Name: 為什麼美國政府無法說服美國人生孩子？ (Why The U.S. Government Can’t Convince Americans To Have Kids)
Uploaded: 2025-06-02T03:20:53.000Z
Duration: 11 min 38 s

情態副詞

America's fertility rates are hovering around historic lows, with approximately 1.6 births per woman over her lifetime.

美國的生育率徘徊在歷史最低點，每名婦女一生大約生育 1.6 胎。

This is below the level needed to sustain the population, which is 2.1 births per woman.

這低於維持人口所需的水準，即每名婦女生育 2.1 胎。

We're actually projecting that about one in four young adults today will never have kids.

實際上，我們預計現在每四個年輕人中就有一個永遠不會有孩子。

There are plenty of us out there who are kind of concerned about the falling birth rate, both for kind of its impact on people's ordinary lives, as well as for the ways in which it will affect our economy and our government.

我們當中有很多人對出生率下降感到擔憂，因為這不僅會影響人們的日常生活，還會影響我們的經濟和政府。

And we will support baby bonuses for a new baby boom.

我們將為新一輪嬰兒潮提供嬰兒獎金。

Our population will in the not too distant future start to decline.

在不遠的將來，我們的人口將開始減少。

And so that's why this is an issue for governments and for the economy.

是以，這是政府和經濟面臨的一個問題。

And politicians are starting to pay attention.

政治家們也開始注意到這一點。

The concern here in the U.S. is that if we see kind of dramatic declines in fertility, we will eventually see also kind of a drag on our economy and our capacity to cover all sorts of government programs like Medicare and Social Security.

美國的擔憂是，如果我們看到生育率急劇下降，最終也會拖累我們的經濟，以及我們支付醫療保險和社會保障等各種政府項目的能力。

Our population is sort of getting older on average.

我們的人口平均年齡越來越大。

And what that means is we have the baby boomers who are, you know, in their older age years.

這意味著我們有嬰兒潮一代，你知道，他們已經步入老年。

So they are drawing Social Security and they also have quite a bit of medical and care needs.

是以，他們在領取社會保障金的同時，也有相當多的醫療和護理需求。

And so the question is, how will we care for our aging population?

那麼問題來了，我們將如何照顧老齡人口？

It's very hard in modern U.S. society to combine work and having kids.

在現代美國社會，工作和生兒育女很難兼顧。

We have very little by way of support to families in this country.

在這個國家，我們對家庭的支持少之又少。

Here's why the government can't seem to convince Americans to start families.

這就是為什麼政府似乎無法說服美國人組建家庭。

When birth rates fall, it affects the entire economy.

One of the big drivers of economic growth is just having more people in your society, more consumers, more workers, more taxpayers.

經濟增長的主要動力之一就是社會上有更多的人、更多的消費者、更多的工人、更多的納稅人。

In East Asia and countries like Japan, for instance, that have seen low replacement fertility for a long while and are now actually just shrinking demographically.

例如，在東亞和日本等國家，更替生育率長期處於較低水平，現在實際上只是人口在萎縮。

Both in terms of the Japanese economy, there's been signage, but also in terms of Japanese government having greater difficulty kind of paying the tab for the challenges they face in terms of quickly supporting an older population that is relying to an important degree on the Japanese government.

無論是從日本經濟的角度看，還是從日本政府的角度看，日本政府都面臨著更大的困難，需要為其所面臨的挑戰買單，即如何快速支持在很大程度上依賴日本政府的老年人口。

With the worker to retiree ratio shrinking, Social Security and similar programs could struggle to remain financially sustainable.

隨著工人與退休人員的比例不斷縮小，社會保障和類似計劃可能難以保持財政可持續性。

The Social Security trustees put out a report about how long they expect Social Security to stay solvent.

社會保險受託人發佈了一份報告，說明他們預計社會保險的償付能力還能維持多久。

What's interesting, though, is that the lever that we are trying to force on people now is people should have more children so that then eventually 20 years from now or so, we'd have more workers who would then be paying into it.

但有趣的是，我們現在試圖強加給人們的槓桿是，人們應該生更多的孩子，這樣 20 年後或更久以後，我們就會有更多的工人，而這些工人就會支付保險費。

It doesn't seem like a very efficient system to me because it doesn't solve the short term solvency problem.

在我看來，這不是一個非常有效的系統，因為它無法解決短期償付能力問題。

Leaders across the U.S. political spectrum have proposed ways to address the birth rate decline.

美國各政治派別的領導人都提出了應對出生率下降的方法。

You've got Elon Musk, who is essentially having the ear of the president and in the White House, and he's very much interested not only in increasing birth rates, but this notion that the best and brightest should really be reproducing.

