Some years ago, the ConWeb was somewhat obsessed with declining birth rates, which was expressed through the idea of “demographic winter,” that the world would eventually grind to a halt if birth rates — specifically that of white Christians — didn’t increase. Don Feder, who was one of the people to talked about it at the time, revived the idea again in his Feb. 26 WorldNetDaily column, but at least he’s not making many explicit racial distinctions:
Imagine you’re standing at the side of a railroad track. Suddenly you see a train barreling toward you, accelerating as it goes. The brakes aren’t working. It’s heading toward a collision with another train coming in the opposite direction.
What do you do? Jump up and down, wave your arms, shout at the top of your lungs? What if it does no good?
We are heading for a demographic train wreck. Demographers and governments know about it, but no one can figure out what to do about it, though there are no shortage of unworkable solutions.
Once renowned for its high birthrates, Asia is leading the march into the frigid wasteland of demographic winter.
Japan’s economy just fell into fourth place internationally, behind the U.S., China and now Germany. The nation is slipping into recession, due in part to what is described as crimped domestic demand, which reflects a falling population. With a fertility rate of 1.34, well below replacement, it’s losing roughly 800,000 people a year.
According to the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, China is set to lose 60% of its population by the end of the century.
In 2023, for the second consecutive year, there were more deaths than births in China. Last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping called on his people “to actively foster a new culture of marriage and childbearing.”
However, black and Hispanic people are conspicuous by their absence in Feder’s column. Muslims, too, even as he touted the idea of religious faith for boosting birth rates and declared that “procreation needs a foundation in faith”:
When it comes to bolstering falling fertility, nothing seems to work – cash payments and other subsidies and appeals to national pride. Eventually, countries like China will resort to force – as it did for decades with its one-child policy. How would this work in reverse: evicting singles from their apartments? A tax rate that punishes bachelors?
The one thing that hasn’t been tried is faith, in part because most governments discount the value of religion.
Around the world, it’s the religious who are having children – including Catholics, Orthodox Jews and Mormons. In an anti-natalist culture, procreation is an act of faith.
[…]Since the Industrial Revolution, population growth and economic development have gone hand in hand. It was the population boom of the post-Civil War era that led to American preeminence in the 20th century.
The wreck is coming. On one train, there are declining fertility and fewer resources that come from fewer producers. On the other, a growing population of old people and the expenditures needed to care for them.
Avoiding this looming catastrophe is the great challenge of the 21st century.
“Having children is saving the world,” Elon Musk says. True, but the right motivation is required.
We suspect right-wingers like Feder would be highly reluctant to provide even a tiny fraction of the wealth Musk has to help raise those children, or the women he indiscriminately sleeps with to crank out those children.