Jim Penman explains why China's government can't reverse its falling birth rate despite relaxing the one-child policy. Cultural shifts toward smaller families, urbanization, and stigma against large families persist even when the state encourages more children, suggesting government control has limits over reproductive choices.
So welcome to another episode of Conversations with Jim Penman. We're talking about the birth rate crisis and other topics and the big country we're going to get onto which we haven't touched on to before. We've spoken about South Korea, Israel, Japan, which people can go listen to the episodes, but the big one is China. So what is happening with China and do you want to just talk about that?
China is a fascinating example because it shows the limits of government power. The person is Chinese government is more effectively powerful than pretty well any country in the world. They've got this mass Communist Party members all through society, people under watch, their social media is challenged. So this is, this is a society that controls people very, very effectively more than anywhere else. Now let's look at how that applies to changing the birth rate. They brought in the one child policy some decades ago. The idea was there was a big danger of population exploding and running out of food. So it's okay, one child policy now. They were never completely effective. People would have a second child. It was exceptions for those in minority groups and so forth. But the birth rate did come down. That was effective. It was down to below replacement level. And then a couple of decades ago, they said, oh, this is really causing a bit of a problem because we can see ourselves having too few people. So let's actually change this. Let's make it possible gradually to have two children.
Wow.
Okay, now sit back. Government says, all right, limits are off. Now you can have two children sat back waiting for the birth rate to start rising. The birth rate went down. So they actually changed the law to make it easier to have more children, allowing you to have a second child. The birth rate went down and they started saying, hey, we've got to be worried about this. You know, okay, I know we're going to change it now. We are going to make it so that we want you to have more than two children. We're going to be encouraged, we're going to bribe you to have more children. Now the government is all powerful. So they sit back and say, okay, now they're going to see the birth rate rise. The birth rate went down. So every time the government changed the law, it actually to try and encourage birth, the birth rate continued to decline. So the most effectively powerful controlling government in the world does everything it can to reverse it. So what it tells you is governments can effectively stop people having children. They can, they can enforce them. They can do all kinds of things. They're powerful enough. The Chinese did it. The Indians had some success during state emergency, but they can't get them to have more. Because the trend. People have children because they want to have children. If they don't want to have children, no amount of governments will make them do it. No amount of persuasion, no matter propaganda, no amount of bribes, nothing. And the Chinese government shows this clearer than any other country in the world.
Yeah. I've been listening to a bit of Peter Zion, who's a geopolitical guy, and he's talking about the demography collapse in China. And they're hiding a lot of statistics and they're hiding a lot of things as well. Must be really frustrating to them because, as you said, they're used to. If a road, if you want a road to get built in three months, it gets built in three months. And then now this problem, they can't. They're having the same problem as other countries are and they're trying to do from what the same sort of solution.
They really expected these societies to work. They thought people would have more children. They don't understand. The fact is that the cultural attitudes have changed because of wealth and urbanization, but also because when you. When you have less children, then you. It becomes the norm. Now you've got people like, like my wife, who's got four children, she's Chinese born and so is her sister. The attitudes in China towards people who do that, they call them pigs. Children. Then it becomes the norm. Now you've got people like my wife, who's got four children, she's Chinese born and so is her sister. The attitudes in China towards people that do that, they call them pigs because they're like breeders, they're like pigs. We're having multiple. Multiple suckling. Multiple.
Is that really the term?
They actually call them pigs.
Wow.
Yes. Which is. Which is not exactly polite, even in Chinese terms. Even though they like pork, that's more than wheat, but they call them pigs. And it's a very. It's a very abusive term. It's a degrading term used to people who have more children. So the whole society has now become so accustomed to having very few children. The people who want to have more actually look down.
There's big stigma attached to it, isn't it?
Stigma.
And it's very hard to get rid of stigma. So.
Well, you can't. The trend towards lower birth rate is irreversible. The only thing that could change it is technology, which is the neuroscience that needs to be done so it could be turned around.
So is there an accurate figure on their birthright or Is it just you can't get an accurate figure because it's China.
We know it's pretty bad. We know it's gone down. The Chinese will try and hide these statistics but it's quite clear since they've reduced the, got rid of the one child policy, the birth rate has declined. No question at all.
Do you think with the same thing with them is your advice exactly the same thing. They could address it, but they've got to look at what you're doing.
Okay. That is the real solution. Smaller solutions. One of the things they could do in China which might have a marginal impact is to stop persecuting religion. Okay. Because. Because it's the attitudes to religion that actually causes. So for example, they're still trying to stamp out Christianity. They they being effectively atheist by the ideology that's very, very harmful. At least Vladimir Putin in Russia has the idea. He wants to encourage Greek Orthodox. It's not working very well. But the Chinese are doing the opposite. They're actually trying to try and stop people becoming religious. Religious. And that's actually worsening the problem.
How big of a collapse do you think is. Do you think China is going to be exacerbated more than anywhere else just because the. Due to the size and with all the financial. They're obviously trying to be a global superpower. So what. How bad do you think it'll get in sort of a time frame?
Well, China's not that wealthier country by Western standards. And I think China is going to go through a down period. Definitely it's going to become weaker, the economy is going to fall off, the demographics, the work ethics declining. You can obviously see it in the younger generation. China's forever. I mean China will still be around in a thousand years. I wouldn't say the same thing about say South Korea or Japan.
Well, I was going to say because the outside media or the outside attention on China would probably make people think the opposite. You don't really hear the demography sort of stuff mentioned. There are some people online who do talk about like Peter Zion and these sort of people as well yourself. But when do you think China is panicking with this sort of stuff? Or they're not going to let on with that or.
I don't think they're panicking at the level of Japan or South Korea. Yeah, but they're worried about it. They are thinking now they have to do something about it. And you will see in the future more and more stuff where they're trying and trying and they'll use their Communist Party, you know, propaganda and stuff and control the media to try and boost. But it won't work. It will not work. The one thing they could do, which is to encourage religious involvement. They won't do.
No. There we go. Some dire, dire, dire times as well. And it'd be interesting to see how that one progresses over the time as well. So, guys, thank you very much for your attention today. Jimpeman.com to sign up to Jim's mailing list and also the book mailing list for the birth weight crisis is there available as well. Thank you very much for your time today, Jim.
Rising mental illness and falling birth rates have the same cause, it is this.....
