Just imagine. The entire modern economy, pretty much anywhere, but certainly in any “Western” nation, is now based on the idea that everyone male and female, works full time…
Universities have become wholly female-dominated. So have many, many professional fields. Most workplaces cater to the wants of middle-class women. So does most government messaging. So does the entire “field” of HR and recruiting…
At the same time, birth rates are crashing to totally unsustainable levels. Children aren’t raised properly at all, and are shipped off to “childcare” or to older relatives, as early as possible. Parents no longer no, or care, how to raise kids.
Cook for your family? Congrats, you’re an outlier. Most people seem to view cooking as some sort of “luxury”, and instead base most meals on either frozen shit, or takeaway and deliver, depending on their background…
Marriage is broken, and hell, most millennials don’t even bother with it. Divorces are higher than ever, and many couples barely even see, or talk to, each other, let alone their kids, anymore. So many kids are from broken homes, now, whatever their background or race…
Yet jobs are still flying offshore (never mind automation. It’s not there yet), and immigrants are still piling in to every Western country, partly to keep the birth rates up, and partly to keep house prices and rents ever increasing… Oh, and to push wages down, of course.
This, despite more “locals” working than ever before. This, despite women demanding ever more catering to from corporate, and all of the “equity” bullshit…
There’s no way any of this is sustainable, and yet it is everywhere… In every single “developed” country.
Some people here like to talk about Russia, but christ, look at their birth rates. Look at China, too. It’s not just “American allies and adjacents” that this is affecting. It’s almost everywhere, with a few very notable exceptions…
Amazing to think that “women's rights” and runaway corporatism, plus unlimited contraceptives (arguably) may be what dooms us, let alone all the trans kids raised on hormones shit…
I would say that maybe some parts of humanity can still correct this ship, but I’m not so sure anymore…
I doubt even in 1980 people would have thought that fucking Nigeria and India would inherit the Earth, but here we are…
/rant
Japan has had an average birth rate per one person of less than 1 for decades.
It is the safest and most civilized country in the world.
I don’t agree with the need to have exponential growth or replace the next generation with immigrants.
Supposedly the hypergamy of educated Japanese women is just as bad or even worse than the US, leading to the typical hordes of careerist spinsters.
Most women I know of my approximate age and younger are highly educated (generally Masters or two undergrads), high-income, at least near parity with their partner…
Or they’re single, and as you say, won’t “date down” (so zero chance for me, lol)…
Pretty much none are less independently “successful” than their respective partners or exes…
It’s all rather an inversion of some aspects of how this all used to work, but at the same time they still want to find someone more successful…
It’s unsustainable, imho…
I think that very example will soon cause a backlash in the younger generations, if it isn't already happening.
Women were sold the idea of "having it all" in the 80s; fulfilling career, loving husband, state-raised kids. But now we've had a chance to look at the result and it's far from the pie in the sky.
Divorce rates jumped. Birth rates plunged. As another poster mentioned, a huge percentage of women now need anti-anxiety meds just to function; they aren't even happier.
We had never tried this before so who could have said, with evidence, "This won't work"?
Now we can, and the younger generations are waking up.
Gen Z males are already waking up. They're not as visible as the soy suckers and legbeards because the media doesn't want them to be, but they're the ones who flocked to Andrew Tate in droves. The women of that generation are as horrible as ever unfortunately. I also don't have much hope for Gen alpha women barring a massive external shock. It's not like women of previous generations shaped up in response to the cultural rot. The men have to wake up because they're the ones who will suffer the consequences if they don't. I feel like millennials were the first to notice how fucked up things are but only a small fringe were serious about dealing with the problem. It's more mainstream with Gen Z, but plenty of those guys are still fucked up from the nonsense. I think that Gen alpha men are going to be the ones with the ability to fix shit when they come of age. Either that or they'll just go MGTOW en mass. That will mostly depend on whether women shape up.
There's also the problem that if you don't produce any young people, you end up with a top-heavy age pyramid of elderly who need looking after by someone...
Unless you want the "welfare state" to collapse, which Japan obviously does not.
So this problem becomes extremely significant even before societal collapse and "going extinct" becomes a real possibility...
As you say, Japan is stable now, but in a few decades? Children of Men has pretty much already shown us one possible outcome...
Eat the Old, lol
World wide birthrates will eventually fall below replacement. The pyramid scheme is going to end sooner or later.
It's just not as simple as that, though... See below.
Now ≠ how the situation will be in 20 years time.