[ExI] From the baby boom to the baby bust

[spike at rainier66.com]

-----Original Message-----
From: extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org> On Behalf Of
BillK via extropy-chat
Sent: Sunday, 2 June, 2024 3:11 PM
To: Extropy Chat <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org>
Cc: BillK <pharos at gmail.com>
Subject: [ExI] From the baby boom to the baby bust

Even the economists are getting worried about falling birth rates.
BillK

>From the baby boom to the baby bust
Falling fertility rates are one of the biggest challenges facing our world
Martin Wolf     May 28, 2024

<https://www.ft.com/content/ab4ce770-18cf-4025-8714-186f16a4f145>
Quote:
People live longer than ever before. This, as I noted recently, has created
both opportunities and challenges. But postponing death is only a part of
the demographic story. The other is the decline in births. The combination
of the two is creating huge changes in the world we inhabit.
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BillK, it might be insightful to study areas where there are already few
children, a low child to adult ratio, such as the San Francisco Bay area.
In most places around the bay, it is too expensive to have children, or if
one goes to the few areas where it isn't too expensive, it is too dangerous
to raise children.  Overall, birth rates are low, as fertile young people
are too busy with their careers to do families.  I notice a huge difference
between here and when I go back to where I cheerfully misspent my own
childhood.  They have a much higher child to geezer ratio back there:
families can afford to live.  Here, young single educated men struggle.

There are other examples: retirement communities, such as Sun City Arizona,
where one must be over 55 to even own a home in some places.  They import
labor from elsewhere I suppose.

spike