10 Comments

Putting aside the government's role in all this, is there real world evidence it would be effective? Hungary offers such a program, their fertility rate did go up I believe but not a whole lot.

Furthermore, I would start by removing incentives the government gives against marriage, such as paying women to stay single if they have children. I don't believe it's an issue of money or of work life balance, or else Sweden would have a much higher fertility. It's clearly an issue of values.

This is a recent paper on Pro Natalist policies in Eastern Europe. I'd take the finding with a grain of salt since a lot of research is biased but the real world effects need to be looked at, not just circular chickens in a vacuum.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/social-policy-and-society/article/trying-to-reverse-demographic-decline-pronatalist-and-family-policies-in-russia-poland-and-hungary/3A37FB42837F6CA05C91F5B1BB463E64

Expand full comment

That question occurred to me, too. In fact, Canada has been paying pretty generous child benefits for many decades and it doesn't seem to have worked. I think Hanson's point is that you it makes sense to offer *huge* payments (@$350k/kid) to move the needle. I don't think anyone has ever tried that.

And, of course, the thing about "unintended consequences" is that they're usually unexpected. Who can imagine how people would game and scam programs involving this kind of money - or how it might possibly corrupt the Orthodox world?

Expand full comment

Collapse of civilization and the decrease of IQ in the general population is not likely to benefit the Jews. It will make the Jewish influence, domination and malfiesance more prominent and with the weaking of the wealfare state undermine the foundations of the current lifestyle of many rapidly growing Orthodox communities. With the rise of racial and religious conflicts, identity politics, populism, social strife and instability the level of antisemitism is likely to rise as well and the Jews will likely find themselves in a familiar historical environment. Our history is written by our genes and for the duration of it we have been a foreign element in the society of the host nations. No people like to be dominated, even if it is mostly a perception, by a foreign minority and the history will repeat itself.

Is it good for the country that I'm living in? - is the proper question to be asking, not 'Is it good for the Jews'.

None of this is relevant to the Aimish who just want to be left alone to live their simple pure lives.

Expand full comment

Great article btw! All this initiative would do Is increase child abuse exponentially as many who are not interested in raising kids will have one.

Expand full comment

I guess that's one of the many potential unexpected consequences. And speaking of child abuse, I would imagine such an initiative could rescue public schools... :)

Expand full comment

My dear friend, this post misses the mark and has terrible suggestions.

'Similar to how Christians came to dominate the Roman Empire. These groups reject many of the dominant world culture’s cherished values, including innovation and open debate. '

Barking up the wrong tree. The problem is that the European nations and demographics which have created the modern free technological society are not reproducing. The other races do not have this problem. It just happens to be that the European races are genetically superior and have higher IQs and this what enabled them to advance. Bringing black, brown and Asian races to the Western world is ruining it, because people create the culture, the culture doesn't create people. Giving financial incentives will only increase the desgenic reproduction of the non-european races. Government subsidies have already been doing this for decades.

Expand full comment

Actually, nearly all the world's countries are looking at serious population declines either now or in the next 20 years. Mulsim worldwide population growth, for example, is dropping fast (from a fertility rate of 4.3 in 1990-1995 down to just 2.9 in 2015 and even lower in more recent years - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_population_growth). That trend suggests that their US-based population won't be a significant factor in the time-frame we're talking about.

And, of course, the Chinese government is said to be frantic about their situation (https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/12/05/key-facts-about-chinas-declining-population/).

You're absolutely correct that throwing tons of government money around seldom ends the way we expect - and adds copious opportunities for corruption. But I believe we should at least talk about the problem...and about how various solutions might impact our own communities.

Expand full comment

The US is in a downward spiral and is going to be a majority non-european nation in a few years. Western Europe is moving in the same direction. Ibn Chaldun has written about decline of civilizations 700 years ago "Lessons, Record of Beginnings and Events in the History of the Arabs and the Berbers and Their Powerful Contemporaries". See 'The Bell Curve' for the IQ studies. What is causing the collapse of civilization isn't the world birth rate and the future dangers do not come from the Aimish or the Jews. The declining birth rate of the low IQ and the non-european demographics is a blessing for the world and the sooner it comes the better. Roman Emipre was unsuccesfully trying to reverse the decline with material incentives to the Roman citizens ONLY, you can read about it. At this point the future is very bleak and I don't believe that there is a road back.

There are enough incentives as is for the low IQ demographic.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2008/jun/21/usa

Expand full comment

There are (and have always been) plenty of serious problems within any civilization, even within homogeneous, high-IQ ethnic groups. Elizabethan England was - for all its great literature and innovative politics - a pretty violent, filthy, and nasty place. And plenty of civilizations have declined and failed - each for its own set of reasons.

The western world will eventually follow them, and things will almost certainly get messy. But all things being equal, I'd prefer it didn't happen in my lifetime. And if pushing back against even one of many risk factors might help incrementally, I'm game.

Expand full comment

In the context of its historical period Elizabethian England was an ascending civilization.

Offering incentives of $350,000 per child will only speed the decline. Stopping the immigration of the low IQ races would help, but will not happen. Eventually there simply will not be enough high IQ people in the population to advance the society or even maintain it at the present level.

Expand full comment