埃隆-馬斯克（Elon Musk）基本上是總統和白宮的耳目，他不僅對提高出生率非常感興趣，而且對 "最優秀和最聰明的人應該繁衍後代 "這一理念也非常感興趣。

So let me say very simply, I want more babies in the United States of America.

是以，讓我簡單地說，我希望美利堅合眾國有更多的嬰兒。

You have, I would say, a more sort of religiously or conservatively oriented bent about this.

我想說的是，你在這方面更傾向於宗教或保守主義。

So it's not just about increasing births, but it's about increasing births within sort of a traditional family.

是以，這不僅僅是為了增加出生率，而是為了增加傳統家庭的出生率。

So marital status is really important to this group.

是以，婚姻狀況對這個群體來說非常重要。

We have the Democrats pushing really hard for an expanded child tax credit.

民主黨大力推動擴大兒童稅收抵免。

Now, the Republicans come out with something called a baby bonus.

現在，共和黨提出了一個叫做 "嬰兒獎金 "的東西。

That would be $5,000, allegedly, at the time a child is born.

據稱，在孩子出生時，這將是 5 000 美元。

This is a pretty common policy in other countries, that there's some extra child allowance, child tax credit, baby bonus sent to parents when they have a newborn.

這在其他國家是一項相當普遍的政策，即當父母有新生兒時，他們會得到一些額外的兒童津貼、兒童稅收抵免、嬰兒獎金。

Both political parties have proposed policies that provide money to families, either in the form of direct cash or tax refunds.

兩個政黨都提出了以直接現金或退稅形式向家庭提供資金的政策。

But experts say one-off proposals are not likely to move the needle for families.

但專家們表示，一次性的建議不可能對家庭起到推動作用。

The kinds of financial incentives or benefits that we're providing just really aren't enough to change the calculus of a tradeoff of bringing a child into one's household or family.

我們所提供的經濟激勵或福利確實不足以改變一個人在將孩子帶入自己的家庭或家族時的權衡取捨。

In particular, the $5,000 baby bonus that's being sort of bandied about is not likely to budge fertility rates.

尤其是，人們熱議的 5,000 美元嬰兒獎金不可能降低生育率。

The United States lacks key policies that other comparable nations have that could potentially encourage family formation, such as federal paid parental leave, flexible work and some fertility care access.

美國缺乏其他同類國家所擁有的可能鼓勵組建家庭的關鍵政策，如聯邦帶薪育兒假、彈性工作制和一些生育護理服務。

The U.S. offers less cash and services than the average OECD country.

美國提供的現金和服務少於經合組織國家的平均水平。

However, it is above average when it comes to providing tax breaks for families with kids.

不過，在為有孩子的家庭提供稅收減免方面，它高於平均水平。

Research suggests to us that these are family studies that markedly increasing like the child tax credit can have a modest but noteworthy effect on births.

研究向我們表明，這些家庭研究表明，像兒童稅收抵免這樣明顯增加的措施會對出生率產生適度但值得注意的影響。

What we estimate is that if we were to increase, for instance, the child tax credit to $4,500 per child, it's about $2,000 right now.

我們的估計是，如果我們將兒童稅收抵免額提高到每個兒童 4,500 美元，而現在大約為 2,000 美元。

That would lead to an increase in fertility of between 3 and 10 percent.

On the one hand, that's a pretty modest number.

On the other hand, if you kind of look at that effect over the course of the century, we're talking about millions and millions of extra kids being born because of this additional financial incentive.

另一方面，如果你看一下這個世紀以來的影響，我們就會發現，由於這種額外的經濟激勵，又有數以百萬計的孩子出生了。

But even wealthy countries with stronger social programs continue to struggle with low birth rates.

但是，即使是擁有更強大社會計劃的富裕國家，也在繼續為低出生率而掙扎。

France really has been spending a lot on pro-family policies.

法國確實在支持家庭政策方面投入了大量資金。

They now have one of the higher fertility rates in Europe.

他們現在是歐洲生育率較高的國家之一。

How much of their policy emphasis actually help sort of stall out the decline so they're in better shape than some other countries is a really difficult, empirical question to answer.

他們對政策的重視程度究竟有多大，是否有助於延緩衰退，從而使他們的狀況比其他一些國家更好，這確實是一個很難回答的經驗性問題。

But I do think it might be a glimmer of, you know, optimism on the policy front, suggesting if we really do a lot to support families, we at least might be able to stall out the birth rate decline.

但我確實認為，這可能是政策方面的一絲樂觀，你知道，這表明如果我們真的做了很多支持家庭的工作，我們至少可以延緩出生率的下降。

Many governments have attempted to influence or even limit their citizens' family formation practices, such as Japan's recent pro-natalist campaigns or China's one-child policy.

