[scoofy]

Income is not wealth. The crisis is caused by the inability for the median income here to build wealth. That people can’t separate the two is a large part of the problem.

As long as your saving is being eaten by asset inflation, no matter how fast you’re running, you’re still on a treadmill.

[echelon]

The economic argument is oversold. Poor people have kids more than any other demographic.

Smartphones are why we don't have kids.

Unlimited dopamine is why we don't have kids.

The internet is why we don't have kids.

Women like having fun and independence and don't want to be stay at home nannies.

Modern life is TOO FUN.

Fun is why there are no more babies.

Babies are not fun.

Babies are what you do in the 1950's when you're bored out of your mind with nothing to do.

Babies are what you do when you have to wait until next week for your Reader's Digest to arrive in the mail.

Babies are the anti-dopamine.

For the first time in history, we're not bored out of our fucking minds 24/7. Our brains are fully occupied.

There isn't space for babies now that we have the internet.

----

Thought experiment: if you had five million dollars extra right now, would you have a kid tonight?

The answer is probably "fuck no".

And you know why.

Look at the countries still having kids - they're mostly places where women don't have equal rights and smartphone / internet penetration is low.

[thelastgallon]

Babies are also free labor. They are just like the AI agents of today, parents had their children do a variety of things around the farm, instead of paying for tokens, they had to feed them, thats all.

[Izikiel43]

> Thought experiment: if you had five million dollars extra right now, would you have a kid tonight?

Yes, next question

[abc123abc123]

No, next question.

[scoofy]

This is an unfalsifiable pet theory. It is hardly worth discussing.

[echelon]

Don't be so dismissive.

Just because you don't like the hypothesis doesn't mean it doesn't have merit.

https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.6749621

https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.14758

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=6257058

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00148-016-0605-0

https://arxiv.org/abs/1810.04575

The dopamine and devices hypothesis has been picking up steam.

It is entirely possible that our modern pleasure technology has short circuited our evolutionary drive to have children.

We have too many easy ways to not be bored. That throws a wrench into the biological algorithm.

We've been poor and resource constrained throughout history, yet we've always managed to have children. What is the one thing that has changed?

Smartphones and internet and YouTube and online gaming and porn and social media.

That's why the babies have disappeared.

Fun killed babies.