My biggest concern is not that fertility rate is low/population decline is happening, it’s that it’s happening way too quickly for society to be able to handle it.
We’re talking like 4 old people per child (estimated number). Not only would it be a massive strain on the economy to have so many elderly people/retirees to take care of, older people will also have a highly disproportionate account of political power due to their relative abundance. If it’s already such a big deal that boomers were twisting the political landscape for their gain, I shudder to think what would happen at this larger and longer scale.
All of this is going to be a breeding ground for misogyny and right-wing ideology. We’ve already seen it in South Korea.
Plus, without younger people to take up the mantle, many industries that we rely on will need to downsize, and a lot of institutional knowledge will be lost. Many roles that require a “master-to-apprentice” style of learning will be lost and will be unable to recover, even if the population started growing again.
Fox News has the wrong take here, as it is wont to have. But we genuinely should be really concerned that birth rates across all developed countries are this low below replacement rate and are still dropping