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Don't be fooled
(lemmy.world)
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this post was submitted on 25 May 2025
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Unless you expect people to work until they drop dead it's a crisis regardless of the economic system, especially coupled with the increases in life expectancy. You have fewer and fewer people of working age who have to provide for and take care of more and more old people for longer and longer. Even if you eliminate profit motives, you're placing an outsized burden on younger generations.
The notion that a decreasing population is a capitalism issue is straight childish. First-world demographics are going top heavy fast. And for all the cries that, "They just want more workers!", I say, yes, that would be the point.
The more advanced a society is the larger the population needed just to keep people fed and housed, regardless of the system.
This is why agriculture was a trap. It let us have more people which led to needing more people to support the population.
You made the case for the inverse - agriculture had many more kids while technological advances are leading to fewer over time
I’m saying that there’s a minimum viable population for a technological society like ours and if we have too few people working it’s going to collapse.
Maybe it should collapse. Survival of the fittest applies just as well to societies and economic systems. If capitalism is so comically dysfunctional that it cannot even provide people enough that they feel comfortable having kids...when reproduction is the most natural, biologically fundamental thing in the world? Yeah, that is clearly a sick and depraved system that doesn't deserve to continue to exist on this Earth. Let it fall.
that's literally the direction we're going, regardless of birthrate. yes, it is a crisis. france rioted over this. we just shrugged and said meh, cross that bridge something something
Yea but that cuts into corporate profits soooooo why not force a population of people to turn out babies like the good old days!
You think raising kids is free? The cost to raise a child including college is more expensive than end of life care for elderly.
https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=66#%3A%7E%3Atext=Average+current+expenditures+per+pupil%2C%E2%80%9313+to+2020%E2%80%9321.&text=Hover%2C+click%2C+and+tap+to%2Call+figures+on+this+page.
https://www.sofi.com/learn/content/average-cost-of-raising-a-child-to-18/#%3A%7E%3Atext=How+Much+Does+It+Cost+to+Raise+a+Child%3F%2Cballooning+to+more+than+%24651%2C000.
($27k/ year California plus $14k/year for public school for a total of $41k per year for ages 5-18. Then college which is even more expensive.) That's a minimum of $800k.
That compares to $150k of full medical care for last 3 years for elderly. Before that they are self sufficient and have minimal costs.
https://bmcpalliatcare.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12904-023-01197-2
And when elderly die, they free up resources for the next generation.
Self sufficient? So youre saying they grow their own food and repair all their own homes?
It's a simple problem of not enough laborers to provide all the menial everyday ressources people want/need, while a growing number of people is retired and still consumes these things. We're technologically advanced enough that it won't cause us to starve, but fewer people making things when the same amount of people consumes things will always lead to lower quality of life if technology doesn't offset it by automating labor.
Capitalism is merely the cruelest system at this, since it will always fuck over the vulnerable first. Under capitalism it's a problem for old people and everyone whose elderly parents are still alive, under a fairer system it would equally affect everyone, but to a lesser degree.
Money is a representation of the labor. Do children grow their own food? Do you?
Yes. But the elderly get that money from past labor. Which does not contribute in the present. The entire system of retirement is built on the assumption that you work for more than 1 person until retirement to provide for the elderly (and well, also to provide for children) so that then, once you are retired yourself, the next generation will provide for you.
There being fewer children does feather the effects a little though.
Neither children nor elderly work. Being that children cost more (require more labor input) than elderly, there is a surplus from having fewer children.
As technology improves to reduce workforce needed, it frees up more people to enter elder care workforce.
So things can still balance out.
Ideally social security, Medicaid and Medicare should’ve been implemented as individual accounts. You get what you pay for with an extra amount being collected for disability insurance. Politically impractical but mathematically solves the problem of fluctuating population numbers.
That wouldn't help. Retirement accounts are just as affected by population pyramids as state social welfare systems. They're just obfuscated.
It's going to happen eventually whether you like it or not. The harm has already been done, do not delay the consequences.
When the state pension was introduced in the UK back in the early 20th century it was set at about 2 years below average life expectancy. It just wasn't increased as life expectancy went up. I wouldn't be surprised if other countries are the same.
How many people work in health care now? How many people are under/unemployed? How long will elderly live?
Do you see how this isn't a crisis for anyone but the rich?
You did nothing to explain how it's not a crisis for the poor.
HEALTHCARE has a definitely shortage in alot of areas, nursing, doctors, and there so much fuckery going on with those industries too make it an unattractive option, Nursing you might be enticed to go as a traveling nurse, since they can make a High income earner. Others like CLS have limited amount of schools that will even teach for the certification it requires,(its a grad level certification) and thus the competition for these school is very high, and they all try to come to cali for it.
You're looking at it purely from a present-day perspective. Just because the pool of available workers is large enough today to provide for everybody doesn't mean that it will be fifty years into the future. It's not about "infinite growth" it's about providing a consistent standard of living and a fair generational contract that doesn't place an undue burden on future generations.
Well, there's a simple fix. Since 1970, the standard of living for 90% of the population in the US has been stagnant or declining. We have absolutely increased our GDP, our productivity, and our total economic output. But all the gains have gone to the top 10%. You could tax all economic growth past the 1970 level at 100%, and 90% of the country wouldn't even notice.