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Home » The Case For Having Kids: Wajahat Ali (Transcript)

The Case For Having Kids: Wajahat Ali (Transcript)

Here is the full transcript of Wajahat Ali’s talk titled “The Case For Having Kids” at TED conference.

Listen to the audio version here:

TRANSCRIPT:

I’m an Exhausted Dad

I’m an exhausted dad, currently owned and dominated by two mini dictators who rule my life with an iron fist while wearing their Huggies diapers. Now, probably because I’ve been drowning in small people lately, I’ve been paying close attention to a particular headline. It seems around the world, in developed countries, people are having fewer babies. From North America to Europe to China to Japan, there’s actually been a consistent decline in birth rates.

In fact, over the past 50 years, the global fertility rate has halved. “What the heck is going on?” Now, my friends who don’t want kids all point to climate change as a reason for never having babies. And many of you are sitting there right now, saying, “Waj, there’s also overpopulation, there’s also high birth rates, which still exist in many African and Middle Eastern countries, there’s also orphan kids who still need parents, there’s also a lack of resources to go around for everyone, and oh, by the way, we have a ginormous carbon footprint that is destroying this planet.” I hear you, I hear you.

And yet, despite all this chaos, I still think we should have babies. I believe we can and should fight for the earth and humanity, side by side. Now, if I could take it personal for a second, I get it, I get why some of you might be skeptical about having babies.

Here’s a photo of my wife and me before we had kids. Young, happy, fresh. Here’s a photo of me after having kids. A broken, defeated husk of a man. Here’s the photo of the car I thought I’d be driving as an adult. A Porsche. Here’s what I actually drive. A Honda Odyssey minivan. Where there was once hope, now there is convenient space, and good mileage, good mileage.

Now, I just want to stress that I’m completely aware of the very dire threats of global warming and climate change. I just want to acknowledge that choosing to have babies is a deeply, profoundly personal choice. And that many who want to are unable. But just for today, let’s examine the flip side of the coin.

The Global Fertility Dilemma

At how not having enough new people is going to be a major problem moving forward. According to the World Health Organization, we need to average about 2.1 children per woman today just so we have enough people to replace the previous generation. A lot of you thought overpopulation was going to be a problem in 100 years — yeah, it might be underpopulation. So a question: what happens if that number dips below 2.1?

There’s going to be a domino effect. As all of us get older, and live longer, there’s going to be a shrinking younger population, which is going to lead to rising labor shortages in the world’s biggest economies. I’m talking about United States, China, Japan, Germany. Fewer younger working people means less tax revenue. Less tax revenue means less money and resources to go to safety net programs that all of us are going to depend upon. I’m talking about pensions and health care. It seems every generation is indeed connected.

But how the heck did we get here in the first place? Well, in some cases, it was intentional. Let’s take the DeLorean to simpler times. Let’s stop in China. Somewhere between the death of disco and “Empire Strikes Back” — 1980. In 1980, China decided to implement the one-child policy, largely limiting most parents to having just one kid to combat overpopulation. Check out some good old-fashioned Chinese propaganda, lovely.

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Now, fast-forward to 2019. Even after ending its one-child policy in 2015, China’s birth rates have largely declined. In fact, the falling population in China is removing one of its biggest drivers of growth — people. If trends continue, China’s population is actually going to peak in 2029, before entering “unstoppable decline.” China’s government is so freaked out right now that it’s actually doing new propaganda — it’s begging couples to have children for the country.

Let’s take the DeLorean and hop over to Japan, home of my beloved Honda Odyssey minivan. Japan is now producing more adult diapers than infant ones. The number of kids in Japan has fallen for the 37th straight year. And unlike other countries, it has not been able to replace its population numbers through immigrant workers. There will be labor shortages and not enough money to fund the safety-net programs.

Attempts to Boost Birth Rates

Now, Japan has introduced two solutions. First, a financial incentive. Some local governments in Japan have offered couples money to have babies, with the money increasing with each additional child being born. This actually worked for one year in 2014 in this town called Ama. It actually raised the birth rate from about 1.66 kids per woman to 1.8. But it did not gain traction across Japan.

In 2018, a leader of Japan’s ruling party tried a new tack. He told young people, “You’re selfish for not having babies.” Shockingly, shaming was not a rousing aphrodisiac. Surprise, I know, surprise. Who would have thought?

Let’s take the DeLorean to Europe, the continent of delicious cheeses I love to eat but cannot pronounce. The UK and much of Western Europe has a birth rate of about 1.7 kids per woman, which at least is better than Hungary, where it hovers around 1.45. Now, Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orbán has proposed a new solution to try to incentivize people to have kids. He said families where the women have four or more kids will no longer pay income tax. Pretty good, right, pretty good. At least it’s better than Russia’s 2007 proposal, which once offered women in a particular region the opportunity of winning a fridge if they had more kids.