Yesterday, I told you Mexico’s total fertility rate is at 1.2. Today, let me remind you that Argentina’s total fertility rate is at 1.05: screenshot from the Argentine statistical agency below. Yes, 1.05. Argentina, in 2014, was at 2.3: a drop of more than 50% in a decade.
And before you tell me “it’s Milei’s/the Peronists’/Leo Messi’s fault,” remember the following: of the 236 countries and territories on the planet, 219 have a clear negative trend in fertility. Of the remaining 17, I’d say the trend is negative as well in probably 16, although statistical methods have a hard time picking it up for one reason or another. The remaining one? Israel.
So, if you think fertility is going down in your country because of some country-specific reason X, well, you might want to think twice.
South Korea – A cautionary tale for the rest of humanity - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46230576 - December 2025 (177 comments) ("Childbearing decisions are memetically influenced. They are shaped by the decisions peers make and the examples they see around them in everyday life.")
Childbearing decisions are memetically influenced. They are shaped by the decisions peers make and the examples they see around them in everyday life.
Surely this explanation is circular. People look around and see that their peers are having fewer kids. But why are their peers having fewer kids to begin with? There has to be a backstop somewhere otherwise you get infinite regress.
Because children are expensive, in time, fiat, and opportunity cost while the freedom of being childfree is free if you choose to have less or no children. Social media allows for the socialization of these ideas at speed versus historical transmission rate of culture and social norms. This is covered most robustly in my Birthgap video citation above, additional citation below (by the same author as the tweet that is this post).
"As of 2026, humanity is likely below replacement fertility. That has never happened before, not in wars or pandemics. But the real surprise is that the fall has been concentrated in low- and middle-income countries and among poorer and less educated women. We fit a single-factor model to 236 countries since 1950: the common component peaked in 1978, and what drives fertility down today are country-specific trends, 219 of them negative and not one leveling off. None of the commonly cited mechanisms can account for this pattern, so we offer a conjecture: modernity itself, which makes a third child expensive and childlessness cheap. Children come in integers, so it takes very little to move a cohort’s fertility rate from 1.8 to 1.3. And nothing in an economy pushes fertility back to 2.1. We close with the main economic consequences, in particular slow growth."
There has to be a backstop somewhere otherwise you get infinite regress.
In summary, the global population boom happened because women were not educated and empowered to assert their reproductive choices. They are now. We are currently performing neutral fertility rate discovery via who does and does not choose to have children when it is a choice, versus when it is not a choice or forgone conclusion. A byproduct of this was economic growth, which is coming to an end, and will not repeat in our lifetimes based on demographic trends and trajectories.
If the global baby boom lead to all the technological and lifestyle improvements of the twentieth century, I’m getting a little nervous for them twenty first…
That's a big if. The largest technological improvements (electrification, internal combustion, antibiotics, plumbing) mostly arrived before the post-1950 population explosion, and productivity growth slowed right as population growth peaked in the late 60s. What drove tech innovation was research and R&D spending, much of it funded by governments as part of war efforts.
"Fertility rate" is a bit confusing because it implies some biological reason like microplastic in the balls or something. Like the inability to have kids rather the the choice to not break your body, or to spawn in more suffering into the world which this seems to be about.
It's just a term of art with a longstanding specific meaning, just like any other term of art. No one even passingly familiar with the topic would be confused by it here.
People are not optimistic about the future, and why should they be?
The previously "looming" climate crisis that we did little to nothing to slow down is here, now, and the real-world negative effects of it are getting worse faster than the predictions that a lot of people used to label as alarmist.
Economic inequality is teetering nearly all of the world's economies on the brink of runaway major crises.
I'm stuck here in this ridiculous society we're running off a cliff, but I don't have to doom anyone else to this fate by having kids.
This completely and entirely ignores what was actually happening in Argentina over the past 10 years, and I think the reason is the same as everywhere else: cost of living is too high. Argentina was in a state of hyperinflation in 2023.
It’s the inflation itself, not the cost of living. Inflation does weird things sociologically and psychologically, you’re messing with the fabric of human economic relations which is implicated in status hierarchies and assortative mating
funny enough before people used to make estimates of how earth won't have resources to carry a large population. hence some people would need to settle in space or that there needs to a massive drive in birth control, which led to Chinese 1 child policy which has had a devastating effect.
https://archive.today/IO7lA
https://ourworldindata.org/population-simulation-tool?demogr...
https://ourworldindata.org/which-countries-have-already-pass...
