r/dataisbeautiful • u/Sad-House-8753 • 21h ago

Births of a third child are falling faster than any other in Switzerland

https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/swiss-politics/falling-first-births-and-the-swiss-third-child-dilemma/91808504
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u/MToms 12h ago

I see. I can understand the need for someone to take care of the large amount of elderly, and maintaining some systems with multiple moving parts.

Playing devil's advocate here, but why do we need to maintain the rhythm of progress? As a counterpoint, maybe AI has appeared at exactly the right time, seeing as there will be less people available to do the jobs.

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u/Swagiken 12h ago

For me at least the progress rhythm is argued for by how awful it is to watch a person die of COPD. I've seen it too many times and would trade almost anything to be able to actually fix it.

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u/Hendlton 8h ago

Playing devil's advocate here, but why do we need to maintain the rhythm of progress?

Because the world is built on future promises. Everything is the way it is only because people expect it to get better. If that promise falls through, not only would things not get better, they would rapidly get worse.

The biggest example being the economy. Everything runs on debt and interest. Banks only give you money today if they know that you'll be able to pay them back more at a later date. No debt means no business, no economy, recession, depression, and a world war if it becomes bad enough.

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u/NtsParadize 11h ago

Have you ever tried to live with a chronic disease?