Given how specialization works in other areas of life, I would expect "professional parents" to emerge, adopting 5-10 artificial kids over their lifetime. Possibly even more. That could actually be a reasonable job for people who are otherwise less qualified.
In more authoritarian countries, I would expect government-run boarding schools to emerge, preparing boys for future careers in military or the Party, girls ... well, that would depend on local culture, probably.
"Joking aside it seems to me the answer is way simpler and doesn't require magic tech. We still have working bodies."
If it were so simple, some countries would be able to solve it. I would, on the other hand, say, that it is as "simple" as solving the obesity crisis: a problem that looks straightforward from a distance, but turns into a maze of nightmarish "devil's details" up close.
We do not really have working bodies. Peak fertility is in late teenage years and early twenties, but societies which highly value education must shift childbearing to much later age. And after 30, a lot of people who want to have kids are no longer capable to do so without medical help, and this process is so tedious and stressful that you will wind up with smaller families than wished for.
Already about 5 per cent of kids are born out of IVF, which indicates that the cohort of people struggling with fertility is significant.
Oh that's a scary thought. Authoritarian countries growing children for war and might. Sprinkle in some genetic engineering!
Interesting thought about gender separation in authoritarian countries too. A lot of outdated concept of gender is rooted in the role of motherhood, which in this scenario wouldn't really be a thing. More a specialized career.
Yeah I guess my meta point was a lot of people wait to have kids because of their careers and the ginormous cost of raising kids. But that's a good point about education; even with all the resources in the world it's hard to raise kids and attain grad school or higher education. But graduating college by 21 still leaves a lot of time.
Given how specialization works in other areas of life, I would expect "professional parents" to emerge, adopting 5-10 artificial kids over their lifetime. Possibly even more. That could actually be a reasonable job for people who are otherwise less qualified.
In more authoritarian countries, I would expect government-run boarding schools to emerge, preparing boys for future careers in military or the Party, girls ... well, that would depend on local culture, probably.
"Joking aside it seems to me the answer is way simpler and doesn't require magic tech. We still have working bodies."
If it were so simple, some countries would be able to solve it. I would, on the other hand, say, that it is as "simple" as solving the obesity crisis: a problem that looks straightforward from a distance, but turns into a maze of nightmarish "devil's details" up close.
We do not really have working bodies. Peak fertility is in late teenage years and early twenties, but societies which highly value education must shift childbearing to much later age. And after 30, a lot of people who want to have kids are no longer capable to do so without medical help, and this process is so tedious and stressful that you will wind up with smaller families than wished for.
Already about 5 per cent of kids are born out of IVF, which indicates that the cohort of people struggling with fertility is significant.