.The Case for More Babies Joel E. Cohen What to Expect exceeded 2.1) and yet it grew from 209 of accidents of history and thou­ change" projection is not a prediction. When No One's Expecting: million in 1970 to 310 million in 2010, sands of little choices. It is a "what if" thought experiment. It America's Coming an increase by nearly half. With a fer­ oddly assumes that net migration into Demographic Disaster tility rate that fell steadily from 2.01 in He recognizes that America has other the US remains constant until 2050 by Jonathan V. Last. 1993 to 1.61 in 2009, the population of women: and then declines toward zero: This Encounter, 230 pp., $23.99 China grew from 1.19 billion to 1.33 bil­ assumption is even less realistic than lion. Last's simplification of the Golden Black women have a healthy assuming birth rates and death rates Number omits the crucial effects of mi­ TFR of 1.96. White women, on remain constant at 2010 values through Demography is the key factor. gration to the United States, China's the other hand, have a TFR of 2100. If you are not able to maintain high proportion of young people be­ 1.79. Our national average is only In this scenario, the US population yourself biologically, how do you fore the One-Child policy, as well as boosted because Hispanic women rises to 335 million people in 2040 and expect to maintain yourself eco­ the timing of childbearing and mortal­ are ... having an average of 2.35 then Very slowly declines to 330 mil­ nomically, politically, and militar­ ity, especially child mortality. In Sierra babies. Our concern isn't that lion in 2100, w4ere the projection ends. ily? It's impossible. The answer of Leone in 1995-2000, tlie replacement Hispanic Americans are having America's projected population size letting people from other countries would be larger than it is now (around come in . .. that would be an eco­ 315 million people in 2013) for the re­ nomic solution, but it's not a solu­ mainder of the twenty-first century. Is tion of your real sickness, that you this an imminent crisis for America? are not able to maintain your own Last claims more: "Population con­ civilization. traction is where most of the world is headed." True, more than half - Viktor Orban, the world's women have had below­ Prime Minister of Hungary, 2012 replacement fertility rates since (epigraph of What to Expect When roughly 2003. Still, he ignores that No One's Expecting) global population grew by a billion people from 1999 to 2012 and is cur­ Jonathan Last wants Americans to rently rising by 75-80 million people a have more babies. If we don't, he warns, year (adding every four years or so as the proportion of young people will many people as the current US popula­ fall while the proportion of old people tion). In the UN's "no change" projec­ will rise to unprecedented levels. This tion, global population rises from 7.1 aging of the population will bankrupt billion in 2013 to 18.3 billion by 2100. our retirement system or divert spend­ In the UN's "low fertility" projection, ing from other priorities or- heaven assuming fertility rates that are half a forbid-lead to an increase in taxes. child lower than the UN's best guess, It will weaken America's capacity to global population rises for at least project military power in the world be­ three decades to 8.1 billion in 2046 and cause · families with few offspring will then slowly coasts downward to 6.2 bil­ be reluctant to sacrifice them in battle. lion in 2100, just above the 6.1 billion It will diminish the proportion of inno­ people in the world in 2000. Is this an vators in the economy and lower Amer­ imminent crisis for the world? ica's rate of economic improvement. It will undermine America's competitive position in the world. Last blames what he presents as a cri­ "In the long run," Last writes, "the sis in American fertility rates on "the groups that breed will (literally) inherit ubiquity of college, the delay of mar­ the future." To save America from the Titian: The Worship of Venus, 1518-1520 riage, the birth-control pill, car-seat dire ills that accompany "the long, inex­ laws, [lack of] religious participation, orable process" of demographic decline, level of the fertility rate exceeded 3.4 too many babies . .. The problem the rise of the thousand-dollar stroller, he calls for a resurgent American natal­ children per woman's lifetime because with the elevated fertility level of and Social Security. This is a partial ism-many more babies must be born. of very high death rates in childhood. Hispanic Americans is that it isn't list." Social Security? · What to Expect When No One's Ex­ America's fertility rate of 1.93 chil­ likely to last. pecting is one more in a series of politi­ dren. per woman's lifetime in 2010 Where people's offspring had for cally