I am preparing for finals late in the game, but I can't help myself from thinking about things other than school. I was trying to figure out the amount of money I would need to save from my summer job. This journey led me to think of a discussion on the radio. The issue of the discussion was societies that have an aging population with fewer young people. To have a good economy based off of socialism, a country would need two things. One thing to be able to support the aging population would be to raise taxes while the other possibility would be to make more babies to support the older generation. Taxes can only go so high, so no matter how determined the citizens are to give certain benefits to their elders there is a limit this is possible.

With the limit in mind I began to think of conversations with people who oppose gay marriage. The main argument I deduced against gay marriage is that gay marriage does not contain the ability to reproduce. An older population would benefit from a younger generation that out numbers the older generation. To the old person, procreation is a tool that keeps himself secure.

In America, the baby boomers have underdone their parents. Baby Boomers have a threat that lurks behind them. These threats are very real and make sense to worry about. But what does that say of marriage and of the virtue of raising a child? In this light, birth is not a moral ideology but a pragmatic investment. I think that it is absurd to see gay marraige as something that will lower the birthrate anyways. I doubt that many people who would consider getting a gay marriage would procreate if they didn't get married. The problem is obviously more complex. Gay people shouldn't get blamed for this problem.

Baby boomers will enter old age with a possibility of financial uncertainty. But lets concider some factors. Baby boomers have not reproduced as much as their predesestors and their children have followed this trend as well. That is part of the problem. Also, the behavor of baby boomers as a whole is recless. We have problems with diet, drugs, and financially unsound spending. These will all be costly. The children of these boomers will mostly like inherit a lot of this behavior as well. Infact, children now are needing health care that was once pertained to an aging person. All of this from a bad diet and lack of excersize.

And so promoting birth without considering the burden of raising a child will not solve the problem either. Children should not be treated as little knick nacks. One has to seriously invest in a child and one must also take responsibility for their own actions as they will model behavior for their children. We as a collection of people are entering into a time that will be lean and mean, yet our behavior is not reflecting this which worsens the problem.