Russian women not reproducing; next stop, dustbin of history
Russian president Vladimir Putin, in a state of the nation address, has highlighted what he believes to be his country’s most serious problem: it’s dying. Specifically, it’s losing about 700,000 people per year. The most recent census had the total population at 145 million, but it could fall by as much as a third by 2050.
Remember the glory days of the old Soviet Union? They were the first into space with Sputnik and Khrushchev, in high Cold War fashion, said, “Whether you like it or not, history is on our side. We will bury you,†referring to the West and capitalism.
Turns out history wasn’t on their side after all. Contrary to Khrushchev’s bluster, his own country is now busily burying itself. In fact, if they don’t do something rather dramatic, their country is not just going to experience history, it’s going to be history, literally.
The problem is demographic: Russian women aren’t having babies anymore, or at least not enough of them to replace the population. And why is that? Because babies are a lot of trouble and, in a basket case economy that fails to provide prosperity, they’re also too expensive.
So Putin has a plan. He wants to double the amount of monthly child benefits women receive for their first baby and then double that amount for their second child. On top of the monthly benefits, women should be given a large lump sum of money following the birth of their second child.
Sounds like a lot of wishful statist thinking and where the money is going to come from is anybody’s guess, but if they can scrape it together it might help solve the problem. They might also want to consider outlawing abortions since it is estimated that there are more abortions than births each year in Russia. Having legally available abortions in such a country is sort of like having an open bar at an A.A. meeting.
Feminists will naturally get huffy over that suggestion and ask, what about a woman’s right to choose? The short answer is, if a woman’s right to choose in this particular country and demographic situation eventually leads to no more women, maybe it’s a right that ought to be suspended for the good of women, as well as everybody else. Or looking at it another way, if a woman’s right to choose is written in the legal books, but there’s no women left to read it, does that right still have any meaning?
Putin also said that immigration policy is an important factor in improving Russia’s economic development, that Russia needs “to encourage an inflow of qualified migrants, educated and law-abiding people.†But why would people like that want to go to a dying, ramshackle country where women have to be bribed into perpetuating the species?
It’s a vexing problem and an ironic one as well. Imagine the world’s largest country in terms of physical size ending up the most devoid of human population. Ronald Reagan once said that the evil empire of the Soviet Union would be consigned to the dustbin of history, but who thought it would happen this way?
Greg Strange provides conservative commentary with plenty of acerbic wit on the people, politics, events and absurdities of our time. See more at his website: http://www.greg-strange.com/
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May 10th, 2006 at 10:18 am
[...] Russian women not reproducing; next stop, dustbin of history [...]
May 10th, 2006 at 3:22 pm
So?!?!?! The Russian federation spans something like 10 time zones so it’s already one of the most sparsely populated nations on earth.
Western cultures and Japan now buy into the notion of a need for growing or sustainable populations due to the political urgency of the social security/pension schemes (which are collapsing anyway.) If anything, it’s healthy for an economy for a population to shrink, not grow, as fewer unskilled laborers are required.
Imagine, if you might, the standard of living in the U.S. if we had simply maintained our 1940’s population of 40 million. We’d have twice as much oil as we produce and wind up a net energy exportor. The vast majority of children being produced or immigrated in the U.S. and Europe are unskilled laborers who create a net drain on society through welfare entitlements and infrastructure support needs.
In the meantime, Russians tend to have children they can financially support and nurture without resorting to a non-existent welfare system. Why, what an awful idea that is! Raising children that have a purpose and support system.
May 10th, 2006 at 3:30 pm
If the benefits are given outside marriage, it will simply accellerate Bolshevist social decay. In Russia feminism is deeply inculcated. illegitimacy is the norm, and marriage is a dead institution. Using oil wealth to build a feminist dictatorship is a very bad idea.
Unless Putin actively creates jobs, and keeps incentives within marriage, Russia will be in worse shape than it is. A violent society of socially disenfranchised, jobless men is not a place anyone wants to live in or migrate to.
May 10th, 2006 at 10:17 pm
As an russian, I want to know: who is that idiot, who is popularizing such incredible thoughts? Maybe you think, that we also drinking vodka with bears every day?
Your propaganda telling to you such fantastic things about us, and you don’t know nothing about real life in our countries (I don’t mean only Russia, because there are also Ukraine and Belorusia. It is different countries, but we have united destiny).
So, when you can, that there is marsians military base situated near Moscow or that every russian is mafia – don’t believe to this.
P.S. Sorry for my english, I don’t have practice for a long time.
May 11th, 2006 at 6:34 am
A violent society of socially disenfranchised, jobless men is not a place anyone wants to live in or migrate to.
This is also a good description of inner cities in the states where people have fled for the suburbs. The only thing keeping these centers from collapsing completely is the artificial influx of government money.
May 11th, 2006 at 3:06 pm
Pay women to have children? Pay women to care for children?
I don’t think that has ever been a sustainable strategy in the
history of the world. I can’t think of any such long term culture.
The entire mindset is offensive. Children are a blessing to a
family. Children are not something to be created for money.
I am dismayed that men are left out of the discussion. Men are just irrelevant. I think men play a very large role in all this.
If marriage is dead in Russia, then men are not creating families.
Yes, men play a key role in all this — creating families.
I don’t why this would be true but if Russia is like American I can make some pretty good educated guesses.
If men are allowed to be part of and create families. If they can do this reliably and without immense risk, families will be restored.
Women are not the center of the universe. Men are necessary also
I suppose the State can completely replace the father (except for the procreative act itself — possibly even that). Any such State will not be healthy. Russia should cultivate real fathers who head and support their families and let families grow. It is a loser strategy for the State to attempt to become fathers (financially).