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☆ The White House is cracking down on companies illegally using migrant children to fill the labor shortage as 15-year-olds pack Cheerios and 13-year-olds change your hotel sheets
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-28 | by ( Jason Lalljee | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

The New York Times reported last week that companies across the US are exploiting the labor of migrant children. The investigation comes as multiple states seek to loosen child labor laws to address the labor shortage. The Times reported that the use of child labor is prevalent across a number of prominent brands in the US, highlighting J. The Labor Department has found some of these companies, such as ice cream staple Ben & Jerrys, guilty of child labor violations before. Economists say that during a labor shortage, paring back child labor laws is a common phenomenon in the US.

☆ Instead of paying adults more, some states might let companies hire kids as young as 14 to fill the labor shortage
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-13 | by ( Jason Lalljee | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Republicans in some states are proposing exceptions to child labor regulations. Lawmakers in Iowa and Minnesota have introduced legislation in the last month proposing exceptions to child labor regulations in their respective states, due to the persisting labor shortage hitting them particularly hard. "A lot of the child labor jobs are menial jobs and those skills aren't transferrable," she said. The proposed laws skirt around the child labor requirements outlined by the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. Research shows that these workers aren't averse to meatpacking work entirely — they're just not willing to do it for the current wage standard.

☆ In aging China, a call for 'bold' steps to cut cost of having babies
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-10 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

HONG KONG, Feb 10 (Reuters) - A Chinese health official has urged local governments to take "bold" steps to lower the cost of having babies and raising children to reduce the burden on families and boost fertility, a state-backed publication reported on Friday. In addition to that is the prospect of a rapidly aging population slowing the economy as revenues drop and government debt increases because of soaring health and welfare costs. Yang Wenzhuang, director of Department of Population Monitoring and Family Development under the National Health Commission (NHC), stressed the importance of family support for improving the fertility rate, the publication the Paper reported. China had to "firmly grasp the important window period of population development" during its 14th five-year plan which runs until 2025, to accelerate "the promotion of childbearing support", he said. Yang's comments were published in the latest issue of NHC-managed magazine, Population and Health, the Paper said.

☆ Make it easier to raise children, say many Chinese after population falls
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-18 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

"Our parents think if they have more children, they can get more care when they grow old. They think raising one child is already very tiring." China is one of the most expensive places to raise a child, beaten only by South Korea, according to the Beijing-based YuWa Population Research. In Australia it was 2.08 times, 2.24 times in France, 2.91 times in Sweden, 3.64 times in Germany, and 4.11 times in the US. By comparison, north Asian countries were the costliest, with Japan 4.26 times, China 6.9 times and South Korea 7.79 times.

☆ China set for historic demographic turn, accelerated by COVID traumas
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-13 | by ( Farah Master | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

[1/3] Ang Ran and her 2-year-old son Tang Ziang look out from their home in Beijing, China November 8, 2022. A glimpse of the scars caused by the pandemic to China's already bleak demographic outlook may come to light when it reports its official 2022 population data on Jan. 17. "In less than 80 years China’s population size could be reduced by 45%. The United Nations predicts China’s population will start to decline this year when India overtakes it as the world's most populous country. U.N. experts see China's population shrinking by 109 million by 2050, more than triple the decline of their previous forecast in 2019.

☆ Billionaires like Elon Musk want to save civilization by having tons of genetically superior kids. Inside the movement to take 'control of human evolution.'
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-17 | by ( Julia Black | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +40 min

"We are the Underground Railroad of 'Gattaca' babies and people who want to do genetic stuff with their kids," Malcolm told me. Ellison, meanwhile, who has two children in their 30s, has reportedly resumed having kids — with his 31-year-old girlfriend. "The person of this subculture really sees the pathway to immortality as being through having children," Simone said. The person of this subculture really sees the pathway to immortality as being through having children. Before she met Malcolm, Simone was convinced she wanted to live her life single and child-free.

☆ Climate justice gets harder as world population passes 8 billion
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-15 | by ( Gloria Dickie | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

These are also among the countries most vulnerable to climate impacts, and most in need of climate finance. "A SIGN OF HUMAN SUCCESS"Globally, the 8 billion population milestone represents 1 billion people added to the planet in just the last 11 years. Even while the global population reaches ever-new highs, demographers note that the growth rate has fallen steadily to less than 1% per year. "A big part of this story is that this era of rapid population growth that the world has known for centuries is coming to an end," Wilmoth said. Rapid population growth combined with climate change is likely to cause mass migration and conflict in coming decades, experts said.

☆ As world population hits 8 billion, China frets over too few babies
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-14 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Such decisions by countless people like Tang will determine the course not only of China's population but that of the world, which the United Nations says is projected to reach 8 billion on Tuesday. Tang, 39, said many of his married friends have only one child and, like him, they are not planning any more. But now the United Nations expects China's population will start shrinking from next year, when India will likely become the world’s most populous country. China's fertility rate of 1.16 in 2021 was below the 2.1 OECD standard for a stable population and among the lowest in the world. The proportion of the population over the age of 65 is now about 13% but is set to rise sharply.

☆ Chinese authorities ask: Dear newlywed, when's the baby arriving?
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-27 | by ( Farah Master | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

[1/2] Students at Ayi University, a training program for domestic helpers, practice on baby dolls during a course teaching childcare in Beijing, China December 5, 2018. The Nanjing municipal government and the National Health Commission did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment. The post was taken down a few hours after it was posted along with all the comments. The first time she was asked if she was taking folic acid and if she was preparing to conceive. Take the time to have a baby," she said she was told.

Passengers help a baby wear a mask at the Shanghai railway station in China, as the country is hit by an outbreak of the novel coronavirus, February 9, 2020. REUTERS/Aly SongBEIJING, Oct 16 (Reuters) - China will enact policies to boost its birth rate, President Xi Jinping said on Sunday, as policymakers worry that an imminent decline in China's population could hurt the world's second-biggest economy. "We will establish a policy system to boost birth rates and pursue a proactive national strategy in response to population ageing," Xi told some 2,300 delegates in a speech opening the once-in-five-year Communist Party Congress in Beijing. Its fertility rate of 1.16 in 2021 was below the 2.1 OECD standard for a stable population and among the lowest in the world. Still, the desire among Chinese women to have children is the lowest in the world, a survey published in February by think-tank YuWa Population Research showed.

☆ Elon Musk says 'population collapse' is more dangerous than global warming. Experts say that won't happen.
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-02 | by ( Isobel Asher Hamilton | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Elon Musk is scared low birth rates could lead to what he calls "population collapse." Experts told Insider the global population is still growing, and when it shrinks it'll be gradual. "Global population decline is therefore still some way off, and is likely to happen gradually when it does take place. Dr. Peter Matanle, an expert in East Asian social and cultural geography, agreed low birth rates "will not cause a population collapse." Reid also disputed Musk's claim that low birth rates are a "bigger risk to civilization than global warming."

☆ The man who unlocked the world's secret to living to age 100 says you can skip the gym
▼ + stars: | 2019-12-05 | by ( Hilary Brueck | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

People residing in these Blue Zones are outliving us because they have figured out what others have not, according to Buettner. In 2009, he piloted his first "Blue Zones Project" in Albert Lea, Minnesota. The goal was to reverse-engineer it into a Midwestern Blue Zone. Playa Santa Teresa, on the Nicoya peninsula in Costa Rica, is in one of Buettner's Blue Zones. AdvertisementAdvertisementUpdate: A previous version of this story mentioned Belgian professor Michel Poulain as the inventor of the phrase "Blue Zone."

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