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Utopia Talk / Politics / We're winning the birth war
Allahuakbar
Member
Wed May 15 14:38:47
Ours is the future!

http://www...s-birthrate-is-at-record-level


U.S. Births Fell To A 32-Year Low In 2018; CDC Says Birthrate Is In Record Slump

May 15, 2019

The U.S. birthrate fell again in 2018, to 3,788,235 births — representing a 2% drop from 2017. It's the lowest number of births in 32 years, according to a new federal report. The numbers also sank the U.S. fertility rate to a record low.

Not since 1986 has the U.S. seen so few babies born. And it's an ongoing slump: 2018 was the fourth consecutive year of birth declines, according to the provisional birthrate report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Birthrates fell for nearly all racial and age groups, with only slight gains for women in their late 30s and early 40s, the CDC says.

The news has come as something of a surprise to demographers who say that with the U.S. economy and job market continuing a years-long growth streak, they had expected the birthrate to show signs of stabilizing, or even rising. But instead, the drop could force changes to forecasts about how the country will look — with an older population and fewer young workers to sustain key social systems.


"It's a national problem," says Dowell Myers, a demographer at the University of Southern California.

"The birthrate is a barometer of despair," Myers says in response to the CDC data. Explaining that idea, he says young people won't make plans to have babies unless they're optimistic about the future.

"At first, we thought it was the recession," Myers says of the recent downturn in births. But after a slight rise in 2012, the rate took another nosedive. He adds that by nearly all economic standards — except for high housing costs — birthrates should now be rising.

As for what's behind the negative sentiment among people of childbearing age, Myers cites the current political turmoil and a gloomy outlook for America's future.

"Not a whole lot of things are going good," he says, "and that's haunting young people in particular, more than old people."

Many current or would-be parents also responded to the report Wednesday, using social media to list a string of obstacles to having kids in the U.S., from the frustration of finding child care to high insurance costs and a lack of parental leave and other support systems. And they note that while the national economy has done well, workers' paychecks haven't been growing at the same pace.

As Elena Parent, a state senator in Georgia, wrote on Twitter, "Parents know why the birthrate is falling. Kids are expensive & time-consuming & our society doesn't make it easy."

Another factor, says sociologist Sarah Damaske of Penn State, is job security — even in a time of low unemployment.

"From January 2009 to December 2017, 36.6 million American jobs were lost. That's more jobs than were lost during the Great Recession," Damaske says. "So, even though the unemployment rate is better, companies are still using layoffs to maintain profits at the expense of their workers."

Citing conversations with people who have lost their jobs in the past decade, Damaske — who is writing a book on that subject — says some workers have resigned themselves to the possibility that they might not find stable jobs again.

"When you think you might not be able to find steady work, it's harder to imagine how to form a family," she says.

Part of the trend also reflects a cultural shift, as more Americans delay marriage and child-rearing. While women in their 20s have historically given birth to the most babies in the U.S., women in their early 30s had a higher birthrate in 2017, for the first time ever. And that gap widened in 2018.



In what's widely seen as a bright spot in the CDC's provisional data, teenagers saw another sharp drop in birthrates, falling 7% in 2018 to 17.4 births per 1,000 teenagers between the ages of 15 and 19. That rate has now declined by 58% since 2007 and by 72% since 1991.

The rate of cesarean delivery, or C-section, fell to 31.9% in 2018, the CDC says. That's down from a peak of 32.9% in 2009. The rate of cesarean procedures in low-risk cases also decreased, to 25.9% of all deliveries.

From 2017 to 2018, the number of births fell 1% for Hispanic women and 2% for non-Hispanic white and non-Hispanic black women. The rate fell by 3% for women who are identified as non-Hispanic Asian and non-Hispanic AIAN (American Indian & Alaska Native).

The latest birthrate data put the U.S. further away from a viable replacement rate — the standard for a generation being able to replicate its numbers. The U.S. has generally fallen short of that level since 1971, the CDC says.



The total fertility rate fell to 1,728 births per 1,000 women over their lifetimes — a 2% fall from 2017. That's far below the replacement rate of 2,100 births per 1,000 women.

The Census Bureau has long predicted that America's future population growth will increasingly rely on immigration, despite a fertility rate that has historically been higher than similar developed nations.

According to the census agency's Population Clock, the U.S. is currently gaining one person every 16 seconds — in part because it's adding one international migrant every 34 seconds. Both of those are net results, meaning they account for deaths and outward migration.
Rugian
Member
Wed May 15 15:09:04
Shit like this is why I'm 150% in support of those rednecks and their abortion bills now.

