Controversial Incentives for Teen Pregnancies in Russia

Simone and Malcolm as they discuss the controversial topic of teen pregnancy. They delve into the historical context of youth adulthood, declining teen pregnancy rates, and examples from media that have influenced public perception. They explore how extended adolescence may be contributing to modern youth struggles, teen depression, and argue the potential benefits of teen pregnancy in fostering responsibility and maturity. They also critique global approaches, such as Russia's cash incentives for pregnant students, and propose a vision for integrating parenthood with education to create a more supportive society for young parents.

Simone Collins: Hello, Malcolm. I'm so excited to be speaking with you today because today we are trying to make teen pregnancy great again.

Speaker 3: My name is Victoria and I'm 15 years old, and I don't care what my mama says. I'm gonna have a baby. I'll do whatever it takes to take care of my baby. If it has to come out prostitute in my body, then so be it.

Simone Collins: It is a truth universally acknowledged that demographic collapse is in part a product of a drop in teen pregnancy, which most people hail is a big good development. For example. So I, I need to,

Malcolm Collins: I need to make a few notes here for people who don't know.

In the United States, if you divide women out by age ranges in, in, you don't know us is going through a major fertility crash right now.

Every age range of women is having the same or higher fertility rate than they have historically. Mm-hmm. Except for women under 24. Yeah. From 1990 to

Simone Collins: 2023, teen pregnancy dropped 78% in the USA. So the teen birth rate in 2023 was 13.1 per 1000. Teens,

Malcolm Collins: and this isn't just in the us Latin American demographers have said the majority of the crash in fertility rate in Latin America is coming from women.

I think it was under 21. Yeah. And it's,

Simone Collins: it's, and, and everywhere it's going down and, and even still in the US just like, just from 2007 to 2023. So this is, you know, in all of our recent memory, we're seeing about six to 8% year annual declines per year for teens. So, I mean, you would've thought that maybe in the nineties this would've already completely crashed.

The crash is continuing. It is, it is absolutely still happening. So teen pregnancy is out and most celebrate this as, as a huge win. But, well, what if it's not? So, you know, I think a lot of this, it might just be a product of our extended infantilization of youth, which by the way, is not working well for youth today in 20 23, 20 to 22% of high school students overall seriously considered.

Prematurely terminating their existence with about 9.5% reported actually attempting, said termination on any given year. Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: And so what we're gonna be arguing here throughout this piece is, is teen pregnancy isn't actually that bad and we need to go back to a society which enables and supports teen pregnancy,

Simone Collins: which in turn accelerates adulthood.

And, you know, maybe getting out of youth. These days, it's kind of a get, get the hell outta dodge situation. You know, like people, oh, this robs you of your child. Look at childhood right now. Right. And, and keep in mind, like female students specifically report much higher rates of, of all this misery. Like, you know, this is this, you know, and, and women are the ones who are.

You know, going through the process of pregnancy. So also we, we should point out that delayed pregnancy leads to more health risks for both mothers and babies. But here's the thing, this is also very timely and, and, and newly in terms of people who are looking at prenatal list initiatives because in Russia, for example, cash payments are being issued to pregnant women, actively enrolled as students.

Who reach a certain age of gestation and all of these news outlets I get, I get all the prenatal list news alerts and like half of them for like the past month have been Putin gives out cash bonuses to pregnant schoolbus. Like, you know, there's, he's, you know, it's a whole thing, but let's explore.

Howe Pregnancy got demonized in the first place, and

Malcolm Collins: this was an active campaign to make you think that you are. Low life trash. If you get pregnant while you're a teen. Yeah. That you're ruining your kid's life. That you're ruining your life. Mm-hmm. And I note here,

Simone Collins: well, and that is trashy. That's the biggest thing.

Malcolm no one really cares about how ruined or not ruined your life is. They care about how aspirational or trashy something is. Let's be honest. No, it's true.

Malcolm Collins: But, but I, I will note here. Teen pregnancy works when it is full expectation that the parents are going to help raise the kids. IE your parents are going to help raise your kids.

Yeah. And my kids will be raised fully with that knowledge. Yeah. If they get pregnant when they're teenagers, we will help with as much of the work that we can in terms of child rearing to make it easy for them to transition into that phase of

Simone Collins: their life. I'm super excited to be a grandmother. Oh yeah, yeah.

