"Which could easily raise the Total Fertility Rate by .5 — moving the U.S. from 1.6 all the way to the replacement rate."
Seems like a pretty wild claim not backed up by the data.
The norm isn't "finish your education before having a kid." It's "feel secure in your status before having a kid."
Since we reward credentialism with status and stability, people go that route. But if you got rid of schooling you would have some other ladder to climb. Maybe a better ladder, but a ladder.
There are probably also socio-sexual aspects too. Not a lot of people who aren't religious want to settle down in their 20s. Those that do want to settle down in their 20s manage to do so even when they are in school (conservative relgious women with college degrees have replacement fertility today).
I continue to think the main problem is that childlessness is subsidized by the government. Retirement benefits and/or payroll taxes are not adjusted for number of children. If not having a child leads to hundreds of thousands of dollars in extra income and thousands of hours of time subsidized by other people, then people won't have kids.
Another anecdote in this point: In Israel (the one rich country with above-replacement fertility) people finish their education unusually late (usually mid-late 20s), due to mandatory military service.
Childless people rely much more on Social Security and other welfare payments in old age; people with children can expect support from those children.
So tax single people more to fund such schemes, and tax people with children less. To the extent the schemes are entitlements (rather than need based), reduce the entitlements for each child.
Based on your conviction, I assume you're implementing this policy with your own daughter -- please keep us posted on her progress (or lack thereof) and let us know if it yields the expected result.
Hey, the fallacious comment has already come out, stemming from total resentment.
Pay for your useless career without begging the taxpayers, clown. You'll die frustrated because anything you do in your professional life will always be less than conceiving a son xD
TBH, it's an overall issue with over credentialism, as most jobs do not require this level of education. Related, I learned that in the US you need a PhD to practice as a psychologist, which is wild. Sounds like the first nation that would reduce the credentials arms race would be the winner.
A friend 40 years ago joked that his bachelor's in biology wouldn't get him anything related better than washing test tubes and other lab glassware. He was disappointed, but also thought it was pretty funny.
That's not true. I suppose there may be some things that psychologists do that require a PhD, but talk therapy, the primary thing that psychologists do as far as I know, only requires a master's degree. Indeed, most therapists in the US only have a master's degree.
I'm all in on education austerity, but see zero reason to subsidize STEM when those are the fields most likely to pay for themselves. Get government out of education, period. Funding and control.
I think STEM-less austerity would be a much harder sell than full austerity. Splitting college funding like that seems far more likely to offend people than full austerity.
First, when economists were arguing that ‘lower birth rates’ was a bonus of female education it was because female education served other significant economic objectives: greater productivity, workforce participation and citizen engagement.
Shifting lower birth rates to the ‘con’ side of the column doesn’t change the top line estimates of female education as an economic positive.
Of course Richard seems to be avoiding the fact that when making this argument economists were primarily talking about developing economies where women had limited access to primary and secondary education.
The turnabout is that Richard is primarily talking about university education in developed economies, and in that sense his idea could have some merit. Generally speaking, we probably do need fewer social studies majors, especially PhDs, and to the extent that women favor these areas of study a possible positive effect on birth rates could be a ‘pro’. But just as with the developmental economists, if it is good policy it is because of the primary effect (less subsidies of expertise we don’t need) rather than its *possible* secondary effects.
All of these is obvious, but you still will be lamped with the 'Andrew tate/women shouldnt vote/sharia law' group because common sense is anything but common
I'm not sure that we can infer (A) we should defund higher education from (B) education reduces fertility. The problem is that the evidence for (B) is mostly not about higher education, it's about primary education. As I understand it, the evidence that access to higher education reduces fertility is fairly weak. It seems that a few studies find no effect of expanding access to education at higher levels on fertility:
How is this possible? Because higher education delays childbearing, but it seems to have smaller effects on completed fertility.
My guess is that higher education has a small negative effect on total fertility. But this effect is swamped by other factors that depress fertility (smartphones, labor market opportunities, decline of religion, etc). So, defunding higher education would probably have minimal effects.
I agree with the inferences of your concept. However, I’m not sure what the magnitude of effect will be.
Birthrate has dropped because women are no longer expected to be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. Reducing wasted time in attaining pointless education will help to some extent, but I think that pales in comparison simply to women working outside the home. And that’s never going back simply based on fiscal reality for the vast majority of families.
No because in practice what would happen is everyone of those degrees would simply rebrand themselves as science. For example in the medical field right now, not joking btw, there are degrees in art therapy where coloring books are prescribed. Economics will be rebranded econometrics and move under the math school, etc
Yeah, I noticed that as well. I think a better proposal than “defund everything but STEM” might be defunding every degree that pays in the bottom two-thirds after graduation. Economics, Accounting, Architecture, and Finance would make the cut, while Biology would miss the cut (although barely).