Pro-life legislation doesnt just save unborn lives, it saves the entire nation itself.
kargen
Member
Wed May 15 15:20:29
So more people are deciding not to have children they can't afford and/or wait until later in life to have children. Not necessarily the worst decision they could make. If congress would fix the immigration laws this wouldn't present any kind of problem at all.
Pillz
Member
Wed May 15 15:26:40
Why do you hate America kargen?
Rugian
Member
Wed May 15 16:35:28
Kargen,

Broken immigration system is a feature, not a bug. The globalists who run everything want to convince Western men and women, who value freedom and liberty too much, to stop procreating and go extinct, while they simultaneously bring in millions of Africans and Muslims to supplant and replace us. It's a massive conspiracy, I tell you.

















...INFOWARS DOT COM
Dukhat
Member
Wed May 15 18:04:40
Children who would’ve been aborted do not lead happy lives. Their parents hate them and they end up as criminals of worse: shitposters on UP.
Rugian
Member
Wed May 15 20:28:28
Dukhat

If it makes you feel any better, your parents hate you because they're Asians. It has nothing to do with you specifically.
kargen
Member
Wed May 15 22:25:20
Rugian changed my mind. We need to lock down our borders and deport anybody who hasn't been here for at least four generations.

Oh and free baby sitting for everybody!
Paramount
Member
Thu May 16 02:58:29
I can see what Alabama is trying to do here. By making abortion illegal, they are forcing women to give birth to babies. Women (I'm guessing mostly white middle class women) who can afford to travel to another state will do so, so this law won't really affect them. But those women (I'm guessing women from minority groups: african-american, hispanics, arabs) who may be poor and can not afford to travel to another state and have their abortion there will be forced to give birth to babies.

So white babies will be aborted elsewhere, but Alabama will be flooded with unwanted babies from the lower classes who will then grow up and be used as cheap labour for companies.

In order compete with China, USA think it needs cheap labour.
patom
Member
Thu May 16 06:27:33
The only women who will be barred from getting abortions will be those without connections or the funds to get to a high priced OBGYN who will declare that they have "Female Problems" and fix the situation with a nice D&C in a sterile setting.

kargen
Member
Thu May 16 16:00:47
Can't get much more racist than thinking all minorities are poor.

Alabama and other states want to force Roe v Wade to be revisited. I doubt they will like the results once it gets there.

The US has cheap labor. For now they are in China. Companies are shifting facilities to Malaysia and other countries in the region preparing for the trade war.
jergul
large member
Fri May 17 05:29:15
Kargen
Malay imports from China grew 18% year on year 2017-2018 and direct foreign investment is still far lower than its peak month with 8.4 billion in 2007 (3.2 billion in december 2018).

But sure. China should most def get into the business of trading pieces of paper for stuff.



jergul
large member
Fri May 17 05:37:53
Still, its best to trade decomposed goo for stuff.
kargen
Member
Fri May 17 18:38:03
jergul you are talking the past. I am talking the future. Thus using the words "are shifting" and "preparing" instead of "have shifted" and "prepared".

And not sure where the fuck you pulled the paper comment from? I do have a guess.

US companies have goods made in China. Anticipating a trade war they are looking to instead make those goods in another country. Those decisions have nothing to do with what the Chinese trade their paper for.
jergul
large member
Sat May 18 03:06:25
Kargen
I applaud your kargenmath prediction.

I have used to bits of paper for stuff comment for decades. My new contribution is suggesting that China is approaching that position (well, the decomposed goo for stuff is newish too).

The silk road initiative is pretty much a carbon copy of the Marshall plan.

It is a mistake to think that decreasing global willingness to trade stuff for treasury issues and currency deposits benefits the US.

Implicit inflation has been the main US export for decades. 1920s Germany will look good if all that ever came back home to roost.
kargen
Member
Sat May 18 03:48:13
You are running off on a tangent. Bring it on back around.
All I said was US companies are looking to shift manufacturing away from China and to neighboring countries. They are doing this as a hedge against a trade war.
No math involved. No prediction. No statement as to whether or not depending on overseas manufacturing is a good/bad thing. No comment on deficit/surplus trade. Nothing at all about treasuries.

I made a comment about relocating factories by private businesses. Not sure what you think you read. If you want to argue what I said then you kind of have to stick to the topic or at least somewhere in the general vicinity.

It's like I mention soccer and you bring up cricket scores.
jergul
large member
Sat May 18 03:56:24
"jergul you are talking the past. I am talking the future"

Kargenmath prediction in other words.

So to be completely on topic: Kargen thinks that companies are selling off manufacturing facilities in China and build new manufacturing facilities elsewhere.

I don't think that can happen on a significant scale. Sunk costs and disruption of production chains.

