Italy's Birth Rate is Apocalyptically Low

[T.G.G. Moogly]

according to the Health Minister.

Speaking to Italy's La Repubblica newspaper, Ms Lorenzin said: "If we carry on as we are and fail to reverse the trend, there will be fewer than 350,000 births a year in 10 years' time, 40% less than in 2010 - an apocalypse."

Why do some people want more and more and more people? Don't we have enough around the world already?

Italy set to double child benefit to combat low birth rate

 

[GenesisNemesis]

It's something that's not generally taken into consideration simply due to the survival instinct.

 

[repoman]

It would be interesting to see what would happen if immigration into Italy was essentially banned, how this would play out.

It will not happen, so it is a moot point.

 

[credoconsolans]

according to the Health Minister.

Speaking to Italy's La Repubblica newspaper, Ms Lorenzin said: "If we carry on as we are and fail to reverse the trend, there will be fewer than 350,000 births a year in 10 years' time, 40% less than in 2010 - an apocalypse."

Why do some people want more and more and more people? Don't we have enough around the world already?

Italy set to double child benefit to combat low birth rate

Future tax payers have to be born to support the old taxpayers who can no longer work but earned benefits that have to be paid.

 

[credoconsolans]

And since Italians are all Catholics, I'm sure they're all waiting for marriage to have sex and not using that Vatican outlawed thing called birth control, right?

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

according to the Health Minister.



Why do some people want more and more and more people? Don't we have enough around the world already?

Italy set to double child benefit to combat low birth rate

Future tax payers have to be born to support the old taxpayers who can no longer work but earned benefits that have to be paid.

That doesn't seem like the best solution unless there is a better long term strategy. The future has arrived. You can't stuff it back in the bottle by having more kids.

 

[Valjean]

The economy is designed for perpetual growth. This is unsustainable, to say nothing of the fact that our numbers are destroying the planet.
We need to reduce the human population. Unfortunately, this must needs cause some economic turmoil.

 

[Derec]

Why do some people want more and more and more people? Don't we have enough around the world already?

In the world, yes. In Italy/Europe, no. And replacing European population with third world people from Asia and Africa will not save Europe, it will merely transform it into yet another third world hell hole.

 

[EricK]

Very sensibly, they're outsourcing having children to the developing world, where it can be done more cheaply.

 

[bilby]

The economy is designed for perpetual growth. This is unsustainable, to say nothing of the fact that our numbers are destroying the planet.
We need to reduce the human population. Unfortunately, this must needs cause some economic turmoil.

Economic growth doesn't require population or resource use growth. Fiat money is just numbers; it can grow indefinitely without limit.

Population isn't a problem; and it won't be when it starts to fall, in the next three or four decades, either.

Nothing needs to be done with respect to population other than what we are already doing, and have been since the 1960s.

Now if the greenies could just stop wasting so much effort on stupid and unevidenced activism on things like population and nuclear power; and concentrate on the real problems, like fossil fuel use, religion, and dictatorship, the world might even become a better place even faster than it has been.

 

[DBT]

according to the Health Minister.

Speaking to Italy's La Repubblica newspaper, Ms Lorenzin said: "If we carry on as we are and fail to reverse the trend, there will be fewer than 350,000 births a year in 10 years' time, 40% less than in 2010 - an apocalypse."

Why do some people want more and more and more people? Don't we have enough around the world already?

Italy set to double child benefit to combat low birth rate

Neoclassical Economists and their acolytes, the average national garden variety politician, appear to have the mantra of ''growth'' ''growth'' ''growth'' - economic growth, population growth, building, consuming, spending stuck firmly in the grey goo sludge of their brain matter.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

according to the Health Minister.



Why do some people want more and more and more people? Don't we have enough around the world already?

Italy set to double child benefit to combat low birth rate

Neoclassical Economists and their acolytes, the average national garden variety politician, appear to have the mantra of ''growth'' ''growth'' ''growth'' - economic growth, population growth, building, consuming, spending stuck firmly in the grey goo sludge of their brain matter.

Ultimately it is rooted in instinctively desiring a large population, more specifically, larger than your neighbors because states are built upon conquest. It's clearly a behavior that's been selected for, aside from the pleasure of fucking.

Personally, I'd rather live in Japan or one of Derec's depleted European states than I would in India where there is a flood of people.

Derec, you would do well to start seeing yourself and your own plight in the lives and struggles of those people you so despise. Put your brown shirt away, Dude.

 

[DBT]

Neoclassical Economists and their acolytes, the average national garden variety politician, appear to have the mantra of ''growth'' ''growth'' ''growth'' - economic growth, population growth, building, consuming, spending stuck firmly in the grey gooey sludge of their brain matter.

Ultimately it is rooted in instinctively desiring a large population, more specifically, larger than your neighbors because states are built upon conquest. It's clearly a behavior that's been selected for, aside from the pleasure of fucking.

