Item — HN Reader

I'm all for innovative ideas in supporting families and children, but the examples from the article hardly count as "successfully reversing fertility declines".

- Nagi, Japan. TFR: 2.95 (replacement rate is ~2.1). Astonishing. This is the only true success in the article.

- Nagareyama, Japan. TFR: 1.5. At this rate, the population will drop by ~25% every generation.

- South Tyrol, Italy. TFR: 1.64. Marginally better than Nagareyama. Noticeably better than the rest of Italy (TFR: 1.2), but still a population in strong decline.

- Czechia. TFR: 1.6 (https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN?location...). Better than the European median, but not exceptional. Roughly on a par with Lithuania (1.63), Belgium (1.59), and the UK (1.57). Noticeably behind France (1.79). None of these countries at such TFRs are even capable of maintaining their population at a stable level, and should all be regarded as undergoing some level of population collapse.

2 comments

"successfully reversed declining fertility rates by consistently improving and working on family policy" not "successfully reversing fertility declines"

It's kinda sus that you leave the whole "rates" part out

- Japan (1.2) and Tokyo (.99) vs Nagareyama (1.5 considering it's in Chiba and Tokyo) & Nagi (2.95)

- Considering the Italian Birth Rate is in freefall whole South Tyrol is holding steady and above not just Italy's but also the UK.

- Czecha had a 1.8 until a drop to 1.6 during 2021 to 2022 according towards your dataset with Belgium, Lit. and the UK are now below

Considinder Czecha had a 1.1 in 2000, its only just makes it more impressive

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN?location...

It's influenced by the population wave caused by a communist president in early 1970s. The results are subpar if you normalize for that. There are a lot more adults in the age to have children right now than before, but it's going to drop hard very soon.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hus%C3%A1k%27s_Children

Exactly, the article is fluff.

One thing that perplexes me about this topic is that people don't just pull up a historical birth rate chart, find the bit not that long ago when fertility rates were around 4, and then ask "why was it 4 then?".

Followed by asking "how can we restore those things?".

I really doubt it was because any of the popular reasons trotted out whenever this topic comes up, which usually blame money, despite us having much more money now than in days past when birthrates were way higher.

I wonder why it's so hard for people just to say simple things like "it's because everyone carefully uses contraception now, and treats sex as a consumption good, because they want it but not its result - a scenario most of them treat as on par with catching malaria".

Funny world we live in

You would be right in other cases, but the site also reports and summerizes on research about the topic

https://www.population.fyi/t/family-research