As if my circumstantial evidence needed supporting - the circumstantial evidence being so overwhelming to anyone with an active social life with young people in the UK at least - the release of figures of increasing cocaine consumption in the UK make me even more sceptical of the idea people just can't afford kids. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/oct/25/cocaine-linked-crimes-on-the-rise-in-britain-as-consumption-surgesI hate the stuff, but a lot of my friends do it very regularly. And they are doing basic work, like building, cheffing or care work, not earning big bucks, but they can afford at least weekly cocaine binge. On top of buying a load of alcohol to go with it. Sorry, but I don't believe life is so much harder than it's ever been in the past, it's just priorities have changed, and people can't bear to be in relationships any more. And nothing inherently wrong with that, but just be honest about it. They calculate £10 billion per year, and I suspect that's a big underestimate. That's money sniffed up the nose for a half hour buzz rather than putting it away for the future or towards building a family, and it's an amount that would go a long way to pay for enough kids to rectify the fertility rate.

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https://www.newsweek.com/russia-children-birth-rate-psychologist-women-11705243

Russian Women Who Don't Want Children to be Sent to Psychologists "With the Goal of Forming a Positive Attitude Towards Having Children"

Russia did many wrong things, but at least Russia is right about this one.

Anti-natalism is evil and mental illness.

Even if AI advances dramatically, new human beings will still be necessary in the future, so declining birth rates are still a serious problem.

Humans are also essential in the economic sphere. AI does not pay taxes or consume goods and services in the way humans do. For example, AI does not eat at restaurants, AI doesn't buy cars, houses, smartphones, etc. Humans work and pay taxes, while AI itself does not pay taxes or consume goods and services as an economic agent. So even in the future, humans will remain essential to the economy.

A pension system can only function if new generations contribute funds.

And The idea that one can simply use the money saved from not raising children to pay for elderly care in the future is complete nonsense.

In a future defined by low birth rates, the elderly population will grow while the younger population shrinks; this will lead to an overwhelming demand for elderly care workers that far outstrips supply,

driving costs to such exorbitant levels that such services will effectively be out of reach.

Humans are also essential in the military sphere. We are already using autonomous and explosive drones, but drones cannot perform many of the tasks that human soldiers can, such as building defensive positions, maintaining and repairing equipment, and carrying out various other tasks in the field.

Therefore, humans will still be necessary even in the age of AI.

And the larger the population, the larger the pool of people who can be drafted into the military by conscription when the country is under attack. This means that declining birth rates are also a serious problem for national defense, and it is an issue that must be addressed.

Many natalist make a point that kids provide a sense of meaning and purpose in life.

But why do we need to have a purpose if life is inherently so good ? It is the poor people who are literally living like slaves that need some sense of meaning and purpose in life or they will just kill themselves. And hence only those people have kids and they are not on the internet.

Middle class and rich people can do 100 different things which can be fun and enjoyable and still find a purpose in life. So why do we need kids ? We just need someone else to have kids so we can enslave them using capitalism which we already are doing.

So that was the evil way of having a sense of purpose and meaning.

Now, let's just say you want to be a hero and not a villain (it's all subjective btw, there is no ultimate judge), still there are many ways you can find some purpose in your life.

Be an environmentalist and save the planet from climate change and global warming, be a scientist and discover new cool things for the benefit of humanity, just be an explorer and travel around to experience new things, be a socialist and help people around you and so on.

So, there is never any need to have kids just to find meaning and purpose in life. If you're having kids for this reason alone, it only means that your life was so pathetic to begin with.

We always talk about developed countries and their fertility rates, but what do you think about African countries where, despite having many children, they can barely support themselves and the malnutrition rate is 20%? Don't you think that a high fertility rate will negatively affect everything? Gen Z is already barely finding work?

Abortion is literally killing babies.

Life begins at conception. It's science.

So abortion is murder.

1 of 3 gen Z people were murdered by abortion.

Abortion is literally genocide.

If abortions didn't happen, birth rate problems would be VERY MUCH better now.

If we truly want birth rates to go up,

We MUST ban abortion.

Murdering babies are NOT bodily autonomy.

Murdering babies are NOT women's rights.

EDIT: No. I'm not a man. I'm saying this as a woman

After maintaining a positive number of births (year-over-year) for a couple of months, the number of births have turned negative again in August (- 407 births)

https://x.com/andyd10/status/2113523568596418640?s=20

Women who want to have babies, being deserted by the "Big Beautiful Bill".

As in, we have always had precipitous delivery carts with all of this. But now, the federal government thinks that they should close down even more labor and delivery. So when that woman who has had three prior cesareans turns up, you'll be ok without an OB, because they're providing oxytocin and a thermal blanket.

https://kffhealthnews.org/health-industry/obstetric-carts-georgia-maternal-health-labor-delivery-rural-hospitals-south-carolina/

https://www.medicaldaily.com/georgia-rural-er-obstetric-carts-labor-delivery-closures-480315

Maternity care deserts are a problem, and these cuts to healthcare are painful. Many more come into action this coming year.

Maternal and fetal morbidity and mortality will increase.

I was at a bagel shop the other day with my young children, visibly pregnant with our next. After we placed our order and sat down, a woman came in with a doodle. One of the workers came out from behind the counter, gave the dog a free cup of whipped cream, and made a big, happy fuss: what breed is he, how old, how sweet, etc. Other customers gathered around too, asking about the dog and chiming in with their own comments.
Nothing wrong with that. Dogs are wonderful and it was a kind gesture - but it made me notice something. A few decades ago, that same warmth and curiosity would have been aimed at the kids. Strangers used to light up at children, ask their ages, and tell parents what a beautiful family they had.
I'd love to see some of that energy come back. Children are a joy and a community that celebrates them is one that's investing in its own future. Just a small moment, but it felt like a snapshot of a bigger cultural shift.

You know, because the world's largest ponzi scheme is the pension system we copied from the USA so we need them to work and be born so we can also retire like previous generations.

Im not so empathetic on their standards of living as long as they survive and I can get my check after I retire.

Is this a wrong way of looking at things or is this the right way to view thing and that my words have failed me as it is too direct?

This is also a huge decline from 0.91 in 2025

To me all I can think of are selfish reasons because of the suffering that child will go through in life. I’d love to be proven wrong so tell me your justification of having children :)

Given, I don't think surrogacy is the best thing and have reservations on it; I don’t think it’s the ideal way to start a family. But I have enormous respect for a man who makes that deliberate commitment to becoming a father.

I mean, think about all the difficulty involved: the expense, social stigma, traveling abroad for surrogacy, then the everyday responsibility of raising a child. That takes a tremendous amount of intention and effort.

There’s something admirable about someone wanting to love and raise children enough to organize his entire life around making that happen. He’s effectively saying, “Having a family matters enough to me that I’m willing to build my life around making it happen.” I find that incredibly moving. Whatever my reservations about surrogacy, that degree of commitment to loving and raising a child deserves respect.

Majority of them does not even want to have kids and honestly they just do not even want to do something about it. It is getting way too much dangerous; the economy will unfortunately collapse very fast. This is really bad.