Valeriy Zabawski

@DragonStacker @paulg But how do you estimate the quality of life? Life expectancy now is higher than in 60s, for example. Affordability? Maybe, but an average person has more things and possibilities (to travel, for example), than their parents. So, what metrics do you use?

Thats certainly true to some extent, except the quality of life today is lower than it was in 2007 for most western countries. US quality of life probably peaked from 1985 to 2008, and birth rates were actually up and sustainable during that time. Another period regarded as the highest quality of life in the US was the postwar 1950s-1960s, where we also had a huge birthrate surge. I cant speak to China and bangladesh, though my list certainly impacts their population to some extent. China did a lot of other things that inevitably created their current situation. I forgot to mention a massive issue, fertility itself, which has plummeted globally due to a variety of factors like microplastics. Testosterone has also plummeted. One interesting dynamic at least in the US, is that birthrate is very different based on political affiliation. There is definitely a huge psychological component.

If Steve Jobs were still alive, he would have the moral authority to face and maybe even to solve this problem. But I doubt anyone in the phone business now does.

@YK_Insightz @marcosagusstinn As a person who worked for both US and EU companies, I have a feeling US companies gain productivity through “lean and mean” approach. US employers make people overwork, provide less job and social security, so people just crunch more and that’s it. Worse work/life balance.

@marcosagusstinn 0.7% real growth per year for 17 years = stagnation. US productivity: 100 to 180, EU: 137. Adding population and regulation without productivity gains just spreads the pie thinner.

Europe’s economic model has been stagnating since 2008. Real GDP per capita in the EU was around €30,440 in 2008. By 2025, it was roughly €34,100 — barely 12% growth in 17 years. That is less than 0.7% per year in real terms. EU real gross disposable income per capita increased from an index of 100 in 2008 to only 115.5 in 2025. That is just +15.5% in 17 years This is the core problem: Europe has added population, regulation, debt and public spending — but not enough productivity Europe adds workers, but output per worker barely rises. More population without higher GDP per capita does not raise living standards. The solution starts with completing Europe’s single market for services: services account for around 70% of EU value added and employment, yet they remain far more fragmented than goods, limiting cross-border competition, labour mobility and firm scale. A real services union, combined with deeper capital markets, would create more competition between companies, more competition for workers, larger European scale-ups, higher productivity and finally stronger real wage growth.

@marcosagusstinn > More population without higher GDP per capita does not raise living standards. Do Europe really need to raise living standards? They are one of the highest in the world, if we speak of France, Germany, Netherlands, AFAIK. And higher than in US.

@Brian_Johnsn @DamirWallener @paulg This doesn’t explain why. “Causes” section is just full of different points of view. But I guess, it sums up from culture, perspectives (having kids good and is a must), money (good salaries, cheap houses, help from the government).

@VZabawski @DamirWallener @paulg post-WW2 baby boom en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mid-20th-…

@DamirWallener @paulg This chart made me wonder: what was happening in 1940-1970 that made fertility rate jump? I’d bet on economic growth and overall optimism, but that’s just a guess.

@paulg Oops….

@DragonStacker @paulg All of your mentioned reasons might be applicable to US, but not to Bangladesh or China where fertility rates also plummeted. When the quality of life rises, people stop having many kids. A woman in Gaza gives twice much (3.5) birth than in US (1.6).

@paulg It's not any one thing. It's death by a thousand cuts: smartphones, remote work, social media, climate change doomerism, job losses, the Me Too movement, political polarization between young women and men, mass immigration, and even discrimination in college admissions.

@AsaNietsche @akamvl @paulg Having a baby nowadays is a legacy project. If you don’t have a lot of money to keep safe, if you don’t want to leave your legacy, you don’t really need kids, unless you really want them just because. People have dogs and cats instead, call themselves “dog mama”.

@akamvl @paulg Sure, birth rates have been consistently down in rich countries for a very long time now regardless of culture and internal politics. But whatever thing I think is most important this election cycle is why.

@Patrick_am_I @niederhaus17566 @akamvl @paulg People in Gaza have multiple kids (3.4 per women), way more than an average American family (1.6 per woman).

@niederhaus17566 @akamvl @paulg Go right ahead and present your evidence of all these claims.

@niederhaus17566 @akamvl @paulg Urbanization has its effect. If you live in a village, having kids is mostly about feeding them. The threshold for having kids is pretty low. If you have kids in a 20 sq. m. apartment, that will be problematic from space, money, and overall stress perspective. That’s my idea.

@akamvl @paulg No correlation there – poor people have more kids than people who are middle class and above (apart from the super rich who also have a lot) The affordability argument is fake. People throughout history have made families work even on very tight budgets. It’s something else.