No, we'll be

Malcolm Collins: pushing them. Like, especially if your kid no longer have kids at that age when our first kids are. Yeah. Because I realized

Simone Collins: if, if we have the number of kids we wanna have, I'm gonna be pregnant at age 50. I'm like, I don't know. Like, just in terms of the, the likelihood of me making it to that I want to yeah, but you know, we have to be realistic.

So increasingly, like grandchildren, I, I, I have a spreadsheet that like tells me what, what age our kids will be at different years. And I'm like, well, let's see, probably by this year. I can start reasonably pushing your grandchildren. I have to figure out marriage first. Have a plan. My, my dad had

Malcolm Collins: me when he was 42, so we'll be at kid number, what is it, six or seven when I'm that age?

Simone Collins: Hold on, I have a spreadsheet

Malcolm Collins: because we're, you're pregnant with number five now? Yeah. So where, where am I gonna be?

Simone Collins: Let's see. So, we will have what child number, what?

Malcolm Collins: When I'm 42, the age. Oh, when you're

Simone Collins: 42. That's 2031. Is when I would have our eighth child if we keep to our schedule.

Malcolm Collins: Okay.

Simone Collins: So, and this is assuming,

Malcolm Collins: and that's when I'd be completing the full round of kids that I intended to have.

Eight was, no, you wanted seven.

Simone Collins: Seven was your original, like Yeah,

Malcolm Collins: but eight. And that would be when you're 42.

Simone Collins: Oh yeah. So Oh gosh. Yeah. When we, when we would be doing yeah, when you would be 42 when we had, would have. Seventh child. And your dad was only, although your dad had a daughter from a previous marriage, so there was that.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. And then he had one more kid after me.

Simone Collins: Yeah,

Malcolm Collins: yeah. No,

Simone Collins: yeah. People are getting started later and you know, again, it's super feasible. But anyway by the way, just wanna say thanks to, to Megan for suggesting this episode. It's a really good topic 'cause she, she, Megan, who pointed out. Megan from Patreon, our friend Megan, also friend first.

Okay. Patreon second. I mean, you, you could say who she is. She's, she's Scott, Alexander's wife. She's, but on her own, like yeah, on her own.

Malcolm Collins: She's really cool. But she doesn't have a big public. Yeah. Like

Simone Collins: he, I can take relief. I mean, I, I love Scott Alexander. I get be wrong, but I'm, I'm team Megan here. Sorry.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah, I, I agree.

Simone Collins: Sorry, sorry, not sorry. No, I agree.

Malcolm Collins: Megan's really cool.

Simone Collins: But anyway, she pointed out that, you know, a lot of people are like, this is great, you know, this is wonderful. But she also is like, is it so wonderful though? Because she's seen in her life and we have to, and we'll get into this later, so don't, don't get into it too much, but like how pregnancy changes people often for the better, and having kids changes people for the better.

Is it such a good thing?

Malcolm Collins: The people I know who got pregnant as, as teenagers. Like they were often the more rebellious kids whose lives I saw were Yeah. Because

Simone Collins: now it's the re rebellious thing to get pregnant. As a teen. Yeah. No,

Malcolm Collins: no, no. But, but, but these are people whose lives were clearly spiraling when this happened to them.

Mm-hmm. And this just like course corrected their entire life. Yeah, like now they're like hardworking, studious, holding a job, building a career. I mean, they might start from a lower place because they, you know, spun out a lot, which led to the teen pregnancy. But this isn't to say that this is like a negative thing.

If, if anything, it's what saved their lives.

Simone Collins: Absolutely. Yeah. So let's, let's start off by just giving, like, sort of laying, give you a lay of the land. 'Cause I think a lot of people, again, just they, they aren't really familiar with how much teen pregnancy has dropped. So in North America. Teen pregnancy is down 78% since 1991, which is, is huge in Central America.

There it's still actually relatively high with some decline. The improvement actually stalled with COVID-19, which is interesting in South America. There have been large national declines and going from basically 72 out of a thousand in U Uruguay in 1996 to 36 out of a thousand in Uruguay in 2018.

