Barbara Kay: ‘Doomography’: The Trend of Plunging Fertility Rates Is Eroding Societal Well-Being

MAJ Dale E. Wilson, Ph.D. today is grieving parents day, remembering all those who were loved but didn’t make it.

In rural India, the norm is to keep producing children till a boy is born and a single child is not enough. So, an uneducated couple in rural India give birth to a boy and a few years later they welcome a girl. Since a girl was born, the couple have a third child, which is a boy again. The production stops here. However, where girls are born, the couple can bring five or even six children into this world. Poverty does not stop this ancient social trend. What has changed is that girls are accepted as family, yet they are still not included in family succession plans. The boy, irrespective of whether he was born last, will be the head of household.

MAJ Dale E. Wilson, Ph.D.