Is wealth really the best form of birth control?

A few weeks ago I quoted former CIA director Herb Meyer's fascinating demographic forecasts, particularly his claim that

"The world's most effective birth control device is money. As society creates a middle class and women move into the workforce, birth rates drop. Having large families is incompatible with middle class living. The quickest way to drop the birth rate is through rapid economic development."

He goes on to point out that birth rates in most of Western Europe as well as Japan are below substitution levels; that the populations of these countries are simply dying out, and maintaining parity only by importing workers. I posited from this that the upshot of Meyer's analysis is that rather than embark on the expense and inconvenience of bringing up children the ageing populations of the developed world are simply selling off their countries to inbound workers in return for the promise of lifetime pensions and healthcare.

Discussing this with a friend last night, we touched on the possibility of an entirely different conclusion. What if this economic/demographic phenomenon is just a blip while people (in, say, the UK) are rich enough to want the benefits of child-free leisure but not quite rich enough yet to afford childcare? Which possibility leads me to an entertainingly contrarian conclusion. Western Europeans (and Japanese) are dying out because they don't have enough immigration.

Follow it through. Wealth creates opportunities for leisure, expectations of permanent income and (therefore) a willingness to have fewer children. To reverse that trend (without a huge cut in standards of living) requires inexpensive child care so that wealthy Western indigenes habituated to leisure and disposable income can have children without sacrificing more of either than they are apparently willing. And that means greater mobility of labour across borders (as well as no wage controls). Be sure to tell Nick Griffin* - if the English (etc) are not to die out, we urgently need more people to move to the UK from abroad.

*leader of the UK's odiously right-wing British Nationalist Party  

Comments

[Ron Davison]

Interesting point.

It could also be that market-driven media is forced to spin every headline into a threat. ("After this from our sponsors, why your drinking water may be killing you!") The gap between real quality of life and perceived quality of life may have never been higher. It's hard to believe that such a state is going to promote rampant procreation.

[Tim Worstall]

Opportunity costs, opportunity costs.
The aim of the game is to have children who then go on to create further descendents (well, pretty much what C. Darwon said anyway).
As child mortality rates fall you need to have fewer to ensure this outcome. Thus the opportunity costs of small families have fallen.
I suspect (on the basis of no evidence whatsoever) that this is the major driving force.

[Seamus McCauley]

Ron - very true, the gap between how scared people are of getting mugged and how likely they are to actually get mugged widens constantly.

Tim - that works if we're talking about falling birth rates and consistent family sizes (fewer children die so you end up the same net number of descendants via fewer births), but we're talking about falling total family sizes even allowing for that. Parts of Western Europe and Japan sub replacement rate - that's a very different problem.

Thx for commenting.