The 2020s has seen the rise of a new kind of influencer – beautiful young mothers, usually with bountiful litters of children – who talk about how much they love being a stay-at-home mum.
You have to look at this trend over time and within specific populations as well. While socially liberal Sweden has a higher birth rate than socially conservative Poland, you’ll probably find that socially conservative Swedes (including of non native origin) have a higher birth rate than social liberals. If you do a longitudinal study on any population up to the baby boom you’ll probably find similar results. I think that makes it clear the social attitudes are not sufficient causes. Understanding the causes of the baby boom might be interesting however as it happened across geographies and in a specific context from which you can extrapolate.
In addition it might be interesting to see birth rate differences in similar populations living under different contexts such as east and west Germany.
I can see a possible explanation for why socially liberal countries have higher birthrates, and why conservative communities within socially liberal countries have even higher birthrates.
The explanation is that a woman's (or man's for that matter) options are defined by national policies and attitudes, but their preferences are correlated with their community, either because they choose their community based on their preferences or because their environment influences their preferences, or more likely a complex mixture of both.
So when society empowers women to make whatever choice best fits their own preferences, especially when there is sufficient available wealth that those choices are minimally constrained, a fair number of women choose to make children the focus of their lives. And women in socially-conservative communities within the socially-liberal countries make that choice at a higher rate than others.
So, under this explanation we see a range, from very traditionally-conservative and un-free countries where women have no options, they're forced to stay home and have children, to moderately-liberal countries where women do have options but find the way to prove their value is through professional work, to very liberal and free countries where women can choose to do whatever they want, and many of them find their joy in children, while many others prefer the status of professional work. And so we see a birthrate curve from very conservative high-birthrate countries to moderately liberal low-birthrate countries to very liberal moderate-birthrate countries.
Or maybe "conservative" Eastern Europe lived under godless communism that crushed nearly every aspect of their society.
Meanwhile Latin Europe is barely white, poor, and dysfunctional. Too rich and modern to have kids willy nilly, too poor and fucked up to want to have kids.
I see you’re familiar with that article already so you’ve probably already thought about the first part of this comment. Having said that I think it would be interesting if you look at not only different populations within a similar context (eg Ultra Orthodox Jews and Secular Jews in Israel) but also similar populations within a different context, such as East vs West Germany as mentioned.
This is my guess too. I don't know how I can find a good dataset that measures both social conservatism and birth rate. It will probably have to be like the Institute for Family Studies work that I linked, where they look at regions.
Yes, I am a Big Fan of that article. It's very interesting. The argument it advances is interesting. I think it's correct that the Baby Boom was caused by it being easier to have children. But the Baby Boom happens with a background of declining birthrates that eventually, over a few decades, override the boost. Weird
An extreme counter example here is the wealthy East Asian countries, which are far more socially conservative than European or North American countries in general and also have rock bottom fertility rates.
The correlation in the second chart is to be expected, if one expects that socially conservative countries, which presumably do not want the state to play much of a role in families' lives, provide smaller quantities of lower quality subsidised child care than do liberal countries, which presumably try to make it easier for women to be in the workforce.
Assuming, of course, that the same economic and social forces are in play in both groups: low wages that create a "two income trap", forcing women to work, and a culture of nuclear families meaning that each household has to provide all of its own needs for child care (to a first approximation).
If people know that there is little childcare available, and that they would need to use childcare if they had children, they are likely discouraged from having children.
I think this might be a Jonathan Haidt problem. If you're naturally religious, you're more happy with a Conservative tradition of parenting. If you're naturally secular, you're more happy with a Liberal tradition of relationships and children. Basically, you can't force secular people to become religious, nor religious people to become secular. If you can't change the culture, then giving child-free benefits to encourage child rearing is probably the best option in modern Capitalism.
I think you should really try this concept to Asia. South Korea and Japan massively struggle with low fertility as advanced societies. Singapore is really disappointing for a strong central government. China too. On the other, the deeply religious Philippines has some of the most highest birth rates in Southeast Asia. I think Indonesia too although I'm not too sure.
My solution is basically if your country is still religious, promote pro-religious family values alongside the child-free tax credit stuff and if you're a secular nation, follow France and the Scandinavian approach of giving both parents time off to raise their kids and child tax cuts. I think China theoretically should be the most capable of fixing this, as an authoritarian technocratic state, but of course Western democracies can't do that.
