Can China Reverse Its Population Decline? Just Ask Sweden(nytimes.com)
nytimes.com
Can China Reverse Its Population Decline? Just Ask Sweden
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/09/upshot/china-population-decline.html
8 comments
Question is - have it ever been tried to stimulate childbirth directly? Such as, hiring single lower-class women, singing them on long-term contracts, putting them into controlled, centralised facilities, getting them (through IVF) pregnant from selected pool of higher-quality males, and paying them to have many (5-10) babies? Then raising and educating them in government-controlled facilities as well? That sucks in terms of their mental health/social adaptation, as history of people raised in foster care shows, but it was hardly optimal in large families of the past where kids were born in part because of lack of contraception, in part to force them to work in the field from young age.
That's a desperate measure but it really seems there's nothing better that can be done?
Upper classes have many children anyway, their reproduction is not a problem. Just complement them with enough lower classes.
WTAF?
Well, rich countries can work around that problem by immigration. China obviously, cannot, and Japan wouldn't. Maybe some other fixes are necessary?
They could try not to be communists. They could ask, "what policies are making people want fewer children" and change those. They could stop thinking the unending growth is the goal.
I may be mistaken, but it seems to me that while one-child policy certainly had an enormous impact, and it was a direct consequence of Communism, that damage is done and it can't be undone by quitting Communism now. Apart from that, i can't see what Commies are doing wrong in terms of demography today.
Aldous Huxley took that idea further (improvements he made include the use of artificial wombs and the realization that it’s not only the upper classes that need more children), but the tech didn’t exist yet, so he could only develop the theory.
I think there is consensus is that it may not be a good idea.
I think there is consensus is that it may not be a good idea.