Transportation

Declining Birthrate Likely To Swing Upward Via Advent Of Self-Driving Cars


The latest stats from the Center for Disease Control (CDC) indicate that the birthrate in the United States has continued to decline, inching down to the lowest in 32 years. This closely watched fertility indicator is predicted to continue going further down.

Numerically, the rate stands at 1.72, based on data that shows there are now 59 births per 1,000 women in the U.S., statistically bounded by the age groups from 15 to 44 years old (considered the childbearing years, per how the CDC defines these matters).

The birthrate in America has been on an overall downward slope since the Great Recession started in 2008.

Why care that the birthrate is so low and seemingly going to go even lower?

One concern voiced by many demographic experts is that we need to achieve a birthrate of at least 2.1 to ensure the ongoing renewal of our population.

Yes, you read that correctly, namely that if we want to keep the United States population in good stead, we are supposed to be aiming at a birthrate of 2.1, otherwise we’ll face numerous societal pitfalls.

One such downfall involves an undesirable shift in population age segmentation, inexorably becoming lopsided, meaning that we’ll have fewer and fewer young people to shoulder the overarching burdens of our society. Analysts decry that the United States is becoming an “aging society” of those over the age of 65 exceeding the number of those under the age of 15 (on a respective proportional basis).

So, we’re now at a record low of 1.72 birthrate factor and somehow are supposed to find our way up to a 2.1, though all signs point in the other direction.

A crass remark by some would be that we need to set aside more effort toward procreating, which perhaps might be an opening line if you are half-drunk in a seedy bar.

Well, it is conceivable that something is going to happen in our society that will cause an uptick in the birthrate, though at first glance it might seem counter-intuitive as a kind of savior for this extinction fostering trend.

Here’s the somewhat surprising solution: The advent of true self-driving cars might end-up boosting the birthrate in America.

Say what?

Let’s unpack the matter.

The Levels Of Self-Driving Cars

It is important to clarify what I mean when referring to true self-driving cars.

True self-driving cars are ones that the AI drives the car entirely on its own and there isn’t any human assistance during the driving task.

These driverless cars are considered a Level 4 and Level 5, while a car that requires a human driver to co-share the driving effort is usually considered at a Level 2 or Level 3. The cars that co-share the driving task are described as being semi-autonomous, and typically contain a variety of automated add-on’s that are referred to as ADAS (Advanced Driver-Assistance Systems).

There is not yet a true self-driving car at Level 5, which we don’t yet even know if this will be possible to achieve, and nor how long it will take to get there.

Meanwhile, the Level 4 efforts are gradually trying to get some traction by undergoing very narrow and selective public roadway trials, though there is controversy over whether this testing should be allowed per se (we are all life-or-death guinea pigs in an experiment taking place on our highways and byways, some point out).

Since the semi-autonomous cars require a human driver, such cars aren’t particularly significant to this birthrate matter. There is essentially no difference between using a Level 2 or Level 3 versus a conventional car when it comes to driving and therefore doesn’t merit discussion on this topic.

It is notable to point out that in spite of those dolts that keep posting videos of themselves falling asleep at the wheel of a Level 2 or Level 3 car, do not be misled into believing that you can take away your attention from the driving task while driving a semi-autonomous car.

You are the responsible party for the driving actions of the car, regardless of how much automation might be tossed into a Level 2 or Level 3.

Focus On True Self-Driving Cars

Let’s go ahead and focus on the Level 4 and Level 5 autonomous cars.

There isn’t a human driver needed in a true self-driving car, which though a seemingly obvious point, it is worthwhile to ponder the ramifications of no longer having human drivers in cars.

A human driver is normally an adult.

Besides driving the car, the adult driver also acts as a kind of supervisor overseeing any activity inside the car.

No monkey business is usually the rule that most adult drivers would offer to any younger occupants inside the vehicle.

Plus, the adult driver aids in determining where the car is going to go.

I’m leading you toward a point of importance that pertains to the birthrate matter.

With true self-driving cars, young people will be able to ride around without any direct adult supervision in the vehicle. Furthermore, those young people can presumably tell the AI to go here or there, wherever they might wish to have the AI system drive them.

Some believe that we might open a Pandora’s box by providing a “safe place” for young people to do certain kinds of deeds if you get my drift.

Two youths that eyed each other at school are aiming to have a private rendezvous. In today’s world, they would need to likely get their respective parents to give them a lift, and presumably, need to tell their parents where they will be going.

Such spying eyes by the parents make any private activity less likely to readily occur.

In the future, one of the two youths can access a mobile app to request a self-driving car ride, jump into the empty driverless car once it arrives, take it to pick-up the other youth, and they now have a place to get to know each other (wink-wink).

If the two need some extended private time, they could tell the AI to drive around town a couple of times, not aiming to go anywhere in particular. Essentially, they are in a roving capsule that innocuously makes its way across town.

Many are expecting that self-driving cars won’t have regular windows, and will instead have LED displays, allowing you to watch a movie or see streaming videos while inside the driverless car. As such, the inside activity of the self-driving car will be blocked from view by those outside of the vehicle.