It's just like to choose one South American place in Africa. There, there has been a slow decline, but. Like still, it, it's, it's going down even if the absolute population is growing. And in Europe there's been just a steep and steady decline. It's, it's, it has the lowest rates of teen pregnancy globally.

So basically the largest in absolute percentage declines have been in North America and many parts of South America and Europe and Central America and Africa basically have a more modest declines. But there's still. Lots of teen births, especially because there's just so many young people that like, there are still a lot of teen births 'cause there's so many teens.

And then Europe has the lowest overall teen pregnancy rates. Which might be why like. People are fascinated by gypsy weddings and like gypsy

Malcolm Collins: mothers. Well, I mean, I think one of the things about teen pregnancies is people will be like, kids are not old enough and not mature enough to make decisions that will affect them the rest of their lives when they're teens, like who they partner with.

Yeah. And it's like, yeah, but their parents are, and this is why pseudo arranged marriages are so important.

Simone Collins: Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, I think there's, there's a lot to be said for thoughtful teen pregnancy, like the earliest place. In terms of media demonizing teen pregnancy, the earliest contemporary place I've seen teen pregnancy demonized is in one of those 1950s propaganda instructional film videos that I love to watch.

And there's this, this one in which this high school couple that's dating is like out and about walking around, and they see their friend from high school who dropped out because she had a baby and is now like being a housewife. But the guy that she had a baby with and then married. Kind of like, you know, isn't that educated, isn't that conscientious?

Like she just made a poor choice. And it's clear from the, the. The propaganda that the primary critique is just a lack of good vetting and preparation. And not necessarily that she had a kid young, because the general pattern at that point was to get married right out of high school and have a baby right away anyway.

So it was more like, Hey, maybe don't do it at age 16, maybe do it at age 18, which is really interesting. But the first really prominent Western show, that was both researched and, and widely aired. That demonized teen pregnancy was 16 and pregnant. The MTV show, which I never watched. And then it, it's subsequent sort of inspired show called Teen Mom.

I, I'll send you a, a clip from the trailer 'cause it's, it's so, reminds me of like old MTV stuff, which just is entertaining. So just like, take a look at that to get a picture of how they were framing pregnant women.

Speaker: I'm starting my senior year of high school in the fall, and I plan on becoming a police detective,. I'm also training to become a professional cage fighter and a model, a lot harder because I'm pregnant.

Malcolm Collins: Wow. For a 16-year-old she was doing a lot.

Simone Collins: Yeah, no. So like the what what's shown in in the preview is basically like, I'm a girl. I have a lot of big dreams, but I'm also pregnant. And actually someone in her comments of, in another video recently actually was wondering what the effect of this show was on most viewers.

Yeah. Because she watched this show, and at least for one of the pregnant. Female protagonist that was featured in it. She was like, oh, like, I, I wanna have, I wanna have a kid now. Like, this teen pregnancy thing looks great. And I think later after she saw how the relationship between this young woman and her male partner kind of devolved she, she kind of changed her mind about that.

But it. There, there've been. The interesting thing is interest, like research studies done on the impact of this show and people have analyzed the effect and their effect on teen pregnancy among viewers. So basically, the show caused significant reductions in teen births, multiple studies, most notably by economist Melissa Kearney and, and Philip.

Levine, they found that the premier of 16 and pregnant in 2009 in areas where there was higher viewership experienced, notably larger declines in teen birth rates. Their research estimates the show was responsible for a 4.3 to 5.7% reduction in teen births in the 18 months following its debut, which explains the approximately one third of the total decline in teen birth during that period.

So this goes to show just like how much, 'cause the show also kind of frames it as. It's kind of trashy to get pregnant as a teen. It's not, you know, they're not showing aspirational, wealthy teens being pregnant. They're showing, you know, her, her boy, the, the boyfriend of the girl who in the preview that I showed like, well, he's unemployed.

Like, I wish he would get a job. He just kind of messes around and here she is being all like, ambitious and everything. I wanna be a detective and whatever. A model and a kickboxer and a model. An MMA fighter. Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: Wait, wait. She clearly is not gonna be an MMA fighter or a model. If you can look at her dream big

Simone Collins: girl.

I mean, yeah. But here's the thing is, is those careers ultimately in the long, larger scheme of things, isn't gonna come close to having a kid and raising a kid. Well, so in the end, you know, it's, it's, that's the thing. And, and, but it also wait, you find

Malcolm Collins: that you're not gonna make enough money or they're not gonna No,

Simone Collins: no, no.