Higher fertility rates lead to poverty, lower fertility rate lead to extinction, the middle fertility rate is impossible to hold for long terms. So after stripping down the real choice is: poverty or extinction.
A compromise would be that general business and liberal bachelor's degrees should be shortened to 2.5 years instead of 4, and people who score in the top 30 percent should be eligible for 1.5 years fast track
What would be the economic impacts? Women make up a significant portion of the workforce and therefore of tax payers. This idea has to account for the lost tax revenue from SAHMs as a balance to the savings gained from not funding certain majors. And what about the productivity impacts of reducing or deskilling our workforce?
As a child-free male STEM PhD I suppose....this won't affect me so I shouldn't have any notable bias, so here are my 2c:
Overall yes, but the reasoning is a bit too "partial equilibrium". While the culture of the Cathedral is part of the antinatalist behavior of educated folks, a bigger factor is simply that education provides access to jobs that are far more comfortable to perform - that is the white collar professional careers.
Certainly I'd personally hate to work less on proving Theorems (or even debugging C++23) in order to change diapers or clean vomit
Of course, if there were much fewer government regulations overall, then many of the administrative and legal occupations that typically require college degrees will no longer be necessary. So overall Austerity -> more births holds up at a broader zoom lens.
But then again, if you went further and privatized pension schemes and healthcare, then low birthrates would be much less of a problem to begin with.
While I'm quite firmly in the libertarian camp, I'm also realistic, so I don't think this will happen voluntarily. But basic arithmetic will make taking a machete to societal complexity a stark necessity in most developed nations within 20 years, and gutting higher education spending will be easier to sell first than pension haircuts.
I'm in favor but,
"Which could easily raise the Total Fertility Rate by .5 — moving the U.S. from 1.6 all the way to the replacement rate."
Seems like a pretty wild claim not backed up by the data.
The norm isn't "finish your education before having a kid." It's "feel secure in your status before having a kid."
Since we reward credentialism with status and stability, people go that route. But if you got rid of schooling you would have some other ladder to climb. Maybe a better ladder, but a ladder.
There are probably also socio-sexual aspects too. Not a lot of people who aren't religious want to settle down in their 20s. Those that do want to settle down in their 20s manage to do so even when they are in school (conservative relgious women with college degrees have replacement fertility today).
I continue to think the main problem is that childlessness is subsidized by the government. Retirement benefits and/or payroll taxes are not adjusted for number of children. If not having a child leads to hundreds of thousands of dollars in extra income and thousands of hours of time subsidized by other people, then people won't have kids.
Another anecdote in this point: In Israel (the one rich country with above-replacement fertility) people finish their education unusually late (usually mid-late 20s), due to mandatory military service.
Childless people rely much more on Social Security and other welfare payments in old age; people with children can expect support from those children.
So tax single people more to fund such schemes, and tax people with children less. To the extent the schemes are entitlements (rather than need based), reduce the entitlements for each child.
Based on your conviction, I assume you're implementing this policy with your own daughter -- please keep us posted on her progress (or lack thereof) and let us know if it yields the expected result.
Do you think his daughter would need taxpayer funding to attend university? Or if she would, that she'd be interested in non-STEM fields?
There are quite a few gaps here that don't make this as much of a zinger as you might have hoped.
Hey, the fallacious comment has already come out, stemming from total resentment.
Pay for your useless career without begging the taxpayers, clown. You'll die frustrated because anything you do in your professional life will always be less than conceiving a son xD
TBH, it's an overall issue with over credentialism, as most jobs do not require this level of education. Related, I learned that in the US you need a PhD to practice as a psychologist, which is wild. Sounds like the first nation that would reduce the credentials arms race would be the winner.
A friend 40 years ago joked that his bachelor's in biology wouldn't get him anything related better than washing test tubes and other lab glassware. He was disappointed, but also thought it was pretty funny.
That's not true. I suppose there may be some things that psychologists do that require a PhD, but talk therapy, the primary thing that psychologists do as far as I know, only requires a master's degree. Indeed, most therapists in the US only have a master's degree.
I'm all in on education austerity, but see zero reason to subsidize STEM when those are the fields most likely to pay for themselves. Get government out of education, period. Funding and control.
I think STEM-less austerity would be a much harder sell than full austerity. Splitting college funding like that seems far more likely to offend people than full austerity.
lol, what a troll.
First, when economists were arguing that ‘lower birth rates’ was a bonus of female education it was because female education served other significant economic objectives: greater productivity, workforce participation and citizen engagement.
