by Bryan Caplan
113 Psychologists call this hindsight bias: See Ulrich Hoffrage and Rüdiger Pohl, “Research on Hindsight Bias: A Rich Past, a Productive Present, and a Challenging Future,” Memory 11 (4–5) (January 2003), pp. 329–335.
114 When Social Security began: “National Vital Statistics Reports: United States Life Tables, 2004,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2008), Table 11.
114 One careful study of elder care found: David Cutler and Louise Sheiner, “Policy Options for Long-Term Care,” in David Wise, ed., Studies of the Economics of Aging (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994).
115 the decline of marriage and religion explains much: In the General Social Survey, I initially estimated respondents’ number of children as a function of YEAR, AGE, SEX, log of real income (REALINC), and education (EDUC, with separate coefficients for men and women). The coefficient on year was–.010. Controlling for marital status and church attendance reduced the coefficient on YEAR by more than half to–.004.
116 Look at thirty-something American moms who never married: General Social Survey 2008. This comparison assumes that out-of-wedlock pregnancies are more likely to be unplanned, which is indeed the case. About 70 percent of out-of-wedlock pregnancies are unplanned, versus about 25 percent of inwedlock pregnancies. Lawrence Finer and Stanley Henshaw, “Disparities in Rates of Unintended Pregnancies in the United States, 1994 and 2001,” Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health 28 (2) (June 2006), p. 93.
117 makes you feel round and supple: Rich Cohen, “A Woman in Full,” Vanity Fair, July 2008.
118 Your feelings are important, but from a purely selfish point of view: Of course, when you’re predicting your future feelings, you should remember that there is some probability you will experience nothing at all because you’ll no longer be alive.
CHAPTER 6
126 He finally realizes: Steven Seagle, It’s a Bird (New York: Vertigo, 2005), pp. 116, 120.
127 The main source of progress is new ideas: For a good summary, see Paul Romer, “Economic Growth,” in David Henderson, ed., The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics (Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Fund, 2008), pp. 128–131.
127 “mainly an ongoing intellectual achievement, a sustained flow”: Robert Lucas, “Ideas and Growth,” Cambridge, MA, National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper, 2008.
128 In the words of economist Julian Simon: Simon, The Ultimate Resource 2, p. 407.
130 The implicit dividing line, apparently: The second most popular dividing line is probably between above-average and belowaverage intelligence. The famous eugenicist Karl Pearson maintained that “the sole condition under which . . . immigration should be allowed” is when the immigrants “form from the standpoint of intelligence a group markedly superior to our natives.” Quoted in David Levy and Sandra Peart, “Statistical Prejudice: From Eugenics to Immigrants,” European Journal of Political Economy 20 (1) (March 2004), p. 16.
132 With almost 2 billion users worldwide: “World Internet Users and Population Stats,” available at www.InternetWorldStats.com.
132 children have no legal obligation to repay their parents: Even if they did, of course, many parents, if not most, would eagerly forgive the debt.
133 In 1940, the United States had almost ten working-age adults: “Social Security Area Population Projections: 1997,” Social Security Administration, Figure 8, available at www.ssa.gov/OACT/NOTES/AS112/as112.html.
133 Now it’s about five workers per retiree: “Table V.A2—Social Security Area Population as of July 1 and Dependency Ratios,” Social Security Administration (2002), available at www.ssa.gov/OACT/TR/TR02/lr5A2–2.html.
133 Japan, to take one of the worst cases: Population Projection for Japan: 2001–2050, National Institute of Population and Social Security Research 2002, Table 4, available at: www.ipss.go.jp/pp-newest/e/ppfj02/ppfj02.pdf.
134 “the addition of each person to the American population”: Paul Ehrlich, “Recent Developments in Environmental Science,” 1998, available at dieoff.org/page157.htm.
134 “Having children is selfish,” she explained: Natasha Courtenay-Smith and Morag Turner, “Meet the Women Who Won’t Have Babies—Because They’re Not Eco Friendly,” Daily Mail, November 21, 2007.
134 Yet adjusting for inflation, average commodity prices have fallen: Paul Cashin and C. McDermott, “The Long-Run Behavior of Commodity Prices: Small Trends and Big Variability,” IMF Staff Papers (2002), pp. 175–199, find that the inflation-adjusted price of the Economist’s index of industrial commodities fell by about 1 percent per year from 1862 to 1999. Stephan Pfaffenzeller et al., “A Short Note on Updating the Grilli and Yang Commodity Price Index,” World Bank Economic Review 21 (1) (January 2007), pp. 151–163, report that, adjusting for inflation, the Grilli and Yang commodity price index (which includes metals, food, and nonfood agricultural products) fell by about .8 percent per year between 1900 and 2003.
135 Most notably, air and water quality in the Western world improved: See, for example, Lomborg, The Skeptical Environmentalist , pp. 163–177, 189–205.
135 Around the globe, there’s a standard two-stage pattern: See, for example, Susmita Dasgupta et al., “Confronting the Environmental Kuznets Curve,” Journal of Economic Perspectives 16 (1) (Winter 2002), pp. 147–168.
