There are six (maybe more, but I have six so far) factors in low nuptiality (marriage rates)[1] and consequently sub-replacement fertility, under the headings of religion, medicine, technology, geography, sociology, and ethics.
1. Secularism. Secular populations are less fertile than highly religious populations.
2. Infant survival (low infant mortality).
3. Mechanisation particularly of agriculture.
4. Urbanisation.
5. Credentialism, the social requirement for people to spend an increasing fraction of their fertile years in pre-employment education. Simple literacy is also pretty important in causing early fertility decline in developing countries.
6. Universalism together with a tolerance for inequality. Universalism is applying the same rules to everyone, so women can enter the workforce and make their own life decisions just as men do. Tolerance for inequality I hope I don't have to explain. (I am split whether this is one factor or two.)
There is some interlinkage in these, they are not all totally orthogonal, but they are all fairly distinct dimensions of the problem.
Japan (and South Korea, and China) max out on credentialism and tolerance for inequality but also score highly in all of the others.
Finally this is a great example of one of Iain Banks's "Outside Context Problems".
More than a black swan, it's a problem that governments are simply not equipped to understand or in some cases even see, so they can't do anything to solve it.
1. Secularism. Secular populations are less fertile than highly religious populations.
2. Infant survival (low infant mortality).
3. Mechanisation particularly of agriculture.
4. Urbanisation.
5. Credentialism, the social requirement for people to spend an increasing fraction of their fertile years in pre-employment education. Simple literacy is also pretty important in causing early fertility decline in developing countries.
6. Universalism together with a tolerance for inequality. Universalism is applying the same rules to everyone, so women can enter the workforce and make their own life decisions just as men do. Tolerance for inequality I hope I don't have to explain. (I am split whether this is one factor or two.)
There is some interlinkage in these, they are not all totally orthogonal, but they are all fairly distinct dimensions of the problem.
Japan (and South Korea, and China) max out on credentialism and tolerance for inequality but also score highly in all of the others.
Finally this is a great example of one of Iain Banks's "Outside Context Problems".
More than a black swan, it's a problem that governments are simply not equipped to understand or in some cases even see, so they can't do anything to solve it.
1. https://www.allendowney.com/blog/2020/10/21/millennials-are-...