MADDOG'S LAIR
  • Blog
  • About
  • Contact

Italy's birth rate apocalypse

6/1/2016

Comments

 
Why Italy's facing a birth rate apocalypse

This article may be well meaning but it gets pretty much everything wrong.

​More after the jump.
"Italian women give birth to 1.39 children on average, compared the 1.58 average across the EU."

The EU average of 1.58 is apocalypse, and Italy is worse. 

The idea that the problem is too little state welfare, is also ridiculous. The problem is the state takes too much money from the average citizen, and the state regulates the employer/employee relationship too much, and the state is too deeply entrenched in the lives and work of the people. 

In Europe, the average citizen is little more than a tax slave. They work for a modest income, the government take the majority of it, the government taxes and regulates every industry, and commodity to near extinction, causing the costs of living to be astronomical. The costs of energy, fuel, food, transportation, transit, and everything else is silly expensive. All to feed the gargantuan appetite of government.

The choice for the average person is to have one child and be cash strapped, have two and be cash poor, or have no children and live like an American lower middle to middle class. 

The cost of living cost is so high for each child, there is very little incentive to have them. The idea that this will  be assuaged by a few hundred Euros per month is absurd. 

Equally absurd is the idea that the people of Italy will change their government to lessen the security element. These are the descendants of the people who chose to not emigrate to the US because they liked the high security, low responsibility factors of the dying ancient Italian/European economic system circa 1850-1900. 

Today these descendants will do anything to continue the high security, safety net economy, even if it means cultural suicide. Perhaps this will change, and the new younger generation will help revitalize the Italian/European economy, but we see little evidence of this. Instead we see doubling down at every turn.

"One of the main things stopping them from having more is the drastically low rate of participation of women in the workforce.

“It’s 37 percent in Italy – the lowest in the EU other than Malta,” said Addis.

“The EU average is about 67-70 percent, while the target for all states is 60 percent."

Huh? Women need time to take care of children, so stay at home mothers is optimum. But the couple cannot afford a child if the mother does not work, since the state takes so much of the income. 

The solution is for the state to take less income. Or commit cultural suicide. So, they select the latter.

"Higher-income families, those with taxable earnings of more than €25,000 per year, are not eligible for the scheme, excluding about a third of parents.

The allowances are paid at higher rates for the poorest — those declaring less than €7,000 a year to the taxman."

This is a joke, right? No. In the US a family earning 10,000 is a family in poverty, they receive substantial state assistance for housing, food, healthcare, and a large EITC rebatable refund. They would pay zero in income taxes. A family earring 30,000 would be considered lower class or working class, but at the low end, they also would likely receive food assistance, subsidies for health care, housing assistance, and a substantial EITC rebatable refund. They would pay less than 10% in taxes income taxes, and likely zero. 

In the US, the lower 50% of the income pool pays less then 3% of the total income tax. While that leaves the payroll tax, this is nothing compared to the tax rates Italians/Europeans pay on these tiny incomes.

Lastly, the jobs problem is directly attributable to socialism, and its cloying suffocation of businesses, and jobs. 

The solution is kill off the socialism.

This they will not do. 

If you would like to see Italy still with a few Italians, you should visit soon. The country will be there in the future but the Italians won't be unless they make some serious changes.

Good bye Italy, we enjoyed our many visits.

Deep down we have a nagging suspicion that we are missing the cultural elephant in the room, and the birth rate problem is not due to economics directly but the reality that the Italians simply want to live an easy, simply life, and a life as decadent as possible on their salary, and kids would crimp that lifestyle choice.

But that is so ugly, we will stick with economics.
Comments
comments powered by Disqus

    Author

    Maddog

      Blog Subscription

    Subscribe to Blog

    Archives

    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016

    Categories

    All
    1000-ways-to-die
    Abortion
    Amazon
    America
    Antisemitism
    Anti-semitism
    Bible
    Blogging
    Blue-model
    Book-links
    Booze
    Bus
    Cancer
    Children
    China
    China-ccp
    China-gdp
    China-ghost-cities
    China-ponzi
    Climate-change
    Coast-guardrescue-swimmer
    Cold-war
    Concealed-carry
    Constitution
    Cool-stuff
    Corruption
    Creative-destruction
    Crime
    Crisis-change
    Dead-guy-vote
    Dead-pool
    Death-of-the-pc
    Declaration-of-independence
    Deflation
    Democrat
    Demographic-decline
    Diet
    Earth-hour
    Ecommerce
    E-commerce
    Economic-change
    Economy
    Education
    End-of-history
    Energy
    Environmentalism
    Epa
    Eric-barker
    Europe
    Executive-outcomes
    F35
    Faith
    Family
    Fascists
    Financial-irresponsibility
    Financial-times
    Firearms
    First-world-problems
    Fitness
    Flight-to-security
    Food
    Fourth-turning
    Free-eye-exam
    French
    Funny
    Gdp
    Gdp-usa-vs-britain
    Gdp-usa-vs-germany
    Gdp-usa-vs-sweden
    Generational-theft
    Global-warming
    Government-incompetence
    Government-we-deserve
    Happiness
    Health
    Helicopter-parent
    Hell
    Holocene
    Honor
    Housing-affordability
    I-love-beaver
    Imf
    Immigration
    Independence-day
    Inefficiency
    Inflation
    Innovation
    Intelligence
    Intergenerational-conflict
    International-relations
    Investing
    Iran
    Iraq-war
    Islamic-reformation
    Italian-travel
    Japan
    Jodie-foster-effect
    Kayaking
    Keynesian-economist
    Kurdistan
    Law
    Leave-nato
    Leave-the-un
    Light-rail
    Maddog-story
    Marine
    Marriage
    Media
    Medical-insurance
    Medicine
    Middle-east
    Military
    Military-waste
    Money
    Monopoly
    Nanny-college
    News
    New-seasons
    Nirvana-is-another-name-for-hell
    North-korea
    Nukes
    Obama-doctrine
    Oil
    Oregon
    Organic
    Parenting
    Partition
    Pearl
    Pensions
    Peter-principle
    Police
    Politicians
    Portland
    Portlandia
    Portland-transit
    Predictions
    President-bush
    President-feckless-odither
    President-obama
    Psychology
    Race-huckster
    Rape
    Recession
    Recipe
    Replace-the-un
    Republican
    Research-studies-are-always-wrong
    Reviews
    Russia
    Salafism
    Sanctions
    Science
    Science-versus-faith
    Self-defense
    Self-drive-vehicle
    Sex
    Shale-oil
    Shia
    Sjw
    Sleeper
    Smart-growth
    Socialism
    Sovereignty
    Sport
    Sunni
    Supreme-court
    Syria
    Tax
    Technology
    Terrorism
    The-fed
    The-house-of-saud
    The-last-economic-superpower
    Therapy
    Trade
    Transit
    True-believer
    Tvfilm-review
    Un
    Union
    Urban-planning
    Urinals-of-note
    Venezuela
    Voter-fraud
    Wages
    Wahhabism
    War
    War-crimes
    Weird
    Weird-science
    Welfare
    Whole-foods
    Work



    RSS Feed

​Maddog's Lair is copyright 2016-2018 by Mark Sherman. Please feel free to quote from this site provided you link back to the original article.
Proudly powered by Weebly
  • Blog
  • About
  • Contact