135 most scientists say that our emissions of carbon dioxide cause global warming: See D. Bray and H. von Storch, The Perspectives of Climate Scientists on Global Climate Change (Geesthacht, Germany: GKSS Research Centre, 2007).
CHAPTER 7
138 The most comprehensive study ever done looks at the entire Danish population: M. Murphy and L. Knudsen, “The Intergenerational Transmission of Fertility in Contemporary Denmark: The Effects of Number of Siblings (Full and Half), Birth Order, and Whether Male or Female,” Population Studies 56 (3) (Fall 2002), pp. 235–248.
138 The General Social Survey confirms the same pattern in the United States: In the General Social Survey, the correlation between number of siblings and number of children is .20.
139 Fertility runs in families because of nature, not nurture: See Kohler et al., “Is Fertility Behavior in Our Genes?”; Rodgers et al., “Behavior Genetic Modeling of Human Fertility”; and Rodgers and Doughty, “Genetic and Environmental Influences on Fertility Expectations and Outcomes Using NLSY Kinship Data.”
140 Government preaching and nagging seem about as futile: In practice, most government “awareness raising” tries to reduce birth rates rather than raise them. A comprehensive review of school-based pregnancy prevention experiments finds that many programs have no effect; for the rest, “the effects are relatively modest and may only last short-term.” Sylvana Bennett and Nassim Asseffi, “School-Based Teenage Pregnancy Prevention Programs: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials,” Journal of Adolescent Health 36 (1) (January 2005), p. 78.
140 The main researcher who studied Quebec’s program concluded: Kevin Milligan, “Subsidizing the Stork,” Review of Economics and Statistics 87 (3) (August 2005), pp. 539–555.
140 Another research team looked at the effect of paid parental leave in Austria: Rafael Lalive and Josef Zweimüller, “How Does Parental Leave Affect Fertility and Return to Work? Evidence from Two Natural Experiments,” Quarterly Journal of Economics 124 (3) (August 2009), pp. 1363–1402.
140 Other researchers argue fairly convincingly: See Anders Björklund, “Does a Family-Friendly Policy Raise Fertility Levels?” Swedish Institute for European Policy Studies 3 (April 2007).
142 The late economist Bernie Saffran taped a rebuttal to his office door: Saffran was probably paraphrasing George Bernard Shaw’s Man and Superman: “Do not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same.” (Charleston, SC: Forgotten Books, 2010), p. 227.
144 The Quebec experiment found of baby bonuses little or no effect: Milligan, “Subsidizing the Stork,” p. 552.
CHAPTER 8
148 My colleague Russ Roberts named it: Russ Roberts, “The
Most Beautiful Toy Yet,” Cafe Hayek, January 9, 2007, available at cafehayek.com/2007/01/the_most_beauti.html.
148 Apple’s crime: cutting the price by $200: Katie Hafner and Brad Stone, “iPhone Owners Crying Foul over Price Cut,” New York Times, September 7, 2007.
150 65,000 babies—35,000 from their mother’s husband’s sperm: Artificial Insemination: Practice in the United States: Summary of a 1987 Survey (Washington, DC: Office of Technology Assessment, 1988), p. 3.
150 the number of babies born in the United States using IVF: Assisted Reproductive Technology Success Rates: National Summary and Fertility Clinic Report: 2006, Figure 49, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Atlanta: 2008) available at www.cdc.gov/art/art2006/section5.htm. The CDC reports combined total results for all medical procedures “in which both eggs and sperm are handled” (p. 3). These include standard IVF, plus gamete intrafallopian transfer (GIFT) and zygote intrafallopian transfer (ZIFT).
150 Doctors in Africa . . . already offer “no-frills” IVF: Josie Glausiusz, “Cheap IVF Offers Hope to Childless Millions,” New Scientist, August 26, 2009.
151 Multiples have much higher infant mortality rates: “National Vital Statistics Reports: Infant Mortality Statistics from the 2005 Period Linked Birth/Infant Death Data Set,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Atlanta: 2008), p. 5.
151 “If Nature thought it was appropriate for homo sapiens to have litters”: Quoted in Liza Mundy, Everything Conceivable: How Assisted Reproduction Is Changing Men, Women, and the World (New York: Knopf, 2007), p. 212.
151 IVF is moving away from octomoms: Assisted Reproductive Technology Success Rates, Figures 58, 64.
152 Ninety-five percent of surrogates now get pregnant using IVF: Elizabeth Scott, “Surrogacy and the Politics of Commodification,” Columbia Public Law and Legal Theory Working Papers, pp. 39–40, available at lsr.nellco.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1045&context=columbia_pllt.
152 The booming economy of India has quickly become: See, for example, Silvia Spring, “The Trade in Fertility,” Newsweek, April 12, 2006.
153 “Separated from her husband, she found that her monthly wages”: Amelia Gentleman, “India Nurtures Business of Surrogate Motherhood,” New York Times, May 10, 2008.