What I'm saying is. She's not going to change the world in any lasting way by being an MMA fighter or a model, or by being a detective. She will change the world in a very meaningful way if she has a kid and raises them well, that kid could go on to have descendants for, you know, that that a line that lasts for millions of years.

I mean, we're the result of people making sacrifices. And although Simone,

Malcolm Collins: these people are probably not.

Simone Collins: Well,

Malcolm Collins: that's MTV's choice. Our listeners might, our listeners might, especially if they're of the younger variety.

Simone Collins: That we don't know. MTV chose to frame her a certain way. Whatever you know, I can, I wonder if we can like, look up what's, how is she doing now?

But anyway not, it wasn't just this reduction in teen birth that happened, there was also increased interest in contraception that was inspired by this show. Some, some researchers analyzed Google Trends and Twitter data. And these studies found spikes in searches and tweets about birth control and abortion whenever new episodes aired, which suggests that the program increased awareness and discussions about contraception in pregnancy prevention so that like people are watching this show and like actively Googling like, oh no, I need to not do this.

But here's the interesting thing, and this really dovetails with the person who commented on another one of our episodes, kind of wondering like. I don't know, like what's the effect of this show to make some, like, to make people wanna be pregnant more? Well, I think it was in response to our propaganda episode.

Yeah. Yeah. Because some experimental studies found that while a majority of teens are about 82%, who watched the show, felt it helped them better understand the challenges of teen pregnancy. A significant minority, about 15% believed it glamorized being a teen parent. Additionally, these studies revealed that teens who related strongly to the show's stars or formed parasocial relationships with them, sometimes developed more favorable attitudes toward teen pregnancy, obviously.

I mean, they would and they perceived the risk wasn't

Malcolm Collins: just this show, there's the famous like, I'm gonna have a baby. Oh no, that was the, like, those were the Jerry

Simone Collins: Springer shows.

Speaker 4: ​My name is Victoria and I'm 15 years old, and I don't care what my mama says. I'm gonna have a baby. I'll do whatever it takes to take care of my baby. If it has to come out the prostitute in my body, then so be it. I'm gonna adjust my baby in all brand names, and if I can't support it, then I guess I'm gonna steal it.

My mama thinks that I'm not ready to have a baby, but I have everything my. Will need. If my baby gets cold and it needs a blanket, it's all right because I have it. And if my baby needs clothes, it's cool. I have tons of them. And if my baby loses a pastier, I have three more. I'm not just having sex with one, not two, but three different guys.

That's right. I'm a player, but that's cool because I got it like that. My life games are to drop out of school, to be on Girl Scout Wild and to have my baby, and it's nothing. My mother. Can stay to change my mind

, The craziest thing about this story is they did a 10 year follow up on this girl and she actually turned out pretty normal. And with a lot of kids, I.

Speaker 5: . And now, 11 years later,

how are you doing?

Speaker 10: Doing amazing. And

Speaker 5: by the way, you have some exciting news about your life. Yeah. What, what do you want to tell everybody?

Speaker 10: I'm still married. Same baby daddy. All five of my kids.

Speaker 5: All five of your kids. And by the way, you, besides having five kids, you have a, what's your job?

Speaker 10: I'm a registered nurse.

Speaker 5: Oh, wow.

And what we also showed was that back then you were disrespecting your mom. What's it like now?

Speaker 10: Me and my mom are best friends.

Yeah, and as my wife pointed out to me, this is a perfect example of what we're talking about. We're what we might get into this later in the episode, but having a kid when you're young can really help stabilize your life if you are otherwise adrift. And if you look at the things she's saying in the first video, I mean, yes, the promiscuity is an issue, but other than that, she's just somebody saying.

I want to do whatever it takes for my kids. Um, and I want to have those kids and I wanna do whatever it takes and, uh, to, to give them a good life. And I think that that's actually admirable. And once she brought her kids into the world, her first kid into the world, it's clear that she understood that the way that she thought she was going to be able to live a life dedicated to her kids needed to change and needed to get serious.

And that's what she did with her life.