But your opinion is noted.

patom
Member
Sat May 18 05:44:03
jergul, which companies can't move to another country? Did they suddenly lose the memory of how it was done when they abandoned the US and EU for China?
The textile industry is already establishing itself quite well in Pakistan, India, Indonesia, Vietnam, etc. They have the trained workforce and a large supply of more bodies to be trained.
Hell, as strange as it may seem, they could opt to move back to the USA. It might cost them a little in the profit column but they weren't losing money when they left.
Shoe industry, furniture industry, small motor industry.
What industry is anchored in China?
jergul
large member
Sat May 18 06:05:54
Patom
The choice was generally on either upgrading production lines in the US, or simply closing them and establishing modern ones elsewhere instead.

Moving factories offers no protection against tariffs.

Its one of the problems with arbitrarily introducing tariffs in contravention of WTO rules.

Why sink money into a new factory when the tariff regime can quickly follow into that country?

Even moving back to the US would simply ensure that Chinese tariffs come into effect.

We also know that Chinese manufacturing have safeguards. A US company may certainly have to option of abandoning a factory, but I doubt it could shut it down if Chinese interests wanted to continue production.
jergul
large member
Sat May 18 06:07:30
I think companies will opt for simply passing on costs. Why would they not? The market has been broken.
patom
Member
Sat May 18 09:18:21
jergul they moved their plants from the States to other countries for 3 reasons. Cheap labor, with no contentious labor laws or laws that could be bribed around.
Reason #2 is weak or unenforced environmental laws.
Reason #3 is the US is still supplying the military power to insure the safety of their products making it back to the US.

The markup on clothing is astronomical. Retailers can sell these products at 70 or 80% off list and still make a profit.
jergul
large member
Sat May 18 11:17:06
Patom
Yes, but the trigger is generally investment strategy. Either we invest more here to modernize this plant, or we invest in a new plant somewhere else for whatever reason.

100 dollar list price with the numbers you gave would actually only have a 5 dollar tariff (at 25% of import value).

Its ultimately just a federal sales tax on select items.

Companies always pass those on.
patom
Member
Sat May 18 12:18:03
All it will take is a couple of them to move somewhere else and get a higher profit and it will start a mini stampede.
kargen
Member
Sat May 18 16:48:52
"Kargen thinks that companies are selling off manufacturing facilities in China and build new manufacturing facilities elsewhere."

Pulled that one right out your ass too. I didn't mention selling off facilities. I did say they are beginning to shift from China to other countries anticipating a trade war. Not an opinion and it isn't just American companies.
http://www...cturers-are-fleeing-china-just

Forbes also has a couple of articles about businesses moving facilities to other countries.
------------------

"Moving factories offers no protection against tariffs."
Sure it does. Also this isn't an all or nothing move. Many of the companies are still planning on producing goods in China. They will produce goods bound for the US in another country and produce goods for the rest of the world in China.



jergul
large member
Sat May 18 20:27:37
Kargen
"Beginning to shift" is factually incorrect. Businesses in China have been setting up facilities in other countries for more than a decade.

There is no protection from tariffs anywhere until Trump leaves office. He can slap them down with a scribble with his marker. And he does.

US ports handle 2 000 000 containers a month. For reference on the scale of international trade.

kargen
Member
Sat May 18 22:51:52
And now at least you admit it is happening. A step in the right direction. When President Trump announced the first round of tariffs those contemplating a move made the decision. Those already deciding to move expedited the process and some that were not contemplating a move now are.

My point still stands. The US doesn't necessarily need China for cheap labor. Smaller countries are more and more finding their place in the global economy.
jergul
large member
Sun May 19 04:10:27
Kargen
*It* has been going on for a decade. If by *it*, you mean businesses in China have been setting up facilities in other countries.

This was never in dispute.

To use your terms - China doesn't necessarily need China for cheap labour. Smaller countries are more and more finding their place in the global economy.

MAGA is not about assuring that other countries than China carry more of US trade deficit burden. The US is in principle in a trade war with the world. The flavour of the day varies because your president is what he is.

Vietnam tariffs are 6.15% (2017). For reference. Not the best country to set up business in if the plan is to avoid tariffs (other options would be more rational).

http://wit...USA/Year/2017/TradeFlow/Import

My point still stands. Adaption will primarily be by passing tariffs on to US consumers and supplemented by technical contract adjustments. For example by reducing the value of goods and attaching follow up service charges instead.

But the proof is in the pudding. When are you expecting to see significant change here:

http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/statistics/highlights/toppartners.html
jergul
large member
Sun May 19 04:43:20
"Overall, using standardeconomic methods, we find that the full incidence of the tariff falls on domestic consumers, with areduction in U.S. real income of $1.4 billion per month by the end of 2018. We also see similar patternsfor foreign countries who have retaliated against the U.S., which indicates that the trade war also reducedreal income for other countries"

http://www.nber.org/papers/w25672.pdf
kargen
Member
Sun May 19 15:40:49
" Adaption will primarily be by passing tariffs on to US consumers and supplemented by technical contract adjustments."

