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Notes -
The coming Ukraine/Russia baby boom?
There's a theory that one part of falling fertility is female hypergamy. Since my spellchecker is underlining that word, I'll define it like this:
Female hypergamy is when women seek to marry "up", either into a higher social class or to a mate who is superior to them.
It's harder than ever for women to marry up. Modern femininist societies devalue male traits such as stoicism and aggression but highly value female traits such as conformity and self-control. As a result, women's status relative to men has risen greatly. This has the side effect of making most men undesirable to most women.
You know what raises the status of men? Fighting in wars. It's no secret that women love men in uniform. And many will confess to being aroused by male violence. For better or worse, violence raises male status.
Nearly all nations had a baby boom after WWII. And this wasn't merely making up for lost time. In the United States, the fertility rate peaked at 3.74 children/woman in 1957. Even Russia had a fertility rate near 3 despite a ridiculously lopsided gender ratio where more than 80% of men born in 1922 didn't survive until 1946.
So anyway... I predict that Russia and Ukraine will experience a similar (but smaller boom) in the decade following the end of the war.
There are at least 6 million refugees and the overwhelming majority are women and children. Even if the fertility rate goes up there are going to be far fewer women of child bearing age left. Some will come back but that portion will only drop with time as they put down roots abroad and the situation in Ukraine deteriorates. I think Ukraine is screwed in the long run. The EU no longer has the economic vitality to build them up like they did Poland.
Good point. If the refugees don't return (and they never do these days) then there will be a surplus of men, and male status will remain low.
And I suppose I neglected something else as well. Status is now trans-national. So, if migration is allowed to happen, Ukrainian men have to compete with German men too and won't get the same status bump.
A good metric is the wars in the balkans in the 90s. 2/3s of those who fled stayed and 1/3 returned home. It is likely the numbers will be similar for Ukrainians who fled west. For the several million ethnic Russians who have moved to Russia it is unlikely they will return.
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