'Ze Germans Aren’t Coming'

Submitted by Matt on Wed, 2013-08-21 12:04

Article here. Excerpt:

'Which leaves France. France has a legitimately great fertility rate: 2.08—which is within spitting distance of the replacement rate. But is French fertility driven by its daycare centers? Not so much. Separate out the fertility rates of native-born Frenchwomen from the foreign-born population and you see a tremendous divide. Native-born French women have a TFR around 1.7. Foreign-born French women are much higher, probably north of 2.8. (Finding hard numbers here is difficult because it is taboo in France to make such demographic distinctions. Which means that in order for French demographers to get the same numbers our Census Bureau puts out every year, they have to hand-count (and sort) birth records. For a good discussion of all of this, see Christopher Caldwell’s definitive Reflections on the Revolution in Europe.)

What the gulf between native- and foreign-born French fertility suggests is that daycare centers and gender equality have only helped France so much—about as much, actually, as they’ve helped Scandinavia. What really gives France its demographic boost has been immigration which, in the French experience, has also been a source of many problems.
...
But anyone who looks at demographic decline and says, “Hey, just give us nationalized daycare and the problem takes care of itself” is either uninformed, or trying to sell you something.
...
Twenty-three percent of German men—that’s not a typo, 23 percent—said that “zero” was the ideal family size. There probably aren’t public policy solutions to a cultural worldview like that.'

Like0 Dislike0

Comments

Or doesn't that matter? Countless surveys are done asking women what they want in terms of children and gov't srvcs for same, but asking men their opinion seems like it's taboo or something.

Well, I done already speculated myself, here some days back. Sure, there could be and probably are a number of other or alternate reasons/concerns keeping German men away from papa-hood. I simply speculate that life-whacking "family courts" and the recent change in attitudes towards relationships that have ppl/courts viewing fathers as not merely optional but entirely dispensable probably has a lot to do with it.

Like0 Dislike0
Submitted by Matt on Wed, 2013-08-21 16:57

National daycares???

We already have too many, they are called public schools. National daycares will put private daycares out of business. National daycares will be unionized and really no different than public schools, with a political agenda and all. Like teachers, they will become the biggest political force in most states (probably will be the same union). This is just a different way of labeling nationalized preschool.....wait, I'm getting off track here because the article pertains to France. Oh well, my opinion is the same. I don't like government in charge of kids. it's not something that taxpayers should be required to pay for.

Do you really want the government raising your kids? Should taxpayers have to foot the bill for how many kids other couples decide to have?

People need to budget their own lives, if they cannot afford childcare, groceries, a decent home, then they shouldn't be having kids or they need to scale back their own lifestyle so they can provide for their kids. I don't know how it is in France, but here in America, I think people have too high of lifestyle expectations. Even people on welfare are walking around with iphones.

The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world. Be careful who is given access to influence your children.

Like0 Dislike0
Submitted by Kris on Wed, 2013-08-21 18:47