Reading the responses here is a good reminder that, even within the hallowed halls of Slow Boring, the opinions of Very Online people do not represent the Normal American.
One of the things that always strikes me about this debate is the survey research that points to women having fewer children than they say that they want, by quite a bit. While revealed preference is often a better indicator than survey preference, it seems that our society is stacked against people building the actual lives they want. Education is too front loaded, and too expensive, changing careers is too hard.
And then for obvious political reasons we don't support or invest in kids as much as the elderly, which economically is nuts. (Krugman should take on the economic and racial case for social security and Medicare!)
I think that the traditional economic case for investing in kids is pretty strong. But there's also something of a human flourishing argument about giving people more opportunities to create the life they want.
Krugman’s comment that Vance’s proposal was racist is a stark example of how accusations of racism can be used by the left to attack policies that are the exact opposite of racist.
Vance is himself contributing to the browning of America, with two mixed kids with his Indian wife. The idea that he’s got a hidden agenda of turning back white replacement is an offensive smear. I’m south Asian and have three kids with my Irish wife, for I suspect the same reason as Vance and his wife—our cultures both value children.
Look at other key proponents of pro-natal policies: Corey Booker and Kanye West. Say what you want about West’s mental health, his proposal to reduce abortion by giving women money to have kids is solidly rooted in Black Protestant views about family.
The reality is that it’s mostly Black and brown people in this country, along with “ethnic whites” like Irish and Italians, who highly value kids. It’s upper class white Protestant culture that’s fascinated with small families. (And people who have assimilated into it, like some Asians.)
You see a similar inversion with respect to school choice. Blacks and Latinos strongly support it, along with Republicans. So how do liberal whites (the only opponents) frame it? As a racist and segregationist policy.
I am a mother of two, having those children in my 20s, and the wife of an immigrant. I also have one more on the way, and my husband and I would like to have a fourth before I'm 35. We live in a rural area, so day care can be difficult to find, but babysitters/nanny's are cheap, relatively. We are both professionals so we can afford it. The schools don't provide the best academics, but the teachers and staff are genuine. Also, my school-age daughter has a great friendship network. I can afford a tutor if I want my kids to grow further.
All that being said, I think the reason my family can grow this way is 1) we are professionals earning good money in a relative LCOL area (HCOL state though), 2) we had our first kid unplanned and just rolled with it (I was on WIC until I couldn't be - wonderful program), 3) while our family could not physically support us, they were able to send us money when things got hairy. (However, many families do take advantage of grandparents/relatives as cheap/free daycare)
This is just my view of the system as a mother and a worker, but as people have discussed, it wasn't necessarily the government programs that allow us to have the kids we want. It helped a lot, no question. But it was that our jobs provided the money to support it, and our family and friend networks supported us too.
I'm not alone up here in my rural area. I know many conservative and liberal families that all have 3 or more kids, but one or both parents have a great job (white collar and tradesman families).
All that being said, I think having more pro-natalism stance in our society is an excellent thing. Let's have more "mom" parking spots at groceries or more family/child programs (like how the YMCA used to be), but not necessarily free day-care for the whole country. When it comes to true pro-natalism, it's raising the wages of our current workers and providing job opportunities that give *living wages* that will actually increase native-born fertility rates.
Because why should mom go to work when it barely pays for the day care? However if less than half the check goes to day care for a few years, then when the kid is in school, they get the whole check, the family will be more likely think they can afford the amount of children they want.
People are often surprised by Krugman writing silly stuff given his career, but the most banal thing is for a hyper-accomplished academic to later decide to use his reputation to just say whatever nonsense he wants, as opposed to actually retiring and finding some other hobby. Krugman just happens to have a NYT column.
Based on this latest rant (and others) I feel like Krugman is still trapped on the cultural debates of the time he was most relevant, when the left was more unanimously obsessed with population control. It's also pretty weird to implicitly associate religiosity with whiteness.
Having read all the comments on this post, I suddenly had the crazy idea that it might be interesting to read what actual women have to say about the subject of having more babies.
There isn't just encouraging people to have more kids, another option is to encourage people to have kids earlier. All else being equal you get more population growth if families are having children in their 20's instead of their 30's or 40's. That's another factor of slowing population growth besides the number of kids.
And having kids earlier means the opportunity for more kids. Every large family I know of with 4+ kids had their first kid in their 20's or late teens.
But the various economic and social realities of our society mean there is a very strong incentive for most people to delay having children. And that delay is getting longer, not shorter, as the current younger generation struggles with many issues from finding a partner to achieving a sufficient level of economic independence. For example, I have a handful of family members who really want a family and kids but, for whatever reason, can't find a partner. Their ages are 60, 45 and 35. The 60-year old finally partnered with a woman who has kids from an earlier marriage. The other two have pretty much given up.