Simone Collins: You know, where like people would come on and they'd have ridiculous, like our favorite mother in the entire world who's like, and I'm gonna get everything from a baby and all the designer clothes and I can't

Malcolm Collins: afford it.

I guess I'm gonna steal it. I guess I'm gonna steal it. Yeah.

Simone Collins: I, I, I wish her and her baby all the best because she's got, she's got pizazz. She's got, we need more of that. She.

Malcolm Collins: Five pacifiers

Simone Collins: and they're all Ralph Lauren. So yeah, basically like there, there's this weird bifurcation in the impact of these shows where like most people are like, Ew, this is trashy.

I'm not gonna do it. And then there's a couple people who are like, sign me up. And I kind of feel like maybe. That's all that matters because that's kind of how it's gonna be. It's, it's just these, part of our theory around Tism is it's just the people who are like, I'm gonna have 7, 8, 9 kids. Like, I'm gonna keep going forever.

Who are ultimately going to inherit the future? And everyone else who's like, maybe I'll have one or two. Like, they don't really matter because. They're not, they're not above repopulation rate. Yeah. So another, another really big show that at least in our youth introduced people to teen marriage and teen pregnancy was my big Fat gypsy wedding.

Which just showcased these over the top really str like, I think part of it was the culture contrast because these gypsy weddings were. They involve very poofy dresses and very, like this, this extreme contrast that

Malcolm Collins: one gypsy girl you showed me was so badass.

Simone Collins: That was from my big fat American gypsy wedding.

Yeah. And I, I, I sent with to Malcolm

Speaker 11: What color do you want? Black. Black. She doesn't want black. I want black. This is the best place in America to get a dress. And you're still talking about black. No. You need to wear something beautiful. You need to wear something embellished. You need to wear something with swarski crystals. You need to have bling.

You need to have poof. You need to have something beautiful that you feel great in, and you look good in. Okay. We're starting to get a little upset. I'm getting upset because I'm here to get a very beautiful dress that I feel like I would be grayed in and if I just want it to be black. What is so crazy about that dealing with gypsy brides?

Simone Collins: A clip of one girl kind of. Butting up against the, the gypsy tradition of pink poofy wedding dresses. Sometimes it had LED lights sewn in because, you know, I think people loved that contrast of like extreme high levels of spending and very conspicuous consumption.

But then like. In these like rundown parts of town, like living outta trailers. It's such an interesting contrast. But while people didn't study the, this, this is much so there's not a lot of evidence that it increased interest in teen marriage. There's, there's a lot of just academic literature on how it, it, it focuses on issues of cultural stereotyping and social impact of stigmatized groups.

I think. In the end though, this, this falls into the teen pregnancy is trashy camp, because that's what the show really played up. And I, I do think that they made teen pregnancy look bad. And so people are far, I mean,

Malcolm Collins: can you talk about other countries where they're trying to make teen pregnancy look cool?

Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah. Do you want I have the, I can discuss the benefits of teen pregnancy first because I'd like people to know. Okay. Discuss the

Malcolm Collins: benefits.

Simone Collins: Yeah. And then I'll, then I'll get into what Russia's doing and then I'll get into what I think we would do instead if we were. Emperors of the world or Vladimir Putin.

But when, when we say teen pregnancy, I just wanna make clear, like we're mostly talking about age 18 and 19. I, I'm not talking about younger. Just 'cause the medically and I think personality wise, people just aren't necessarily writing. And actually when you go and look back in history, there's this perception that people are having kids really, really young.

And absolutely they were outliers, but most people. In, in history during the medieval age Renaissance, et cetera, like they were not having kids until they were around 18 or 19, or into their twenties. Really young teen pregnancy was actually fairly unusual. Mm-hmm. And, and I, there's a good reason for that because fertility in women is generally maximized between the late teens and late twenties.

And that's when the quantity and quality of eggs are at their peak and the ability. To conceive per menstrual cycle is highest. So basically this is Goldilock stone. And basically from 25 to 29 is what, when many medical professionals recommended, but I think that's just because they're afraid of recommending that 18 year olds have kids.

And it's, it, it, it, it maximizes natural fertility. Basically if you have a kid too young, you're at increased risk of preterm delivery, certain infections, and then fetal growth problems. So it, there can be, there is a too young age. And then after 35 risk of pregnancy complications like high blood pressure, gestational diabetes, preeclampsia, pre preterm delivery, and chromosomal abnormalities like down syndrome start to skyrocket.