153 Japanese researchers managed to keep premature goat fetuses alive: Jonathan Knight, “Artificial Wombs: An Out of Body Experience,” Nature 419 (6903) (September 12, 2002), pp. 106–107.
153 Hung-Ching Liu, director of Cornell University’s Reproductive Endocrine Laboratory: Gretchen Reynolds, “Artificial Wombs: Will We Grow Babies Outside Their Mothers’ Bodies?” Popular Science, August 1, 2005.
154 Sex ratio doesn’t run in families: Joseph Rodgers and Debby Doughty, “Does Having Boys or Girls Run in the Family?” Chance 14 (4) (Fall 2001), pp. 8–13.
156 Only a handful of women can marry Nobel Prize winners: David Plotz, The Genius Factory: The Curious History of the Nobel Prize Sperm Bank (New York: Random House, 2006). In practice, only a small fraction of the donors were actual Nobelists, and none of their donations ultimately produced a child.
156 The Fairfax Cryobank will inseminate you for $355: “Fees 2009: Donor Semen Services Fee Schedule,” available at www.fairfaxcryobank.com.
156 Elite Donors’ wealthy clients typically pay ten times as much: “Finding a Donor: How Much Does It Cost to Find an Egg Donor?” available at www.elitedonors.com.
157 If you want a boy, sperm sortation boosts your odds: Joseph Schulman and David Karabinus, “Scientific Aspects of Preconception Gender Selection,” Reproductive Biomedicine Online 10 (1) (January 2005), pp. 111–115.
158 A totalitarian government could use GE to root out individuality and dissent: For more, see Bryan Caplan, “The Totalitarian Threat,” in Nick Bostrom and Milan Ćirković, eds., Global Catastrophic Risks (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), p. 515.
159 Over 85 percent of Americans—and 100 percent of George W. Bush’s Council on Bioethics: Matthew Nisbet, “Public Opinion About Stem Cell Research and Human Cloning,” Public Opinion Quarterly 68 (1) (March 2004), p. 151; The President’s Council on Bioethics, Human Cloning and Human Dignity: An Ethical Inquiry, (Washington, DC: 2002), p. 202.
159 Instead, they feel grateful for their special bond: See Segal, Entwined Lives, pp. 97–115.
159 “Identical twins . . . are born together”: Human Cloning and Human Dignity, pp. 103–104.
CHAPTER 9
167 “Researchers have checked whether twins are more similar in intelligence or personality”: See Kenneth Kendler et al., “A Test of the Equal-Environment Assumption in Twin Studies of Psychiatric Illness,” Behavior Genetics 24 (1) (January 1993), pp. 21–22; Peter Borkenau et al., “Similarity of Childhood Experiences and Personality Resemblance in Monozygotic and Dizygotic Twins: A Test of the Equal Environments Assumption,” Personality and Individual Differences 33 (2) (July 2002), p. 262.
167 “If similarity of treatment caused resemblance”: See Kendler et al., “A Test of the Equal-Environment Assumption in Twin Studies of Psychiatric Illness”; and Sandra Scarr and Louise Carter-Saltzman, “Twin Method: Defense of a Critical Assumption,” Behavior Genetics 9 (6) (June 1979), pp. 527–542.
168 “One study of families with both kinds of children”: Kyle Gibson, “Differential Parental Investment in Families with Both Adopted and Genetic Children,” Evolution and Human Behavior 30 (3) (May 2009), pp. 184–189.
171 “Average desired family size for men and women is virtually identical”: World Values Survey 2005. Variable identifier D017, available at www.worldvaluessurvey.org.
171 “Women are more likely than men to say that having kids is ‘one of the most important things’”: General Social Survey 2008. Variable identifier IMPKIDS.
INDEX
Abduction, child
Accidents, as cause of children’s deaths
Activities, children’s
Adoption, from Third World
Adoption studies
on character
direct vs. indirect effects
distinguishing nature from nurture and
effect of parents on children’s future and
focus on middle-class, First World families
on happiness
on health
on intelligence
nature and nurture effects and
nature-nurture effect size and
on religion
on success
on values
Age, mortality by, in 2005
Agreeableness, nature vs. nurture and
AI. See Artificial insemination (AI)
Altruism, having more children and
American Enterprise Institute
American family, size of
American War and Military Operations Casualties: Lists and Statistics
Anger management
Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
Artificial insemination (AI)
egg donation and
Artificial wombs
Ask the Children survey
Austria, paid parental leave in
Baby boom
Baby monitors
Babysitters
benefits of use
electronic
Battle Casualties and Medical Statistics: U.S. Army Experience in the Korea War
Becker, Gary
Beethoven, Ludwig
Behavioral genetics
appreciation of parents and
character and
commonsense and
direct vs. indirect effects
distinguishing nature from nurture
evidence for
fade-out and
focus on middle-class, First World families
free will and
happiness and
health and
intelligence and
measuring nature and nurture effects
nature-nurture effect sizes
nature vs. nurture
parental wish list and
/>
practical implications for parents
rebellion and
success and