This certainly seems ready-made for hanky panky.

Suppose though that the number of miles being driven is tracked and going to be charged to the parent’s credit card. Those darned parents are eventually going to ask untoward questions about why the self-driving car was randomly roaming around the city.

If that’s a potential hiccup in the youthful interest of being together, they could tell the AI system to take them to a remote locale, park there, and afford some personal time for the occupants, or maybe drop them off and come back later to pick them up.

With amorous teens, where there’s a will, there’s a way.

I don’t want to make it seem as though the youth of America will be the only ones leveraging the self-driving car capabilities for such purposes.

Imagine that you use an online dating service to find a potential match.

Nowadays, after doing some amount of online courtship, you likely agree to meet in-person.

In Los Angeles, many people won’t even start to date someone that lives more than about fifteen to twenty miles away, because the drive time is horrendous. They know that despite a potential match made in heaven, it won’t work if they each have to endure bumper-to-bumper traffic for an hour each way to see each other.

One of the most touted advantages of self-driving cars is that they will open wide a new era of mobility.

Some are referring to the emergence of driverless cars as shifting our economy into one based on friction-free mobility. The catchword or emerging phrase is mobility-for-all.

Thus, after you find an online connection that you feel is suited for you, the act of getting together will be a lot easier than it is today.

You merely request a lift from a self-driving car and have it drive you to your potential sweetheart. You don’t need to do the driving. You don’t need to cope with the crushing stress of driving in nightmarish traffic. Instead, sit back and relax, contemplating how much joy you’ll have to get to your hoped-for true love.

Notice that this use case does not involve any hanky panky inside the driverless car.

As such, the self-driving car is not serving as a den of debauchery, and instead simply aiding in upping the chances of people being able to get to see each other in-person.

In somewhat crude terms, what does it take to procreate?

In theory, you need to have access and opportunity.

Self-driving cars will provide ready-made access and enable ready-made opportunities.

The barrier to dating will be eased. People of ardent interest can go see each other, whenever they wish, using non-stop 24 x 7 available self-driving cars. Face to face time will dramatically increase.

This all could make the world a better place, encouraging more human-to-human interaction that goes beyond using Facetime and text messaging.

Oops, more in-person human-to-human interaction can have another result, specifically the ability to let passions rein.

Conclusion

The advent of true self-driving cars has several compelling elements that suggest the birthrate could very well reverse in decline and start to head-up.

You might be relieved (or disappointed) to know that this potential new trend in the birthrate could be stymied despite the emergence of driverless cars.

First, it is anticipated that true self-driving cars are going to have cameras facing inward, doing so to curtail riders that might want to mark graffiti in the driverless car or otherwise destroy the interior and be caught on film doing so.

Those cameras will serve other helpful purposes too, such as parents being able to send their kids to school in a self-driving car, absent any adult in the car, and watch their kids during their journey, making sure they safely reach school.

In that case, the youths that want to play some private games inside a self-driving car are going to be on candid camera. Even if there is a feature allowing occupants to turn off the cameras, I’m sure that doting parents are going to insist that the cameras remain turned on the entire time that those youths are being carted around.

Overall, it certainly would seem vital to society that self-driving cars not become a place for underage untoward acts, since we all likely would be disturbed to have underage births becoming a more commonplace matter.

Strikeout then the potential for astronomically abundant youthful indiscretions, but you can still keep into the mix the notion that mobility will be expanded. The odds are that the wider mobility is going to dominate those essential access and opportunity factors anyway.

One of the assumed reasons that there has been an ongoing decline in the U.S. birthrate is due to people being more attuned to using protective methods. If the culture keeps that attention going, presumably added access and opportunity won’t lead to an increase in the birthrate.

It could be that driverless car owners might include protective types of personal products for the convenience of passengers’ use (probably charging an added fee, anything to get more money off a self-driving car), accommodating those that might get an urge and seek to leverage the driverless car for private purposes.

Some say that the economy is one of the largest factors in determining birthrates. When the economy tanks, people don’t want to add the burden and costs of having children.

It’s hard to say whether self-driving cars in themselves will spark the economy, which some economists believe will be the case. If so, it would presumably tend to grease the skids on upping the birthrate. The economy though has so many moving parts that it is problematic to assert that driverless cars will be the sole or primary factor for an economic boom, but it could be a handy spark.

Another consideration would be the parental drain when having children and having to contend with work and raising a child.

Perhaps driverless cars will make it easier to take your children to work with you since you won’t be driving the car and can completely attend to your child during the commute. Also, for those that might have a nanny or similar come to their homes for childcare, the use of driverless cars could make it a lot easier to get someone to come to your domicile to watch over your kids.

All in all, I’d put my money on the bet that true self-driving cars will spur the birthrate to turnaround and head upward. I don’t see the upward movement as a runaway train and anticipate that once we all get used to driverless cars, life will settle in and we’ll stabilize in many ways that at first got jumbled or rejiggered.

Does this mean that we all should be cheering for self-driving cars to get here soonest, allowing us to achieve the vaunted 2.1 birthrate?

I’ll let you decide that.



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