22 Comments
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TonyZa's avatar

South Korea could solve their fertility problems tomorrow if they would pass a law that all women who don't have 2 kids by age 28 get conscripted for 2 years like men are.

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random mover's avatar

Why did Lee Kuan Yew never think of that? Could be he did think of that, but the idea was just too radical for the time.

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forumposter123@protonmail.com's avatar

LKY basically gave up. Said it was the next generations problem. Figured there was at least another generation of mainland Chinese he could poach to make up for his IQ shredder.

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Performative Bafflement's avatar

> LKY basically gave up.

Yup. Pretty much the only major "hard mode" problem modern countries face that he did give up on.

That really gives me pause, given all the other exceptionally hard problems in governance he solved.

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Realist's avatar

Coercing women to have children is not a good idea. What type of mother would they be?

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TonyZa's avatar

Like most mothers in human history.

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Realist's avatar

"Like most mothers in human history."

Most mothers in human history were not coerced into having a baby.

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TonyZa's avatar

Most women in human history were expected to have babies and yes many didn't had a choice about it. Doesn't mean they didn't love their children though.

How is my proposal coercion? If they don't want children they can perform military service like men do. Korean men are conscripted while women are not. How is that fair and equal?

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forumposter123@protonmail.com's avatar

Coercion would mean forced impregnating.

While I wouldn’t draft women, it’s clear that the childless need to be contributing a lot more in taxes to fund their own retirements. Current social insurance schemes around the world allow too much free riding by the childless. Taxes are “coercion” but that’s life, my kids will be “coerced” to fund my childless peers retirement.

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John Hines's avatar

That's a plan that might work! In the US, though, we don't have a draft for men so we don't have the machinery in place to make it work. Maybe a draft for men who've reached 25 without having two kids would work better? (I think that a draft for anyone over 25 is probably not going to produce combat troops, just support troops.)

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TonyZa's avatar

The average age of US service members is 28 while in the Ukraine War both armies have average ages around 40.

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John Hines's avatar

Thanks. Good information.

Do you know what the split is for combat troops versus support troops (REMFs (POGs I think is the modern term)?

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Esme Y.'s avatar

There’s a lot of paid leave in Europe and the fertility rate has not gone up.

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forumposter123@protonmail.com's avatar

We don’t know what works because “what works” would just be *massive* payroll tax breaks to married couples with children. Enough that the childless would truly be paying their fair share towards their own retirement benefits.

It wouldn’t cost society but it would be a very expensive way to buy votes because children can’t vote and olds vote at high rates. Also the people who would like it (married families with income) probably wouldn’t move enough further to the right for the amount it would “cost” in the short run (which is all that matters in politics).

So we get smaller benefits tied to some kind of grift or culture war signal or to poor single mothers because the votes are cheaper and have an easier to digest cover story.

Even Hungary can’t manage to have “married filing jointly” as a tax concept.

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Alex Potts's avatar

I don't think the main point of maternity leave is to increase the fertility rate. Can it not just be a good thing to do in its own right?

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True European's avatar

It would appear that it's now becoming like the definition of insanity ie doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different outcome.

In a carrot and stick analogy those measures would qualify as the carrot part but whether any" stick" element would be feasible in western societies is doubtful.

A clear separation and segregation of the sexes from school onwards to discover how much that each contribute and take from their nation's coffers is an obvious choice. And let's see if women want real equality.

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air dog's avatar

"It's disturbing and pathetic that ... we still don't even know if some of our most expensive policies to increase fertility even work at all."

Eh, it's fine. I consider other peoples' fertility to be none of my business. And I don't want the State managing fertility either - despite possible gains in tax revenue for the government.

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forumposter123@protonmail.com's avatar

It’s my business because these people expect my kids to fund their retirement.

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Realist's avatar

This is getting away from quality over quantity.

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John Hines's avatar

Saw an article (didn't save it, probably can't find it again) that claimed that in California 19% if the women giving birth were first time mothers over 40. I think the article also said there were birthing problems in the sub-groups.

So, i'm not not sure paid leave will help much.

Brief story: I was the only American programmer on a team of about a hundred mostly Indians. We had some exceptionally gifted women programmers who frequently became team leads because the very large phone company whose name I won't mention couldn't get the Indian men programmers to do the paperwork. I noticed that when the women's kids became teens, they frequently quit to stay home and watch the kids.

Maybe paid (6 months?) teen kid in trouble leave would do more to keep women in the work force but would do much for the fertility rate.

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