You have to look at this trend over time and within specific populations as well. While socially liberal Sweden has a higher birth rate than socially conservative Poland, you’ll probably find that socially conservative Swedes (including of non native origin) have a higher birth rate than social liberals. If you do a longitudinal study on any population up to the baby boom you’ll probably find similar results. I think that makes it clear the social attitudes are not sufficient causes. Understanding the causes of the baby boom might be interesting however as it happened across geographies and in a specific context from which you can extrapolate.
https://worksinprogress.co/issue/understanding-the-baby-boom
In addition it might be interesting to see birth rate differences in similar populations living under different contexts such as east and west Germany.
I can see a possible explanation for why socially liberal countries have higher birthrates, and why conservative communities within socially liberal countries have even higher birthrates.
The explanation is that a woman's (or man's for that matter) options are defined by national policies and attitudes, but their preferences are correlated with their community, either because they choose their community based on their preferences or because their environment influences their preferences, or more likely a complex mixture of both.
So when society empowers women to make whatever choice best fits their own preferences, especially when there is sufficient available wealth that those choices are minimally constrained, a fair number of women choose to make children the focus of their lives. And women in socially-conservative communities within the socially-liberal countries make that choice at a higher rate than others.
So, under this explanation we see a range, from very traditionally-conservative and un-free countries where women have no options, they're forced to stay home and have children, to moderately-liberal countries where women do have options but find the way to prove their value is through professional work, to very liberal and free countries where women can choose to do whatever they want, and many of them find their joy in children, while many others prefer the status of professional work. And so we see a birthrate curve from very conservative high-birthrate countries to moderately liberal low-birthrate countries to very liberal moderate-birthrate countries.
Or maybe "conservative" Eastern Europe lived under godless communism that crushed nearly every aspect of their society.
Meanwhile Latin Europe is barely white, poor, and dysfunctional. Too rich and modern to have kids willy nilly, too poor and fucked up to want to have kids.
I see you’re familiar with that article already so you’ve probably already thought about the first part of this comment. Having said that I think it would be interesting if you look at not only different populations within a similar context (eg Ultra Orthodox Jews and Secular Jews in Israel) but also similar populations within a different context, such as East vs West Germany as mentioned.
This is my guess too. I don't know how I can find a good dataset that measures both social conservatism and birth rate. It will probably have to be like the Institute for Family Studies work that I linked, where they look at regions.
Yes, I am a Big Fan of that article. It's very interesting. The argument it advances is interesting. I think it's correct that the Baby Boom was caused by it being easier to have children. But the Baby Boom happens with a background of declining birthrates that eventually, over a few decades, override the boost. Weird
An extreme counter example here is the wealthy East Asian countries, which are far more socially conservative than European or North American countries in general and also have rock bottom fertility rates.
Aren't East Asian countries uniformly atheist and materialistic. Not very "conservative".
As in, counter to the commonly held belief, and completely in line with the Boom project
The correlation in the second chart is to be expected, if one expects that socially conservative countries, which presumably do not want the state to play much of a role in families' lives, provide smaller quantities of lower quality subsidised child care than do liberal countries, which presumably try to make it easier for women to be in the workforce.
Assuming, of course, that the same economic and social forces are in play in both groups: low wages that create a "two income trap", forcing women to work, and a culture of nuclear families meaning that each household has to provide all of its own needs for child care (to a first approximation).
If people know that there is little childcare available, and that they would need to use childcare if they had children, they are likely discouraged from having children.
I think this might be a Jonathan Haidt problem. If you're naturally religious, you're more happy with a Conservative tradition of parenting. If you're naturally secular, you're more happy with a Liberal tradition of relationships and children. Basically, you can't force secular people to become religious, nor religious people to become secular. If you can't change the culture, then giving child-free benefits to encourage child rearing is probably the best option in modern Capitalism.
I think you should really try this concept to Asia. South Korea and Japan massively struggle with low fertility as advanced societies. Singapore is really disappointing for a strong central government. China too. On the other, the deeply religious Philippines has some of the most highest birth rates in Southeast Asia. I think Indonesia too although I'm not too sure.
My solution is basically if your country is still religious, promote pro-religious family values alongside the child-free tax credit stuff and if you're a secular nation, follow France and the Scandinavian approach of giving both parents time off to raise their kids and child tax cuts. I think China theoretically should be the most capable of fixing this, as an authoritarian technocratic state, but of course Western democracies can't do that.
It’s probably that low birth rates create my conservative attitudes, not the other way around.