And also, you know, there's, there's other health issues and we've discussed this in other things. Like when we did the polygenic scores of our embryos just from age, like approximately 33, 34 to age 35, 36, we saw a steep decline in all of their polygenic risk scores around cancer and Alzheimer's and all these other things.

And we're like, oh my gosh, like this is. There, it, there's a cliff. It's, it's there. At least anecdotally. I mean, it, it, if it hits different when you actually experience it yourself and you see how, how genetic scores play out differently. But yeah, also younger mothers tend to, to recover more quickly from pregnancy, but sort of outside of health things, teen pregnancy makes a complete career and motherhood more feasible because if you start your career at third 30, instead of starting at 40, which is when most women end up starting after, like doing the young kids phase at home, if they want to, it's a lot easier because, I mean, there are lots of young like grads who are just coming out of college at age 30.

Y you don't look weird in the job market. You just look normal. And if you're in an academic field, you don't even have to wait to start anything. You can just do all the front loaded academic work with an infant and toddlers because university schedule and lifestyle really works well with that kind of workload.

So like I just think it's perfect If you want to do, like, if you wanna have it all, you'll also of course be more present with your kids 'cause you're not gonna be geriatric when they're older and when they have grandkids.

Malcolm Collins: My is like significantly easier and more scheduled in the early stages of your career.

Simone Collins: Mm-hmm.

Malcolm Collins: I think a lot of, and just like think about the numbers.

Simone Collins: If you have a kid every 24 months, which leaves 15 months for recovery after each pregnancy, then you're having a kid with at 18, 20, 22, 24, 26 and 30, you can be done. When you're 30 and then, and then you can have your whole career in front of you, which is again, when many people graduate with their PhD and you could do all of this while getting it, you know, as long as you are disciplined.

Try not to be so lazy. People. But also I think the more important thing, and I I'd love for us to talk about this a little more because this is kind of the, the, the premise that, that Megan had pointed out. It, it as is, is described in, in Hannah's children, the book by Catherine lic. It burns this selfishness out of people.

It, it, it could reduce short-term orientation in many of its associated ills in the US leading to better voting patterns and more local and civic engagement. I mean, we've, we've met people for sure, like personally you and I can both think of people like friends and, and others. That we've met that after having kids, they're just better people.

Like there have been people who go from party animal to super parent or, yeah,

Malcolm Collins: like, and most people do. I mean, like, we recently filmed an episode about this New York Times reporter who. Just not in New York Times. She, she, she wrote a piece in the New York Times about hating men and, and this is after she had a kid.

And it's clear all she wants from life is sex. Mm. And her daughter means nothing to her when contrasted with her sex life. Oh yeah.

Simone Collins: That's not a great example. 'cause she became a parent and completely washed out, but she didn't

Malcolm Collins: become a parent as a teen. People who become parents as teen as often as like a switch flips in their heads.

Simone Collins: Hmm.

Malcolm Collins: Whereas people who become parents within the proper pathways

Simone Collins: or once they're more ossified

Malcolm Collins: in all their habits. Yeah. I often feel more righteous in continuing that lifestyle.

Simone Collins: Mm-hmm.

Malcolm Collins: In fact, I'd say the biological switch, which is supposed to happen in our heads when we have kids. Mm-hmm. To make you, you know, live for the next generation rather than yourself.

Hmm. Doesn't appropriately flip if you have kids too late. You need to have kids or within a certain time window. It seems to flip much better if you have kids between late teens. I'd say very early thirties.

Simone Collins: Interesting. Yeah, I don't know. I haven't seen the biologically

Malcolm Collins: coded to allow that flip to happen at a later age.

Simone Collins: Or maybe, yeah, maybe. Maybe it's similar to, to people forming much stronger love bonds, it seems when they're younger and less experienced in life. Like maybe, I mean, as you've pointed out, like you don't feel the same level of exuberance and happiness that our children feel. Maybe everything is just kind of dull down.

When you get older, you feel less happiness, you feel less, you know, dopamine reward, you feel less love, you feel less enthusiasm, like everything kind of goes down like we're old dogs limping around. Not that we're that old yet, but you know. Feels like it when we look at our children like God, they're insane.

