We're Doing This to Ourselves: What's Really Behind The Birthrate Crisis | Weds LIVE Ep.64
The Jeremy Boreing ShowShow Notes
The most advanced, most comfortable civilization in human history is choosing not to have children. The U.S. fertility rate is near 1.6, well under the 2.1 needed to replace a population. South Korea hit 0.72, the lowest ever recorded. Why is this happening, and can it be reversed?
Jeremy Boreing sits down with neuroscientist Dr. Debra Soh, sociologist Dr. Brad Wilcox, and economist Dr. Catherine Pakaluk to dig into the biology, the ideology, and the policy behind the birth dearth, and what it would take to turn it around.
They cover why people stopped pairing up, marrying, and having kids, the "fertility gap" between the families women want and the families they actually have, what the sexual revolution did to family formation, Hungary's pro-natalist experiment and what worked and what didn't, why religious families are the one group still having children, the tragedy of abortion, and whether there's any government or cultural path back to replacement-level fertility.
Featuring:
Dr. Debra Soh — Neuroscientist and author of Sextinction: The Decline of Sex and the Future of Intimacy
Dr. Brad Wilcox — Director, National Marriage Project at UVA; author of Get Married
Dr. Catherine Pakaluk — Economist at The Catholic University of America; author of Hannah's Children
00:00:00 The Birth Rate Crisis
00:04:02 Meet the Panel
00:04:59 Why Marriage Is Collapsing
00:12:02 Government, Birth Control & Family
00:20:53 Chastity & the Capstone Model
00:30:41 A Suicidal Civilization?
00:39:59 Who Will Have Descendants?
00:45:19 Casual Sex & Regret
00:58:55 Faith, Mission & Big Families
01:15:34 Divorce Fears & the Prenup Debate
01:33:12 Do Pro-Family Policies Work?
01:40:02 Agency & False Fears
01:58:06 Smartphones & the Sexes
02:14:34 Sex, Marriage & Faith
02:20:59 Hope for Gen Z
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