It is a big factor. Australia's Pollies once had the mantra 'populate or perish' And when Rudd was PM, he was spruiking 'a Big Australia' through significant increases in immigration intake.

 

[Draconis]

There won't be enough struggling taxpayers to support the aging population. So it's either have a cull (ouch) or else ship some young people in from somewhere else who are eager to churn out babies. Alas, some of them are eager to do less appealing things.

The west has really got itself into a serious jam over population age distribution.

 

[bilby]

There won't be enough struggling taxpayers to support the aging population. So it's either have a cull (ouch) or else ship some young people in from somewhere else who are eager to churn out babies. Alas, some of them are eager to do less appealing things.

The west has really got itself into a serious jam over population age distribution.

Not really; We are easily wealthy enough to afford to support quite a few dependents per worker - the problem isn't the cost, but the will.

For some reason, people were quite happy to pay to feed, clothe and house three or four dependents in the 1950s and 60s, when GDP per capita was far lower than it is today; But when asked to do the same today they say "it can't be done", when what they mean is "I am OK with supporting my children, and with my taxes supporting the children of others; but I am not OK with supporting my parents, nor with my taxes supporting seniors without families to look after them".

The numbers are simple enough to understand - as a society, we have no problem affording old age pensions and geriatric care. But most governments, particularly those influenced by the Austrian school of economics, have a policy of increasing, rather than reducing wealth disparity - and this demographic shift is a convenient scapegoat.

 

[Derec]

There won't be enough struggling taxpayers to support the aging population. So it's either have a cull (ouch) or else ship some young people in from somewhere else who are eager to churn out babies. Alas, some of them are eager to do less appealing things.

The west has really got itself into a serious jam over population age distribution.

The West (and the world really) will have to live with a more straight and less pyramid-shaped population age distribution. Increasing death rates to make the old part thinner (what you call "cull") is not really an option and making the young part thicker, either through mass immigration or having more than replacement rate of children, would result in an exponential growth which is unsustainable.

The problem in Italy and elsewhere in Europe is that they are not even having enough children to sustain a stable population though.

 

[Derec]

Personally, I'd rather live in Japan or one of Derec's depleted European states than I would in India where there is a flood of people.

Me too. Ideal would be a stable population - neither depleting nor growing exponentially.

Derec, you would do well to start seeing yourself and your own plight in the lives and struggles of those people you so despise. Put your brown shirt away, Dude.

There is nothing "brown shirt" like in not wanting to see Europe become replaced by an Islamic society through mass immigration and mass procreation of Muslim immigrants.

 

[bilby]

There won't be enough struggling taxpayers to support the aging population. So it's either have a cull (ouch) or else ship some young people in from somewhere else who are eager to churn out babies. Alas, some of them are eager to do less appealing things.

The west has really got itself into a serious jam over population age distribution.

The West (and the world really) will have to live with a more straight and less pyramid-shaped population age distribution. Increasing death rates to make the old part thinner (what you call "cull") is not really an option and making the young part thicker, either through mass immigration or having more than replacement rate of children, would result in an exponential growth which is unsustainable.

The problem in Italy and elsewhere in Europe is that they are not even having enough children to sustain a stable population though.

Why is that a problem?

Automation means that we can do the same work with fewer people. This is clearly shown by the extraordinary rise in GDP per capita since the industrial revolution, and even more so since the second world war. We don't need more people; the world can get along perfectly well with fewer. As ling as the population is high enough to avoid extinction events and to keep the gene pool diverse (which likely requires no more than a few million humans) and low enough not to exceed the carrying capacity of the ecosystem (which with appropriate use of current technology - such as by replacing fossil fuels with renewables - is likely between 15 and 20 billion, but which could be significantly higher as new technologies allow us to reduce our impact even further), who cares what the exact number is, or whether it is trending up or down?

Overpopulation could become a problem, but only if we abandon contraception, and refuse to use existing technologies to protect our environment. Underpopulation is not even a remote prospect unless birthrates remain very, very low for a very long time.

The best current projections for population suggest that the global number of humans will likely stabilize at about 12 billion in about 2050, and then remain fairly constant for at least a couple of centuries. That seems like the epitome of a non-problem to me.

 

[bilby]

Me too. Ideal would be a stable population - neither depleting nor growing exponentially.

Derec, you would do well to start seeing yourself and your own plight in the lives and struggles of those people you so despise. Put your brown shirt away, Dude.

There is nothing "brown shirt" like in not wanting to see Europe become replaced by an Islamic society through mass immigration and mass procreation of Muslim immigrants.

That image fails to take into account the lesson of history, which is:

 

[Derec]

View attachment 6829

Except that is not borne out by evidence. The evidence shows Muslim immigrants to Europe do not assimilate but form isolated Muslim communities, often radicalized. The Paris and Brussels terrorists were largely 2nd generation Muslims.