But yeah, I mean also beyond all this, just like, and also a bunch of people in our Patreon were talking about this like, oh, this person and this person in my life just how they completely changed after they had kids for the better. And also pulling in research evidence indicates that most people experience significant increases in responsibility, maturity, and life direction after having kids.

Mental health usually improves slightly or stays. At least stable for both. Although of course there are strains and, and, and challenges especially from others. But I actually think that giving someone responsibility and meaningful challenges in their lives is really good for their mental health.

Like I think it's much better to be stressed out about being a mom and balancing that with your career, or handling childcare or just dealing with the changes and stresses of being a mom than it is to be. Like obsessed with your aging and, and, and how are you going to afford the laser skin treatments that you're getting now?

And I, I, I watch a lot of dink female, like single childless female influencers on YouTube. And the things they worry about are just. Not very healthy. So yeah, I, I, I think it's, it's great. So yeah. How can we bring back teen pregnancy? Well, Putin is trying and here's the scheme. Malcolm, you can tell me if you think this is dumb or not.

But actually as of this year, so in 2025, following the, like the year of the family in 24 for Russia. Yeah. Meanwhile they're killing all the young men. But whatever the year of the family several regions in Russia began offering substantial cash bonuses to pregnant school girls as part of an aggressive effort to reverse their low birth rate.

And the fact they're killing all men.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. They're, they're, they're gonna disappear. They have such a low fertility rate. They're super

Simone Collins: screwed. But I mean, if they, let's just say, let's pretend that this is a world in which they aren't slaughtering their young. Men of reproductive age and making everyone super extra depressed 'cause they were already Russians.

The, the initiative has, it's also actually drawn a lot of even just local controversy, but they provide a one-time payment of 100,000 rubles. That's about 1,200 to 1,300 US dollars to school aged girls who carry their pregnancy beyond a certain gestational. Threshold. So for some regions that's 12 weeks.

For some it's 22 weeks. It depends. And, and they have to be registered as full-time students. I like this 'cause it's like one, I think it's normalizing. Young mothers in school, which I would love to see in the university system and the academic system. And yeah, in some cases the payments go up to one 150,000 rubles, which is around $1,900.

So let's give you a sense of scale vis-a-vis the average annual income in Russia. So you could kind of guess what that would be. Yeah. In like the us so the average annual income in Russia and US dollars. Is $14,513 with the median being 8,179. So, if we're looking at the lower end,

Malcolm Collins: the

Simone Collins: 1,200, well, the

Malcolm Collins: median, the median's, the better one to go is the median is 8,000.

Okay? Because that's because Russia has a lot of oligarchs and stuff like that.

Simone Collins: Okay? Okay. So then 1,200 divided by 8,000 1 79 is 14%. Or well, 15, we'll say 15%. Like so 15% of an annual salary. That's a non-trivial thing. I ba basically like if, if this were a payment that we're given in the USA, it would be approximately $5,500.

So like, actually kind of the same amount of like the baby bonuses to entertainment. Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: Right. Hold on. So this ba this, this only goes to school kids. It doesn't go to older people.

Simone Collins: You have, yeah, you have to be registered. As a student, there wasn't, there wasn't any clear language on a maximum age. So some, some regions will only extend the payment to only adult age, so you have to be 18 plus.

So you can only, you know, it's not actually that young. Some don't have a minimum age requirement. And I, I don't, I didn't find any information about a maximum age requirement. So it seems they only had minimums meaning that if you were maybe like in your thirties and enrolled as a student, you could get this bonus, which is great.

But I mean, most people enrolled as students are younger, which is also fine by me. And. It, it's only, and you have to be in a full-time education. You can't like enroll in night school and get this. But it also applies not just to general schools, but vocational colleges and legal guardians can receive the payment for school aged girls who are beyond.

Stage of legal elective abortion. So like if, if you're not allowed to legally receive it, your parents can and then pass it to you hopefully. But the Russian government claims these payments are intended to support girls in difficult life circumstances. And they're not explicitly saying that this is to promote teen pregnancies, but everyone's covering it like that.

And it's actually really not well received. So only 43% of Russians support the incentives and 40% are opposed. Which is kind of wild. Mm-hmm. So I just won. But that's

Malcolm Collins: still more supportive than are against it.

