“The low fertility rate, which has persisted for about three decades, will continue to contribute to low birth rates, especially in the context of the systematic decline in the number of women of reproductive age,” wrote the agency. “This trend is further exacerbated by the persistently high level of emigration abroad.”

  • The Picard Maneuver@piefed.world
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    2 days ago

    If every country dealing with this wasn’t beholden to business interests requiring “line go up”, this sort of thing could be considered natural and self correcting rather than a crisis.

    Population decline would mean more housing supply on the market, more competition to hire employees (better salaries and benefits), lower tuition costs to attract more students to your local university, etc. All the things that would make it easier for young couples who want kids to get established and stable earlier in life.

    • arcterus@piefed.blahaj.zone
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      2 days ago

      Population decline also generally means more stress on government programs since the working population paying a larger share of taxes and just generally supporting the retired population is declining while the retired population is increasing. Eventually it might level off, but for a long while it would be bad for everyone (unless the rate of decline is small enough).

      • hayvan@piefed.world
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        2 days ago

        Bad for everyone who is not filthy rich. For those it will be tad bit unpleasant at worst. And that’s our main problem.

        • arcterus@piefed.blahaj.zone
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          Yeah, I considered mentioning it but didn’t bother. If you have enough money, you can just ignore whatever the government provides and pay for it yourself (which is ofc why the super wealthy often don’t like government programs supporting the average person). Sort of makes a bad situation worse when the average person is already stressed from the problems of population decline and then they have to deal with government programs being gutted because the wealthy don’t like them.

        • Rioting Pacifist@lemmy.world
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          1 day ago

          You can only raise taxes… so much.

          I dunno have we tried holding the billionaires by their legs and giving them a good shake.

          Also MMT

    • arcterus@piefed.blahaj.zone
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      2 days ago

      IMO this is more of short-term solution (having some immigration is always good though). All these countries with declining populations need to fix their societies to make it actually desirable for people to have kids. Immigration by itself won’t work forever (assuming the countries people are emigrating from fix their problems), but it will give them time to fix things. Problem is most of these countries seem completely incapable of actually fixing their problems, so…

      • supersquirrel@sopuli.xyz
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        2 days ago

        All these countries with declining populations need to fix their societies to make it actually desirable for people to have kids.

        Yes and it always and ever will be immigrants who lead the charge forward to try new ideas, start businesses, movements and inject new vital life into societies. To argue otherwise is to deny the basic wisdom inherent to genetics that diversity is the conjugation of strength and stability.

        • arcterus@piefed.blahaj.zone
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          2 days ago

          If immigration was the solution to everything, the US would be a paradise. It’s necessary but not enough.

          • Ilixtze@lemmy.ml
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            18 hours ago

            All these epstein files detailing the convoluted Israel psy ops and pedophile billionaire corruption that goes unpunished for decades makes it clear that the type of hell the United States are going through is purposely manufactured by something entirely else than immigration.

            I mean you can’t turn education into an expensive business and expect your population to develop critical skills and historical context out of thin air.

            • arcterus@piefed.blahaj.zone
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              18 hours ago

              The point isn’t that immigration is bad, it’s that assuming that immigration will magically solve everything is just incredibly naive.

      • supersquirrel@sopuli.xyz
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        2 days ago

        That is tangential to the idea of immigration.

        If anything immigration helps with degrowth as younger people can be introduced into a society without needing to raise the global population.

        Unless you are an eco fascist and just want people to starve and die somewhere out of your frame of view to get the world you want?..

        • StinkyFingerItchyBum@lemmy.ca
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          2 days ago

          Fully agree. It’s a buffer to make a return to sustainable more practical, but the goal is a lower population.

          For the record my frame of view is the planet and all life on it.

  • black_flag@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    2 days ago

    It troubles me that this topic immediately falls into discussions of solutions, and especially the turning of that to immediately think of restricting human movement, without any regard for the possibility that this is not a tragedy of some sort but instead something normal and fine.

    It also troubles me that no attention seems to be paid as to why birth rates started falling so significantly in 2020. Mass infertility seems like something worth noting on a medical level, but people are stuck going “brown skin people no come here” like some kinda fucking morons