I'm seeing more and more people who are single into their 40's and beyond. But I don't think government policy can really change that.
More generally, I'm skeptical that the family-friendly policies that Matt supports will provide enough incentive to actually increase the number of kids people have. Again, at least in my circle, no one I know proactively decides to have a kid or not based on government child policies and benefits. Where I think these policies would have the most effect is reducing the number of abortions from unplanned pregnancies, which is another potential sell point to skeptical right-wingers.
Assuming the different view points are going to be somewhat hereditary. Pro-natalist people will have bigger families, and those against will have smaller or none, I think its pretty easy to see who will win the argument in a few generations.
Personally, I just assume that in the greater scheme of History and civilization, the only way to win is to have as many descendants as possible in a few thousand years. Many of us are destined to be genetic dead-ends. All we can do is increase our odds that bits of our DNA code exist when we finally settle across the galaxy.
The main economic motivation to have lots of kids is as a retirement strategy. I have 5 kids. I'm hoping at least one of them strikes it rich and funds my retirement.
Personally, I'd like to see Matt troll the anti-natalists by having a few more kids. I hear that making them is fun.
Yes, I know I have added nothing constructive in this comment section. What can I say, my kids wore me out.
Everytime I hear this issue discussed, someone brings up that Scandinavian countries have great family leave policies and robust welfare states, but these haven't had much of an effect on fertility. I'm all for these policies on humanitarian and economic grounds, but what does the evidence say about how much they boost fertility?
That thread by Krugman is really muddled... I wasn't sure what he was arguing until I read his column today (and he still doesn't engage with pro-natalism on substance).
While I agree that pro-natalism isn't inherently racist, the fact is that "white people are being outbred" has been a talking point in right-wing circles since at least the 80s, with Tucker Carlson and JD Vance espousing this recently. I'm not sure that weakens the argument for those policies, but it's not a fringe idea (unless you consider the entire Republican party to be fringe, which...).
The range countries with under-replacement fertility is really wide and interesting. Look it up on wikipedia if you're interested. It includes not just all the developed European and Asian countries that you'd expect to see, but also many less- developed countries: Brazil, Iran, Bangladesh (by some estimates), Myanmar and Thailand. Maybe half of Latina and America and the Caribbean. Cuba and Puerto Rico are especially low. Especially PR.
Sure there's a policy lever to make people more religious: dismantle the social safety net. Krugman has it backwards; Republicans oppose support for families because a mother who can stand on her own two feet, thanks to government programs available to her as an individual unmediated by traditional institutions, is a free actor, liberated from dependence on a (possibly abusive) husband, a (possibly abusive) birth family, or a (possibly abusive, or just incongruous with her own convictions) church community. Conservatives do not think it is feasible or desirable for people to construe themselves as free individuals outside of a web of social ties, and many do not think it is healthy for women to aspire to the same freedom to set one's own course in the world as men. Hence the relative absence of religious conservatives proposing policies to make parenting easier: they would rather make independence harder, to keep people beholden to family and faith.
This is at least part of why every level of religious disaffiliation in the US is progressively more male, with atheists the most disproportionate. People literally turn to their churches for financial support, and women have less money on average and still shoulder more of the burden of child and elder care. The social safety net also seems to me to be the strongest reason why Western Europe is less religious than the US. (Being a superpower engaged in an existential geopolitical rivalry against a formally atheist opponent probably also contributed.)
And what do you know, which European country has notably high fertility levels for a rich country, a generous social safety net for new parents, a notably small gender gap in religiosity for a majority-Christian country (per Pew https://www.pewforum.org/2016/03/22/women-more-likely-than-men-to-affiliate-with-a-religion/), and a long tradition of leftist anticlericalism? Yes: France, the most underrated (by Americans) European country.
It seems like the foreign policy reasons to have more kids are also really strong. If we double our population we don't need to also double our military budget. So our per capita military spending can be lower. And if we have a huge population then other countries like China will be less likely to try to compete with us militarily so maybe we can mutually lower our military expenditures.
So Krugman says that the population balance won't be that problematic based on the Social Security projection which indicates Social Security as a percentage of GDP will go from about 5% to about 6% between now and 2075 (most of that increase occurs between now and 2035 and then it stays roughly flat after).
But this assumes a Total Fertility Rate of roughly 1.9 births/woman during that time. Why would we assume that is the worst case scenario given many other countries have much lower TFRs? Perhaps significant pro-natalist intervention is required to maintain this. Surely Krugman would concede a South Korea-like TFR of .98 would create significant problems for the economy over the next 50 years.
I'm as left as they come, but the thing left of center people do where they call any conservative frame of an issue racist is annoying as shit
Reading the responses here is a good reminder that, even within the hallowed halls of Slow Boring, the opinions of Very Online people do not represent the Normal American.