tendentious books on population does not necessarily mean the average Immigrants usually adjust their fertil­ centuries seen to the financial decline, among them Fred Pearce's The American woman alive in 2010 will ity rates to those of their country of needs of their parents, retired peo­ Coming Population Crash (2010), Ben have 1.93 children in her lifetime, be­ destination. ple with no offspring now [have] Wattenberg's The Birth Dearth (1987) cause fertility rates changed in the past What's wrong if America's fertility access to a set of comparable ben­ and Fewer: How the New Demography and will change in the future. The fer­ rate remains below replacement level? efits. They could free-ride on the of Depopulation Will Shape Our Fu­ tility rate indicates the current level of system. Those programs are ture (2004), and Phillip Longman's The childbearing in a -population. By anal­ The short answer is that sub­ now incentivizing couples to have Empty Cradle: How Falling Birthrates ogy, a speedometer reading of sixty replacement fertility rates even­ fewer- or no-children Threaten World Prosperity, and What miles per h9ur usefully indicates a car's tually lead to a shrinking of to Do About It (2005). current speed, without implying that population-and throughout re­ - i.e., children who would have looked Last claims: "In order for a coun­ the car will be sixty miles further down corded human history, declining after them. That the pensioners who try to maintain a steady population, it the road after one hour (except when populations have always followed had been employed with and without needs a fertility rate of 2.1-remem­ the car operates without interruption or been followed by Very Bad children paid Social Security taxes ber this as the Golden Number. If the under cruise control on a superhighway Things. Disease. War. Economic all their working lives doesn't seem to rate is higher, the country's popula­ with no accidents or congestion). stagnation or collapse. And these matter to Last. tion grows; lower, and it shrinks." The grim tidings from history may be Other causes of America's low fertil­ truth is subtler. If a country has low and in our future, since population ity, in Last's view, include higher edu­ constant death rates, and if migration Last sees the current below­ contraction is where most of the cation for women, women's entry into changes neither numbers nor ages in replacement fertility rates in some world is headed. jobs other than teaching, increasing co­ the population, and if its total fertility parts of America's population as an habitation without producing children, rate is constant at around 2.1 children acute, momentous problem. "In Amer­ Last leaps from America's below­ falling rates of ever marrying by a given per woman's lifetime for a sufficiently ica," he worries, replacement fertility rates to the con­ age, the rise of divorce, the decreasing long period, then in the long run its clusion that American population is percentage of single-family homes, the population size will remain constant. the fertility rate for white, college­ headed for decline. He never says how rising percentage of apartments and When the "ifs" do not hold, however, educated women-we'll use them soon that could happen. The United condominiums, frequent change of a fertility rate below 2.1 no longer pre­ because they serve as a fair proxy Nations Population Division in 20W residence, the high cost of land, and, of dicts population decline. The popula­ for our middle class-is 1.6. In calculated the future size of the popula­ course, the Supreme Court. tion of the United States had a fertility other words, America has created tion of every country in the world if nei­ The· Supreme Court's first mistake, rate below 2.1 from 1971 to 2010 (ex­ its very own One-Child Policy. It's ther birth rates nor death rates changed Last writes, was its erroneous deci­ cept in 2006 and 2007, when it slightly soft and unintentional, the result from their current values. This "no sion in Griggs v. Duke Power (1971) April24, 2014 57 to outlaw using racially discriminatory they pass exams for specific subjects. is destiny... Never has that been more which also makes childbearing difficult test results in employment decisions. According to Walter Russell Mead, true than today." But no: Last states and costly) conflicts with bearing and Because "the Court held that employ­ who originated this idea, "Subject that "demography is not destiny" and rearing children within a stable family ers could not rely on IQ -type tests if exams calibrated to a national stan­ warns that "we should be careful never (which entails parental sacrifice, per­ minorities performed relatively poorly dard would give employers something to confuse the two." Still, his entire sonal and economic).