Shifting lower birth rates to the ‘con’ side of the column doesn’t change the top line estimates of female education as an economic positive.
Of course Richard seems to be avoiding the fact that when making this argument economists were primarily talking about developing economies where women had limited access to primary and secondary education.
The turnabout is that Richard is primarily talking about university education in developed economies, and in that sense his idea could have some merit. Generally speaking, we probably do need fewer social studies majors, especially PhDs, and to the extent that women favor these areas of study a possible positive effect on birth rates could be a ‘pro’. But just as with the developmental economists, if it is good policy it is because of the primary effect (less subsidies of expertise we don’t need) rather than its *possible* secondary effects.
All of these is obvious, but you still will be lamped with the 'Andrew tate/women shouldnt vote/sharia law' group because common sense is anything but common
I'm not sure that we can infer (A) we should defund higher education from (B) education reduces fertility. The problem is that the evidence for (B) is mostly not about higher education, it's about primary education. As I understand it, the evidence that access to higher education reduces fertility is fairly weak. It seems that a few studies find no effect of expanding access to education at higher levels on fertility:
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10680-021-09603-2
https://academic.oup.com/ereh/article/29/3/273/8099901?login=true
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1467-9442.2008.00563.x
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40455089/
How is this possible? Because higher education delays childbearing, but it seems to have smaller effects on completed fertility.
My guess is that higher education has a small negative effect on total fertility. But this effect is swamped by other factors that depress fertility (smartphones, labor market opportunities, decline of religion, etc). So, defunding higher education would probably have minimal effects.
We must persuade young women to have a family first and then higher education later. They can have both if they do it in the right order.
This comment is a good example of why men get the reputation they deserve.
Low IQ childless women again here xD
I agree with the inferences of your concept. However, I’m not sure what the magnitude of effect will be.
Birthrate has dropped because women are no longer expected to be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. Reducing wasted time in attaining pointless education will help to some extent, but I think that pales in comparison simply to women working outside the home. And that’s never going back simply based on fiscal reality for the vast majority of families.
Are you including “defund economics” in this proposal?
"If you want to study humanities, social sciences, psychology, communications, or business, you can do so on the your own dime."
He answered that in the article, economics is a social science.
No because in practice what would happen is everyone of those degrees would simply rebrand themselves as science. For example in the medical field right now, not joking btw, there are degrees in art therapy where coloring books are prescribed. Economics will be rebranded econometrics and move under the math school, etc
Yeah, I noticed that as well. I think a better proposal than “defund everything but STEM” might be defunding every degree that pays in the bottom two-thirds after graduation. Economics, Accounting, Architecture, and Finance would make the cut, while Biology would miss the cut (although barely).
Here, let me make it easier for you: higher wages, cheaper homes and less social media equal more kids. It's just that easy
Higher fertility rates lead to poverty, lower fertility rate lead to extinction, the middle fertility rate is impossible to hold for long terms. So after stripping down the real choice is: poverty or extinction.
A compromise would be that general business and liberal bachelor's degrees should be shortened to 2.5 years instead of 4, and people who score in the top 30 percent should be eligible for 1.5 years fast track
What would be the economic impacts? Women make up a significant portion of the workforce and therefore of tax payers. This idea has to account for the lost tax revenue from SAHMs as a balance to the savings gained from not funding certain majors. And what about the productivity impacts of reducing or deskilling our workforce?
If divorce is easy, and marriage is not, then birth rate is going to get low.
For the essential project of marriage is rearing of children, and if stability of marriage is questionable, prudence dictates fewer children.
As a child-free male STEM PhD I suppose....this won't affect me so I shouldn't have any notable bias, so here are my 2c:
Overall yes, but the reasoning is a bit too "partial equilibrium". While the culture of the Cathedral is part of the antinatalist behavior of educated folks, a bigger factor is simply that education provides access to jobs that are far more comfortable to perform - that is the white collar professional careers.
Certainly I'd personally hate to work less on proving Theorems (or even debugging C++23) in order to change diapers or clean vomit
Of course, if there were much fewer government regulations overall, then many of the administrative and legal occupations that typically require college degrees will no longer be necessary. So overall Austerity -> more births holds up at a broader zoom lens.
But then again, if you went further and privatized pension schemes and healthcare, then low birthrates would be much less of a problem to begin with.
While I'm quite firmly in the libertarian camp, I'm also realistic, so I don't think this will happen voluntarily. But basic arithmetic will make taking a machete to societal complexity a stark necessity in most developed nations within 20 years, and gutting higher education spending will be easier to sell first than pension haircuts.