Non-US Investing • Career break to maximise time with kids?

Interestingly the papers etc are full of arguments these days about women and children (lack of…!)
Having children is arguably the point of existence certainly in Darwinian terms-for a culture/society to survive and thrive you need boots on the ground/replacements/children!
The fact that currently 50% of women under 30 in Britain today have no kids(Guardian figures ) shows the state of play
Of course child bearing falls disproportionately in some ways on one sex because only females can gestate a child with all the consequences that entails
Arguably though it is very difficult to raise a functional child without a successful male (a) to fertilise the the female and (b) maintain the integrity of “nest”(hearth and home) that the female requires to pull this great/difficult event off -human kids take a long time to reach adulthood -22+ years?
Equality as a thoughtless during force in society these days has relegated having children onto the back burner as women are encouraged to adopt careers as their priority as males used (and still do?)
Fertility for women also sadly falls off rapidly as they age -unlike males- and the consequences of delaying pregnancy are now becoming very evident
Doubtful if this state of affairs can be reversed.Historically replacement by a culture that values having children is the norm
xxd09

We are in uncharted waters on human history.

I don't think there are many (any) examples of pre Modern societies where the Total Fertility Ratio fell below replacement level? You had periods of extreme mortality: War, Plague, Famine. Populations dropped, then rose again. Paraguay legalised polygamy in the 19th century, after a war with *all* of its neighbours at once, led to mass mortality of marriage-aged men.

Because of the extension of human lifespans, which have doubled in 100 years more or less, the effect of falling Total Fertility Ratios won't be felt for a long time. Each country goes through a demographic transition as it develops: in 1960 the Total Fertility Ratio of India was over 6.0, and it's now about 3.0.

Ireland would be an example very much at hand. From a country with a high fertility ratio in the 1960s, and high unemployment and mass emigration in the 1980s, to a country which imports labour now and has a low birth rate, and is one of the richest societies in Europe.

In the meantime no one has an answer. Pro-natalist policies have not been particularly successful in any country. Unless we are all going to turn Amish or Orthodox, and marry at 20 and have 6-8 children, that's not likely to change.

Historically replacement by a culture that values having children is the norm

Again, I don't know of any historical examples. Do you?

What we are seeing with Russia, say, is "the Empire Strikes Back". This has not made them a more cautious society, the precipitate rise in mortality, particularly among men, post 1990. To the point where life expectancy fell by several years. Fertility was already low under communism. But we find Russia invading its neighbours and squandering human life, theirs and others, doing it. North Korea can't be doing too well on replacement rates for its population - long term starvation will do that to a society.

The reality is the planet cannot take having 8 billion people with Western lifestyles -- resource exhaustion and pollution. The race now is between reducing our impact on this planet before we make it significantly less habitable and precipitate something we cannot control.

If present trends continue, world population won't stop rising until well into the latter half of this century. And won't fall much before the 22nd century.

But the actual environmentally stable population, with say the standard of living of Western Europe, is probably less than 2 billion people. We won't get there before the middle of the 22nd century.

The aging of developed societies has its issues. The migration of people out of impoverished places in the Middle East and Africa into developed countries poses problems - but we need them to look after us in our old Age Homes. In the middle of rural Dorset county, hardly a society of immigrants statistically, I would say at least half of the carers at my parents' retirement home were non British born. OTOH Sajid Javid was a Tory Chancellor of the Exchequer (briefly) and his father was a Pakistani (bus driver?). So too Sadiq Khan, former Cabinet Minister and now Mayor of London - for Labour - ditto on parental origins and profession. I'd say they were both pretty assimilated (not to mention Sunak, Braverman, Patel - that's a Chancellor and then PM, Home Secretary, Home Secretary -- all of Indian ancestry; Kemi Badenoch's parents are Nigerian I think, and the talk of her is as the *next* Tory Party leader?).

But we should welcome a long term fall in the total population of humans on this planet, due to our own natural forces. Once again, the most social of the primates, the one with the greatest capacity for organisation, is proving that it can adapt to changing circumstances. The long journey that took us out of Africa during a dry period, continues to take us forward through history.

We are an incredible species. We are quite capable of wiping ourselves out, and have nearly done so on several occasions. And yet we can also send our children to walk on Mars. Go watch the documentary "Good Night Opy" -- about Mars Opportunity and Mars Spirit, 2 robot twin explorers designed to last 90 days, and Mars Opportunity "Opy" lasted 15 years. Feel pride in the human journey, and in what our children, at the beginning of the great age of Space Exploration, have achieved

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4t58Yruhds

Our children have begun to do something we never anticipated. That's a very important moment in our journey through the Cosmos.

Statistics: Posted by Valuethinker — Mon Apr 01, 2024 12:47 pm — Replies 64 — Views 5279

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