Kids are great, y'all.
One of the things that always strikes me about this debate is the survey research that points to women having fewer children than they say that they want, by quite a bit. While revealed preference is often a better indicator than survey preference, it seems that our society is stacked against people building the actual lives they want. Education is too front loaded, and too expensive, changing careers is too hard.
And then for obvious political reasons we don't support or invest in kids as much as the elderly, which economically is nuts. (Krugman should take on the economic and racial case for social security and Medicare!)
I think that the traditional economic case for investing in kids is pretty strong. But there's also something of a human flourishing argument about giving people more opportunities to create the life they want.
Krugman’s comment that Vance’s proposal was racist is a stark example of how accusations of racism can be used by the left to attack policies that are the exact opposite of racist.
Vance is himself contributing to the browning of America, with two mixed kids with his Indian wife. The idea that he’s got a hidden agenda of turning back white replacement is an offensive smear. I’m south Asian and have three kids with my Irish wife, for I suspect the same reason as Vance and his wife—our cultures both value children.
Look at other key proponents of pro-natal policies: Corey Booker and Kanye West. Say what you want about West’s mental health, his proposal to reduce abortion by giving women money to have kids is solidly rooted in Black Protestant views about family.
The reality is that it’s mostly Black and brown people in this country, along with “ethnic whites” like Irish and Italians, who highly value kids. It’s upper class white Protestant culture that’s fascinated with small families. (And people who have assimilated into it, like some Asians.)
You see a similar inversion with respect to school choice. Blacks and Latinos strongly support it, along with Republicans. So how do liberal whites (the only opponents) frame it? As a racist and segregationist policy.
I am a mother of two, having those children in my 20s, and the wife of an immigrant. I also have one more on the way, and my husband and I would like to have a fourth before I'm 35. We live in a rural area, so day care can be difficult to find, but babysitters/nanny's are cheap, relatively. We are both professionals so we can afford it. The schools don't provide the best academics, but the teachers and staff are genuine. Also, my school-age daughter has a great friendship network. I can afford a tutor if I want my kids to grow further.
All that being said, I think the reason my family can grow this way is 1) we are professionals earning good money in a relative LCOL area (HCOL state though), 2) we had our first kid unplanned and just rolled with it (I was on WIC until I couldn't be - wonderful program), 3) while our family could not physically support us, they were able to send us money when things got hairy. (However, many families do take advantage of grandparents/relatives as cheap/free daycare)
This is just my view of the system as a mother and a worker, but as people have discussed, it wasn't necessarily the government programs that allow us to have the kids we want. It helped a lot, no question. But it was that our jobs provided the money to support it, and our family and friend networks supported us too.
I'm not alone up here in my rural area. I know many conservative and liberal families that all have 3 or more kids, but one or both parents have a great job (white collar and tradesman families).
All that being said, I think having more pro-natalism stance in our society is an excellent thing. Let's have more "mom" parking spots at groceries or more family/child programs (like how the YMCA used to be), but not necessarily free day-care for the whole country. When it comes to true pro-natalism, it's raising the wages of our current workers and providing job opportunities that give *living wages* that will actually increase native-born fertility rates.
Because why should mom go to work when it barely pays for the day care? However if less than half the check goes to day care for a few years, then when the kid is in school, they get the whole check, the family will be more likely think they can afford the amount of children they want.
People are often surprised by Krugman writing silly stuff given his career, but the most banal thing is for a hyper-accomplished academic to later decide to use his reputation to just say whatever nonsense he wants, as opposed to actually retiring and finding some other hobby. Krugman just happens to have a NYT column.
Based on this latest rant (and others) I feel like Krugman is still trapped on the cultural debates of the time he was most relevant, when the left was more unanimously obsessed with population control. It's also pretty weird to implicitly associate religiosity with whiteness.
Having read all the comments on this post, I suddenly had the crazy idea that it might be interesting to read what actual women have to say about the subject of having more babies.
There isn't just encouraging people to have more kids, another option is to encourage people to have kids earlier. All else being equal you get more population growth if families are having children in their 20's instead of their 30's or 40's. That's another factor of slowing population growth besides the number of kids.
And having kids earlier means the opportunity for more kids. Every large family I know of with 4+ kids had their first kid in their 20's or late teens.
But the various economic and social realities of our society mean there is a very strong incentive for most people to delay having children. And that delay is getting longer, not shorter, as the current younger generation struggles with many issues from finding a partner to achieving a sufficient level of economic independence. For example, I have a handful of family members who really want a family and kids but, for whatever reason, can't find a partner. Their ages are 60, 45 and 35. The 60-year old finally partnered with a woman who has kids from an earlier marriage. The other two have pretty much given up.