@JurassicParkTho @EU_Eurostat Hostile and degrading != rude and have nothing to do with the freedom of speech, asshole.

@EU_Eurostat So? Disagreement, even rude disagreement, is the hallmark of a healthy society. There should never be laws that protect people’s feelings above the freedom of speech.

In 2025, 42.3% of EU internet users encountered messages online that they considered hostile and degrading towards specific groups of people or individuals.💬⛔️ 🔹Most people saw messages that targeted people for their political or social views (33.7%) 👉link.europa.eu/3dPYRW

@0_10034323 @shashj Why is it undemocratic?

@shashj How undemocratic. Would make Putin blush.

"Rank-and-file party members—a peculiar gang of retired teachers, civil servants and trade unionists—have never been asked to vote for a prime minister. Should Sir Keir go, they will become the most important voters in the country." economist.com/britain/2026/0…

@vitorpy @paulg @DougHenwood You are starting to argue with yourself. My points: famines were happening under any regimes; USSR never had communism and whether they had socialism is debatable. What they had is a totalitarian regime that used “socialism” to justify repressions and dangle as a carrot.

Communism is commonly used to mean the political tradition originating with Marx, including Marxism-Leninism and its dictatorships and horrors. If your definition excludes the Soviet Union, we're arguing about different things. Come back when you can point to a historical example of whatever you call communism. Oh, I forgot. You can't. Probably because it always ends up in dictatorship and your definition excludes it.

We Marxist sourpusses are missing this happiness theory of capitalism. Apologies for the oversight.

@vitorpy @paulg @DougHenwood Communism never really existed as a system. Socialism is debatable. No idea why you call a totalitarian state with government controlled monetary system a socialist/communist country. Will you call Russia a democracy only because they call themselves this way?

@VZabawski @paulg @DougHenwood Comparing the Swedish welfare state with communism (as it existed) is pure intellectual dishonesty and there's a reason no sane person in Eastern Europe remembers fondly the Soviet occupation.

@vitorpy @paulg @DougHenwood It was Stalinism. Although USSR had many elements of socialism, they never really build neither socialism nor communism. And obviously (not for you, I guess) famine and tortures were happening under pretty much any regime. Sweden has elements of socialism but no famine.

@paulg @DougHenwood Marxists often hail from countries that have no living memory of the famine and torture caused by the Soviets.

@nsharma0813 @paulg @AlexH_Johnson How exactly exorbitant are they in numbers?

@paulg @AlexH_Johnson Zero chance. The monopoly is not just visa it’s the entire 4 party system that needs each other to make exorbitant profits

Two thirds of this exchange understand payments.

@Kagetorah92 @DrellaChris @hutchinson @ResoluteMichael So, you can’t prove there’s no democracy in US right now?

@VZabawski @DrellaChris @hutchinson @ResoluteMichael Read Federalist No. 10 and stop being an ignoramus

“We’re a republic, not a democracy”

@Kagetorah92 @DrellaChris @hutchinson @ResoluteMichael Watching anime leads to impotency and being gay, yet it doesn’t stop you, so what? The president is elected via representative democracy with indirect voting. It’s still a form of democracy. Google it.

@VZabawski @DrellaChris @hutchinson @ResoluteMichael The president is still not elected democratically. We still use the electoral college. I want the 17th Amendment overturned and selection of Senators returned to the state legislatures, because democracy leads to tyranny and chaos.

@Kagetorah92 @DrellaChris @hutchinson @ResoluteMichael The answers might be “yes” or “no, because <insert your argumentation>”. Your answer seems to be “Yes, but I can’t admit it”.

@VZabawski @DrellaChris @hutchinson @ResoluteMichael “And so tyranny naturally arises out of democracy, and the most aggravated form of tyranny and slavery out of the most extreme form of liberty.” Plato, ‘The Republic’

@Kagetorah92 No, but those are liberal values. So, do you support those liberal values?

@VZabawski Nothing in the Bill of Rights came from the French Revolution

When I say I’m against Liberals, I mean every ideology that’s rooted in the French Revolution. That includes anarchists, libertines, feminists, communists, socialists, fascists, laissez faire capitalists, and all forms of radicalism. None of these are Conservative or American

@TexasRedRacing @DrellaChris @hutchinson @ResoluteMichael Don’t shift the focus. Do you execute democracy by voting or not?

@VZabawski @DrellaChris @hutchinson @ResoluteMichael Yes oof, you and your idealogical cohort don’t seem to get that the US can constitutionally exist without democracy.