Scientists have no concrete explanation for the decline in the ovulation rate for mule deer during drought years, when forage is insufficient and when the outlook for survival through the winter months looks particularly bleak. We don’t know if a doe actually makes a decision not to ovulate, when she and her offspring are facing possible starvation, or if the loss of fertility is simply a natural, involuntary process. Or what?
We’re slightly more clear about the declining birthrate in America, among humans. But only slightly.
The United States’ birthrate fell for a fourth consecutive year in 2018, bringing the number of people born in the nation to its lowest level in 32 years, according to provisional figures published this month by the federal government. That’s not a ‘per capita’ rate; that’s the actual number of children born — the lowest number since 1986.
From the New York Times, May 17:
Demographers said a number of factors contributed to the downward trend, including fewer teenage pregnancies and the lingering effects of the Great Recession, which made it harder for people now in their 20s and 30s to reach the kind of milestones — like getting married, establishing a career or buying a home — that often precede starting a family…
“Some of the decline is a very positive signal that we are doing a better job of addressing unwanted teen pregnancies,” according to Jennifer Johnson-Hanks, a sociology professor at the University of California, Berkeley, who was not involved in the study. But she said the data for women outside that age range was “more worrisome…”
The birthrate for women in their 20s has tended to drop year after year, Dr. Johnson-Hanks told the Times. According to the report, the birthrate among women in their early 20s has dropped an average of 4 percent each year since 2007.
Dr. Johnson-Hanks said those figures indicated that “it is hard for young adults these days to find their way… into a living situation they find to be safe and secure and stable.” Even though economic data indicates the recession ended in June 2009, “in this one demographic way, we are still seeing its aftereffects,” she said.
The 2018 total fertility rate — an estimate of the number of children born over a woman’s lifetime — also fell to a record low of 1,728 births per 1,000 women, according to the Times article. This could be classified as a “sub-replacement fertility rate”… where a country’s overall population decreases year after years. A “replacement fertility rate” is typically above 2.1 children per female, over her lifetime. More like 2.3 children per…
Just to be clear about terminology, a birthrate measures the number of babies born during a specific time period — usually, one year — while a fertility rate estimates the number of children born to the average female during her entire lifespan.
Why would a young American woman (and her significant other, if she has one) decide not to have children, or to have only one child? Excessive student debt? Lack of affordable housing? The prospects of a frightening future, on an overheated planet? The inability to find a male partner willing to pull his own weight? A choice to embrace a professional career rather than a family? Chronic depression? Stuck in a minimum wage job? Easy access to birth control?
All of the above?
As residents of Archuleta County, we can’t do much about some of these stress factors. Many of the issues depend on individual choices made by individual ovulating humans — student debt, for example, or the use of birth control. Other issues are way too big, on the macro scale. The future of our planet’s climate, for example, is probably well beyond the control of Pagosa residents and businesses and governments.
There might be one stress factor that our little community can influence, if we were willing to put aside our selfish self-interest, and convince our neighbors to do the same.
But before we go there, let’s be brave and ask the question. Is it a ‘good’ thing if the ovulation rate among mule deer declines during a drought? Is it actually ‘harmful’ to the big, environmental picture, for the deer themselves and for other species as well, if few baby deer are born? Even if we take ‘life’ as a positive good, can a decline in the birth rate be a good thing?
America is in the midst of an economic drought, or so it would appear to many — especially, in the eyes of our youngest adults, the Millennial Generation aged 24-34. According to a November 2018 report published by Bankrate.com, Federal Reserve data shows that the Millennial’s net worth is, on average, about half what the Baby Boomers held at the same age. Today’s Millennials also earn 20 percent less in inflation-adjusted dollars than 25-34 year olds in 1989, when that demographic was populated by the youngest Baby Boomers.
A 2017 study by researchers at Harvard University, Stanford University and University of California found that absolute economic mobility — the ability for children to earn more than their parents earned — has dropped by more than 40 percent since the 1940s.
The US economy is currently growing, according to some sources — slowly, yes, but still growing — but the benefits of that growth are increasingly flowing to the wealthiest Americans, and bypassing our young people.
From that Bankrate article:
Coupled with unprecedented amounts of student loan debt and a lack of healthy investments… many millennials are “anxious” and “fearful” about their financial situation…
In recent years, income inequality has been attributed to sources ranging from healthcare access and CEO pay growth to technological advances and a rise in subcontracting.
When coupled with ever-increasing student loan debt, rising underemployment rates among college graduates, growing housing costs and astronomical healthcare prices, millennials’ economic outlook looks less-than-ideal. For some young people, the ‘American dream’ of their parents’ generation can seem far out of reach…
Yesterday, in Part Two, I mentioned that my parents, Bob and Shirley, sold the four-bedroom family home in Oakland, California back in 2005. They could no longer handle the maintenance effort and costs, and my dad’s retirement savings were slowly running out. Probably a sensible move. The housing market was reasonably hot in Oakland, and their real estate agent had offers for the house even before it was officially listed. My parents actually got more than their asking price of $600,000.
They’d bought the house in 1961 for $20,000. If you calculated a similar value in 2005 when my parents sold the house… adjusted for inflation (based on the Consumer Price Index)… the house would have sold for about $125,000. When I visited an Oakland real estate website yesterday, it appears that similar homes in the Oakland hills are now offered at around $1.2 million.
For some reason — or for many reasons — the inflation-adjusted value of an older, slightly run-down, four-bedroom house in the Oakland hills, in 2005, had quadrupled. Today, the asking price there is approaching 10 times the inflation-adjusted value.
Economic drought? Can we do anything meaningful to address this situation, as a small rural community?