許多國家的政府都試圖影響甚至限制本國公民組建家庭的做法，如日本最近的親生育運動或中國的獨生子女政策。

But studies have found that these policies may have unintended consequences.

但研究發現，這些政策可能會產生意想不到的後果。

It's hard to imagine a scenario where the government can say to people, we just really need you to have kids because it's important for our country.

很難想象政府會對人們說，我們真的需要你們生孩子，因為這對我們的國家很重要。

Sort of a take one for the team, patriotic kind of exhortation.

有點像 "為團隊爭光 "的愛國勸誡。

Like, that's not probably going to happen.

America's birth rate used to be higher, but it was partly driven by unintended pregnancies, especially among teenagers.

美國的出生率曾經較高，但部分原因是意外懷孕，尤其是青少年意外懷孕。

We've actually spent years, decades and millions of dollars from the federal government trying to reduce our teen pregnancy rate, which was much higher than other industrialized countries.

實際上，我們已經花費了數年、數十年的時間，聯邦政府也投入了數百萬美元，試圖降低我們的少女懷孕率，因為我們的少女懷孕率遠遠高於其他工業化國家。

是以，我認為這是一個好消息。

The downside is births at older ages have not risen enough to offset the declines we're seeing at these very young ages.

不利的一面是，較大年齡段出生率的上升不足以抵消我們在這些非常年輕的年齡段所看到的下降。

And so that has driven our overall fertility rate lower, although we all are seeing increases in births to women in their 30s and even in their 40s.

是以，儘管我們都看到 30 多歲甚至 40 多歲婦女的生育率在上升，但這也導致我們的總體生育率下降。

I think this timing issue is also another question.

我認為時間問題也是另一個問題。

Has this sort of delay in adulthood, the delay in people feeling like they can find a partner, they can afford a house.

這種成年期的延遲，讓人們感覺找不到伴侶，買不起房子。

Is all of that pushing childbearing to such a late age that people are going to wind up having fewer children than they intend or than they would like?

所有這一切是否會把生育延後到如此晚的年齡，以至於人們最終會比自己想要或希望的孩子更少？

Is there anything policy can do about that to make people feel like they don't have to wait until their 30s to get started having a family?

在這方面，政策是否能做些什麼，讓人們覺得不必等到 30 多歲才開始組建家庭？

And this isn't to say people should start having kids earlier if they don't want to.

這並不是說，如果人們不想生孩子，就應該早點生。

But are there people who would start having kids earlier if it weren't at the same time that a lot of work demands were placed on people?

但是，如果不是與此同時人們的工作要求也很高的話，是否有人會更早地開始生孩子呢？

If it were easier to afford a house before you got to your late 30s, are there policy and institutional changes we could make there?

如果在 30 歲之前更容易買得起房子，我們是否可以在政策和制度上做出改變？

The Trump administration has vocally supported increasing access to IVF.

特朗普政府明確支持增加試管嬰兒的使用機會。

However, it also cut funding for IVF research.

然而，它也削減了對試管嬰兒研究的資助。

The White House did not respond to CNBC's request to participate in this report.

白宮沒有迴應 CNBC 參與報道的請求。

In thinking about the role of IVF in increasing fertility.

在思考試管嬰兒在提高生育能力方面的作用時。

We have companies telling young women, work like crazy during your 20s and don't worry, we pay for you to freeze your eggs because you can do IVF later.

我們有公司告訴年輕女性，在 20 多歲時瘋狂工作，別擔心，我們會付錢讓你冷凍卵子，因為你以後可以做試管嬰兒。

I'm not sure that that's actually going to lead these women to have more children.

我不確定這是否會導致這些婦女生育更多的孩子。

I think in some sense we're really forcing the trade off to the extent we're setting up an expectation that people can delay childbearing to their late 30s.

我認為，從某種意義上說，我們確實是在強迫人們進行權衡，因為我們正在建立一種期望，即人們可以將生育延後到 30 歲以後。

In the end, it might actually exacerbate the low fertility rate for people having fewer children than they sort of ex-ante would have liked to have had.

到頭來，這實際上可能會加劇低生育率，因為人們生育的孩子比他們事先希望的要少。

It's common for fertility to decline during economic uncertainty.

在經濟不穩定時期，生育率下降是很常見的現象。

But birth rates did not recover after the Great Recession.

但大衰退之後，出生率並沒有恢復。

And that kind of caught a lot of demographers around the world flat footed because it also didn't happen in other countries.

這讓世界上很多人口學家措手不及，因為其他國家也沒有出現這種情況。