Re: (tranlation) Apartment Women by Gu Byeong-Mo

On 3/19/2025 1:17 PM, James Nicoll wrote:

In article <robertaw-430EF5.09484519032025@news.individual.net>,
Robert Woodward  <robertaw@drizzle.com> wrote:

In article <vreqff$155k7$1@dont-email.me>,
Cryptoengineer <petertrei@gmail.com> wrote:
>

On 3/19/2025 9:10 AM, James Nicoll wrote:

Apartment Women by Gu Byeong-Mo
>
The Dream Future Pilot Communal Apartments is a bold attempt to
address South Korea's negligible birthrate. In exchange for new
homes in an invigorating rural setting, certain conditions need
to be met.
>
https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/babies-forever
>
Technically, not SF or even futuristic but sufficienty dystopia-
adjacent to be of interest.

>
If one agrees that demographic collapse is a real problem, then
eventually we're going to see governments addressing it.
>
On the dystopian side, one could see a ban on contraception, or
even worse, compelled childbearing.
>

>
Also, Quadi's Vat Girls (and some Vat Boys too). I have some doubts on
how well they could be socialized.

 While childbirth is not exactly trivial, one requires far more resources
to turn the resulting infant into a functional adult. That's a detail
many pro-natalists prefer to ignore.
 ObSF: Ethan of Athos.
 

Absolutely agree - subsidizing just pregnancy and birth isn't
going to be very effective.
Throwing out numbers to give an idea of the magnitudes I think would
be effective: something like a $60k payment for a birth (that's the low end for surrogate mothers), and say, $30,000/year payment for each
child in the house. (approx the cost/year to raise a child in MA). So
a family with 3 kids would be getting $90k, around the US median household income, plus employment income, if any.
pt