High income households have access to the world’s best leisure opportunities, yet they still invest more time in child-rearing than lower income households.
I doubt they invest more time. They have money to pay for more help with childcare. And I think this is the critical difference.
Time spent on care per child has skyrocketed in recent decades. I think that’s one major factor driving down fertility: having kids is a bigger PITA every year.
Thinking of costs solely terms of money is a mistake. The time investment is critical.
This is why I’m unconcerned with low fertility if we get AI progress and don’t die from it: AI is going to be great at childcare. Even current LLMs have the cognitive capacity to be good tutors and playmates.
Time spent on care per child could be an effect of decreasing fertility instead of a cause. The fewer children you have, the more time you can spend on each one.
It could be but that’s clearly not the whole deal. Societal standards for childcare have shifted dramatically. That could be driven by people having fewer children and also causing it, in a vicious cycle.
I doubt they invest more time. They have money to pay for more help with childcare. And I think this is the critical difference.
Time spent on care per child has skyrocketed in recent decades. I think that’s one major factor driving down fertility: having kids is a bigger PITA every year.
Thinking of costs solely terms of money is a mistake. The time investment is critical.
This is why I’m unconcerned with low fertility if we get AI progress and don’t die from it: AI is going to be great at childcare. Even current LLMs have the cognitive capacity to be good tutors and playmates.
Time spent on care per child could be an effect of decreasing fertility instead of a cause. The fewer children you have, the more time you can spend on each one.
It could be but that’s clearly not the whole deal. Societal standards for childcare have shifted dramatically. That could be driven by people having fewer children and also causing it, in a vicious cycle.