and equal opportunity provides more compelling life options then just staying at home raising kids.
The sense of local community, the ease of child care, sick care, food, housing stress all factor in to intentional family planning.
Education and equal opportunity provides more compelling life options then just staying at home raising kids.
The main problem is, that these options are a mere theory for many when two people in a household have to work to make ends meet.
The raising of kids is then just something that comes on top of the existing burdens.
If they let people skip compulsory military service if they’re actively parents. They’ll probably see a bit of a baby boom
A better solution is to make having a family financially practical. I get S. Korea’s need for compulsory military service.