That was covered in the article. There becomes a point where that is no longer a viable option. You are trying to argue things that have really not much if anything to do with my statement.

Companies are relocating quicker and in larger numbers because of tariffs and the threat of an extended trade war.

That is a simple fact.

China isn't the only country that can provide cheap labor.

That is also a fact.

Those two facts make my statement true. Maybe in the future that will change but for now what I said is the absolute truth.
jergul
large member
Sun May 19 17:03:41
Kargen
http://www...hina/foreign-direct-investment

So, no. Its generally just business as usual.

Or where you thinking that net FDI into China had fallen?

http://gbtimes.com/china-remains-second-largest-fdi-recipient-in-the-world

Nope. Its up 3%, though FDI to the US has fallen 18% between 2017 and 2018.

Your absolute truths are simply not true (though of course any country can provide cheap labour. How much are prison inmates paid for the work they do in the US? Wow, that is sure cheap labour).

What my link to an actual scholarly article showed earlier is that both the cost of tariffs and the cost of inefficiencies are passed on to the consumer.
kargen
Member
Sun May 19 18:59:17
"So, no. Its generally just business as usual."

With words like expedite and speed up the process no it is not.
With companies that before were not considering relocating now building new facilities in other countries no it is not.

"What my link to an actual scholarly article showed earlier is that both the cost of tariffs and the cost of inefficiencies are passed on to the consumer."

I've never argued against that. Of course the cost of tariffs as any other new cost is passed on to the customer. I agreed that was the case earlier in this thread. There is a point though where increased prices cut into sales. Companies think the added tariff costs just may do that so they are preparing by opening facilities in other countries.

"How much are prison inmates paid for the work they do in the US? Wow, that is sure cheap labour"

You wanna discuss an unrelated issue start a new thread. maybe I'll join you. We are talking about companies that are currently moving facilities out of China to avoid tariffs. Obviously they have decided moving is more cost effective than passing on tariffs to customers.

"Or where you thinking that net FDI into China had fallen?"

According to your link there is a slight uptick but yeah the past 18 months have had a pretty significant decline. Doesn't really give a true indication of our discussion here though does it.

Companies are moving in relation to tariffs on the USA. While that is a big slice of the pie it is hardly all there is to the global market. Goods shipped to the EU are not subject to the tariff so no need for those facilities to change. The EU is China's largest trade partner and investment is increasing. Even with that increase overall in the past year investment is down according to your link.
jergul
large member
Mon May 20 01:45:09
Kargen
I am burying you with high quality links.

Data on FDI does not support your claim. The Reuters article is using anectdotal evidence (a couple cases) that is not supported by wider data.

You are arguing against tariff and inefficiency costs being passed on to consumers. It amounts to about adding 0.6% to US CPI. Data does not suggest this has impacted on consumption.

Companies are increasing supply in China and elsewhere. Which indicates they think consumption levels will continue to increase.

You have several times mentioned that China is not the only country with cheap labour. I agreed by stating that many countries have cheap labour (even Norway does. Perhaps as many as 25000 jobs are subsidized by our State employment agency). As a blanket statement, it simply is a platitude.

You seem to be arguing that Chinese growth will be lower than otherwise would have been the case due to tariffs. This is certainly true.

All other things being equal, China will lose about 2% growth and the US about 0.7% growth (or 25% and 33% of growth respectively).
kargen
Member
Mon May 20 14:29:25
"Data on FDI does not support your claim"

Not my claim. It is right near the top of the link you provided in easy to read graph form.

"You are arguing against tariff and inefficiency costs being passed on to consumers."

Bullshit. I keep trying to get back to the conversation we were having. You keep trying to drag it back to tariffs being passed on to consumers. I have said twice now in this thread that the costs do get passed on. I also said eventually passed on costs can cut into sales. Companies have decided it makes more sense for them to shift locations than pass on tariff costs. Your link supports that and my link flat out states it.

The rest of you message doesn't apply at all. I am saying because of the threat of a trade war companies are relocating out of China. Nothing else, just that. You can no longer honestly argue against that but want to argue something so you are bringing up things unrelated to what I said.
jergul
large member
Mon May 20 15:57:06
Kargen
If that is all you are saying, then you could simply point to Chinese FDI and suggest that China has additional motivation to set up new capacity (not relocate) abroad.

Which is fair enough. Tariffs give new price norms, help offset capital investment costs, and increase profitability.

Its not even a problem for the US as it can easily digest a .6% increase in CPI.

All other things being equal.
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