I'm seeing more and more people who are single into their 40's and beyond. But I don't think government policy can really change that.
More generally, I'm skeptical that the family-friendly policies that Matt supports will provide enough incentive to actually increase the number of kids people have. Again, at least in my circle, no one I know proactively decides to have a kid or not based on government child policies and benefits. Where I think these policies would have the most effect is reducing the number of abortions from unplanned pregnancies, which is another potential sell point to skeptical right-wingers.
“It’s a big country full of kooks” will be my new mantra to chill myself out when I see nutpicking.
Assuming the different view points are going to be somewhat hereditary. Pro-natalist people will have bigger families, and those against will have smaller or none, I think its pretty easy to see who will win the argument in a few generations.
Personally, I just assume that in the greater scheme of History and civilization, the only way to win is to have as many descendants as possible in a few thousand years. Many of us are destined to be genetic dead-ends. All we can do is increase our odds that bits of our DNA code exist when we finally settle across the galaxy.
The main economic motivation to have lots of kids is as a retirement strategy. I have 5 kids. I'm hoping at least one of them strikes it rich and funds my retirement.
Personally, I'd like to see Matt troll the anti-natalists by having a few more kids. I hear that making them is fun.
Yes, I know I have added nothing constructive in this comment section. What can I say, my kids wore me out.
Also... child tax credit is good!
Everytime I hear this issue discussed, someone brings up that Scandinavian countries have great family leave policies and robust welfare states, but these haven't had much of an effect on fertility. I'm all for these policies on humanitarian and economic grounds, but what does the evidence say about how much they boost fertility?
That thread by Krugman is really muddled... I wasn't sure what he was arguing until I read his column today (and he still doesn't engage with pro-natalism on substance).
While I agree that pro-natalism isn't inherently racist, the fact is that "white people are being outbred" has been a talking point in right-wing circles since at least the 80s, with Tucker Carlson and JD Vance espousing this recently. I'm not sure that weakens the argument for those policies, but it's not a fringe idea (unless you consider the entire Republican party to be fringe, which...).
The range countries with under-replacement fertility is really wide and interesting. Look it up on wikipedia if you're interested. It includes not just all the developed European and Asian countries that you'd expect to see, but also many less- developed countries: Brazil, Iran, Bangladesh (by some estimates), Myanmar and Thailand. Maybe half of Latina and America and the Caribbean. Cuba and Puerto Rico are especially low. Especially PR.
Sure there's a policy lever to make people more religious: dismantle the social safety net. Krugman has it backwards; Republicans oppose support for families because a mother who can stand on her own two feet, thanks to government programs available to her as an individual unmediated by traditional institutions, is a free actor, liberated from dependence on a (possibly abusive) husband, a (possibly abusive) birth family, or a (possibly abusive, or just incongruous with her own convictions) church community. Conservatives do not think it is feasible or desirable for people to construe themselves as free individuals outside of a web of social ties, and many do not think it is healthy for women to aspire to the same freedom to set one's own course in the world as men. Hence the relative absence of religious conservatives proposing policies to make parenting easier: they would rather make independence harder, to keep people beholden to family and faith.
This is at least part of why every level of religious disaffiliation in the US is progressively more male, with atheists the most disproportionate. People literally turn to their churches for financial support, and women have less money on average and still shoulder more of the burden of child and elder care. The social safety net also seems to me to be the strongest reason why Western Europe is less religious than the US. (Being a superpower engaged in an existential geopolitical rivalry against a formally atheist opponent probably also contributed.)
And what do you know, which European country has notably high fertility levels for a rich country, a generous social safety net for new parents, a notably small gender gap in religiosity for a majority-Christian country (per Pew https://www.pewforum.org/2016/03/22/women-more-likely-than-men-to-affiliate-with-a-religion/), and a long tradition of leftist anticlericalism? Yes: France, the most underrated (by Americans) European country.
It seems like the foreign policy reasons to have more kids are also really strong. If we double our population we don't need to also double our military budget. So our per capita military spending can be lower. And if we have a huge population then other countries like China will be less likely to try to compete with us militarily so maybe we can mutually lower our military expenditures.
So Krugman says that the population balance won't be that problematic based on the Social Security projection which indicates Social Security as a percentage of GDP will go from about 5% to about 6% between now and 2075 (most of that increase occurs between now and 2035 and then it stays roughly flat after).
But this assumes a Total Fertility Rate of roughly 1.9 births/woman during that time. Why would we assume that is the worst case scenario given many other countries have much lower TFRs? Perhaps significant pro-natalist intervention is required to maintain this. Surely Krugman would concede a South Korea-like TFR of .98 would create significant problems for the economy over the next 50 years.