this post was submitted on 22 Jul 2025
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Orrrr (and this applies to most western countries in the near future too) they could maybe kinda consider not creating conditions in which its fucking impossible to have kids?
As someone in a western country now inconceivable! Heck we still have a good portion of Americans who complain about the living standards but will stay home in November or actively vote for things like deporting immigrants like that magically fixes the over arching problem
56 is the median age for home buyers in 2025 and it’s been this way for a very long time.
We’re as doomed as Japan honestly we just happen to encourage immigration lol. So I agree with you.
Look at the median age of first-time homebuyers, it's less skewed. Many people make more than one home purchase in a lifetime, including whan they buy smaller places when they're old in order to downsize, or when they buy into a retirement community.
The median age of first-time home buyers is 35, according to this: https://www.financialsamurai.com/the-median-homebuyer-age-is-now-so-old/
National Association of Realtors gives a slightly higher number.
The problem is already well underway in the west. Some potential growth has already been squandered, acting now is an emergency.
"Squandered" is carrying lots of baggage there, in particular the assumptions that population growth is a good thing, that it's sustainable, and that the average person will be better off in a positive-growth scenario. None of those are proven. And the assumption that population reduction is bad is often because measures such as GDP (which is approximately proportional to population) drops if population does. But aggregate GDP is not the appropriate measure in such a case.
For a lot of people, delaying to settle down and have family is a choice (like for myself), but you are right that conditions are being created to dis-incentivise raising a family.
I think South Korea could provide a model to encourage more birth rate. They created a new administrative capital city where it is more family oriented. The result? Explosion in birth rate. In the following years, other places replicated the model and South Korea as a whole experienced more birth this year for the first time in nine years.