We ain't getting any younger

I assumed that there was going to be a pandemic baby boom — a future generation of quaran-teeny boppers.

Much to my surprise, the birth rate in the U.S. fell for the sixth year in a row. According to the CDC, the number of births in the U.S. has dropped to its lowest level since 1979. Apparently, instead of ignoring the CDC’s social distancing guidance in the bedroom, everybody was too busy watching “The Tiger King.” (I think that we all can agree that Carol Baskin is contributing more to the death rate than the birth rate.)

So is a lower birth rate a good or bad thing?

Fewer people means fewer resources consumed, fewer carbon particles pumped into the atmosphere, fewer job applications to compete with, fewer stimulus checks to print, and fewer Instagram pictures of those babies who aren’t as cute as the parents would like to believe.

A lower birth rate is also an indication of some other positive trends. Fewer births can be attributed to fewer unintended pregnancies. And when there are fewer whoopsies, there are more women joining the workforce — totally flipping the script on “going into labor.”

Though the thought of fewer humans — which means potentially fewer jerks in the future — scratches some misanthropic itch (especially for those of us who have grown quite fond of social distancing), a low birth rate isn’t all that it is cracked up to be. A lower birth rate means fewer young people, which means — gulp — more old people.

With fewer young people to pay into the pyramid scheme — uh, I mean — entitlement programs monopolized by older generations. The worker-to-beneficiary ratio has precipitously dropped from 41.9 in 1945 to a 2.8 in 2013 (which is apparently the most recent year of available data) and is projected to dip as low as 2 by 2034. The price tag of downward trend: the $2.9 trillion of asset reserves stuffed into Social Security’s mattress will be exhausted by 2035, meaning potentially lower benefits paid out to the same folks who are already pretty grumpy when those damn kids play their music too loud.

Now, before geriatric cancel culture comes for me, please allow me to clarify: I am not waging war on the elderly. The last thing that I need is the AARP to organize a boycott against my publishers and a “Gray Hairs Matter” protest outside my house.

I genuflect toward my elders, because — let’s face it — I don’t really have a choice: Geezers run our country.

Our political system is truly showing its age. During the 2020 election, 65-and-older voters turned out at a higher rate (74%) than any other demographic cohort and represented 22% of total votes cast. And who did these voters turnout for other than a pair of long-in-the-tooth septuagenarian presidential candidates. And the 117th Congress is no spring chicken, either: 50 senators and 141 representatives are over the age of 65.

Considering that older voters continue to elect older politicians who in turn enact policies that benefit older constituencies, the American gerontocracy is as well preserved as a barcalounger with a plastic slipcover.

So how can our political elders help ease the burden of our aging system? Unless the elderly start making babies (not likely) or foregoing their entitlement benefits (even less likely), they may have to come up with other political solutions.

And if I may make a recommendation, can we please skip any pronatalist system of government? I’d prefer that we don’t reenact “The Handmaid’s Tale.”

One simple non-dystopian solution: ease or eliminate immigration restrictions. Undocumented workers already pay into the Ponzi scheme — uh — Social Security to the tune of an estimated $7-13 billion per year. Naturalizing a smorgasbord of foreign-born citizens would not only ease budget deficits but also potentially grow our shrinking workforce. More work visas and green cards may cover the cost of our national senior citizen discount.

However, as we know, such transformative legislation is dependent upon a political body that tends to drive at least ten under the speed limit, so this may take a while.

In the meantime, the onus might be on us lazy whippersnappers. The optimal replacement-level fertility rate — the rate at which just enough of one generation is able to replace its parents’ generation — is 2.1. Currently, the U.S. rate is 1.73, which means my wife and I, who have two sons, are apparently slacking. As soon as we figure out how to successfully produce one-tenth of a child, we’ll be sure to share our best practices.

I imagine that if we pull this off, we’ll have our own Netflix special — just one more show to binge watch instead of whoopsie making.

Jay Stooksberry is a writer and editor based in Delta, Colorado. His writing is available at www.jaystooksberry.com.