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PaperclipPerfector  5d ago (text post)   2761 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for August 23, 2026

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I just saw a tweet and I don’t care if it’s factually true because a it’s definitely directionally true but it seems like Humans overall just hit below replacement fertility. That would seem existential at some point. Shouldn’t we be considering radical policy choices. One big issue is men dropping out of the labor force. One radical thing we could do would be positive male discrimination. Make firms hirer men whenever possible. There are probably a lot more radical policies but more stable male careers would definitely seem to help. Not saying we should do that specifically but it probably should be inside the Overton window.

One big issue is men dropping out of the labor force.

How this related to replacement fertility? I mean, I was under impression you don't need a lot of men to produce a lot of babies - one male can produce hundreds of babies, given the opportunity. Of course, there would be long term concerns about genetic variety, but that's a different issue. Also, from what I understand, the birth rates are actually not positively correlated with jobs and success at those jobs - poor people can make babies very well, and jobless fathers can (and do) father babies with many women, again if given the opportunity.

As a side note, when you have a combination of ideology-driven oppression, declining real wages, welfare state and economic regulation making hiring low-productivity workers unsustainable, it is no wonder that people on the margin of productivity peel off and choose not to bust their asses working for questionable benefit. But I still don't see how that connects to fertility. Traditionally, low fertility was rather a problem of rich societies.

Men are still viewed as providers in a western Christian ideological framework. I guess Musks is going off on more of a pagan route of the king has 20k kids, but culturally that is not ready to scale in the west. Children are raised in a family of 1 man and 1 wife and the man has economic responsibilities to make that happen.

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