Peak population forecasted for 2050.
South Korea – A cautionary tale for the rest of humanity - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46230576 - December 2025 (177 comments) ("Childbearing decisions are memetically influenced. They are shaped by the decisions peers make and the examples they see around them in everyday life.")
Birthgap [video] - https://youtube.com/watch?v=m2GeVG0XYTc
Surely this explanation is circular. People look around and see that their peers are having fewer kids. But why are their peers having fewer kids to begin with? There has to be a backstop somewhere otherwise you get infinite regress.
Because children are expensive, in time, fiat, and opportunity cost while the freedom of being childfree is free if you choose to have less or no children. Social media allows for the socialization of these ideas at speed versus historical transmission rate of culture and social norms. This is covered most robustly in my Birthgap video citation above, additional citation below (by the same author as the tweet that is this post).
Terra Incognita: The Economics of a Shrinking World [pdf] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49352811 - August 2026
In summary, the global population boom happened because women were not educated and empowered to assert their reproductive choices. They are now. We are currently performing neutral fertility rate discovery via who does and does not choose to have children when it is a choice, versus when it is not a choice or forgone conclusion. A byproduct of this was economic growth, which is coming to an end, and will not repeat in our lifetimes based on demographic trends and trajectories.
If the global baby boom lead to all the technological and lifestyle improvements of the twentieth century, I’m getting a little nervous for them twenty first…
Aren't you confusing causes and consequences here?
Correlation and causation
That's a big if. The largest technological improvements (electrification, internal combustion, antibiotics, plumbing) mostly arrived before the post-1950 population explosion, and productivity growth slowed right as population growth peaked in the late 60s. What drove tech innovation was research and R&D spending, much of it funded by governments as part of war efforts.
Wait, now I'm nervous...
To be fair, you too would keep it in your pants if the chainsaw massacre guy was holding the fate of your nation in his hands.
More seriously, who can start a family when economy is this unstable?
sorry, current president only 3 years in power. what 10 years are you speaking about?
also, by many stats Argentina is more stable of what it was before. what stat you refer indicates less stability?
seems peronista detected here.
On the plus side, if it can change that fast, it can grow again too.
I've heard explanations for South Korea's low birth rate but they seemed country specific. What is it about Argentina?
"Fertility rate" is a bit confusing because it implies some biological reason like microplastic in the balls or something. Like the inability to have kids rather the the choice to not break your body, or to spawn in more suffering into the world which this seems to be about.
It's just a term of art with a longstanding specific meaning, just like any other term of art. No one even passingly familiar with the topic would be confused by it here.
Fertility rate is dropping almost everywhere.
People are not optimistic about the future, and why should they be?
The previously "looming" climate crisis that we did little to nothing to slow down is here, now, and the real-world negative effects of it are getting worse faster than the predictions that a lot of people used to label as alarmist.
Economic inequality is teetering nearly all of the world's economies on the brink of runaway major crises.
I'm stuck here in this ridiculous society we're running off a cliff, but I don't have to doom anyone else to this fate by having kids.
This completely and entirely ignores what was actually happening in Argentina over the past 10 years, and I think the reason is the same as everywhere else: cost of living is too high. Argentina was in a state of hyperinflation in 2023.
It’s the inflation itself, not the cost of living. Inflation does weird things sociologically and psychologically, you’re messing with the fabric of human economic relations which is implicated in status hierarchies and assortative mating
Climate crisis and economic crisis both prevent people from wanting kids.
There has been much higher fertility during much worse times. They don’t really have much explanatory power on their own.
It's dropping almost everywhere because the world is slowing urbanizing and abandoning subsistence agriculture.
Look up the ARS/USD exchange rate: 8x drop since 2016. USD itself has lost 50% of its value since then.
children of men becoming prophetic day by day.
funny enough before people used to make estimates of how earth won't have resources to carry a large population. hence some people would need to settle in space or that there needs to a massive drive in birth control, which led to Chinese 1 child policy which has had a devastating effect.
Everyone is staring at their screens and miss out talking to their partner about the future, a family and making love.