Simone Collins: Yeah. 43 versus 40, though. I mean, it's. It's not

Malcolm Collins: wildly popular,

Simone Collins: but hey, look, I, I like Trump's approach to 90 10 issues.

What is a 90 10 issue? Okay, then go for it. You know?

Malcolm Collins: But Trump's not dictator yet.

Simone Collins: That being the key word

Malcolm Collins: there. We're working on it. Give him time.

Simone Collins: Come on. It's. Where we're not even to the next presidential election. Okay. Just trust the process.

Malcolm Collins: Six was, you know, come on, we really screwed things up there.

Simone Collins: Oh, I we're, we're we're winning. No long game. It's, it's fine. But yeah, I wanna, like, I, I, one, Russia's screwed. Two, I don't think that's enough of a payment to actually incentivize a lot. I love that they're trying to make it a thing for. People enrolled in full-time education to also be pregnant and have kids.

'cause I feel like that's the best time to do it. You have this like, more flexible schedule. I mean, what are you doing as a student, but like up all night studying and you know, you, you breastfeed and you're reading your textbook. It's perfect. Like, I just, I think it'd be great. But let's say that you and I.

Are trying to make teen pregnancy great again, and we're, we're, we're targeting first pregnancies at age 18 because like I said, if you have five kids, like you're done by the time you're 30, it's just, just amazing. It's a big booster. You're also not starting too, too early, I think number one. We have to stop infantalizing kids.

Malcolm Collins: Well, I, I think another thing is people are like, but then when will I get to travel? And it's like, we've created this intermediate stage of somebody's life that like is not an important stage. The

Simone Collins: the eat pre love stage?

Malcolm Collins: Yeah, no, literally like we expect every young person to go through like an eat pre love stage.

And it's wasteful.

Simone Collins: Yeah. It doesn't

Malcolm Collins: do anything. It doesn't help you, it doesn't help you develop as a person. Well, it's clearly

Simone Collins: not helping people flourish economically, professionally. Religiously, philosophically or socially? No. You look

Malcolm Collins: at like mental health rates and the more you pray love, you do, the, the worse it gets you.

Yeah. It's this,

Simone Collins: this clear, but also like we're starting to see gen Z. Recognize this. So I think, I think we're realizing this and I think we are gonna see maybe a rebound in teen pregnancies, but yeah, we're, we're super, I think the primary reason, aside from the trashiness equals teen pregnancy propaganda because we're, we're uncomfortable with teen pregnancies because they're, they're not, we feel like teens aren't ready to be adults.

But let me bring us back to Benjamin Franklin because I'm obsessed with him. He's such a pompous Turkey, but he's great. He started his first job at age 10. Yes. He worked for his, his father's candle making shop, and then at age 12 he became an apprentice with his older brother James as a printer, which came his first significant job and the foundation of his future career at age 12.

And I'm just, I'm asking for age 18, you know, like, this is insane. Oh, fungicide. Just 'cause I, I think I told you this, but he, he in his job working for his brother as an apprentice at age 12. He started submitting editorials to the, to his brother's new newspaper, which was called The New England Current.

It was one of America, the colonies, first newspapers. Under the pseudonym Silence Do Good, which is so puritan it's so nom, determinism. He posed as silence. Do good, do good.

Malcolm Collins: Imagine naming your daughter silence. Do good, silent and do good thing.

Simone Collins: Yeah, and he's writing as. A middle-aged widow, which I'm love, like just this 12-year-old boy who's like, I am Ruth.

Malcolm Collins: Like this widow is named silent. I love, I love in the early internet, they're like, always assume that that you know, anyone who knew is actually a guy. There's no women on the internet the same way. There's no women in newspaper. In early these

Simone Collins: 12-year-old boys writing? Well, he, he allegedly, you know, like according to his autobiography, he, he took on this, this persona because he, I actually quite fairly believed his brother James would not publish his writings.

Mm-hmm. Because, you know, he's his little brother. Oh, actually as he did, he a 10-year-old.

Malcolm Collins: Right? And so you, you can, yeah,

Simone Collins: actually he was, he was more like 16 at this point, but still like, you know, his little brother, he wasn't gonna, you know, give him the time of day. So he secretly wrote the essays and then he slipped them under the door of the printing shop at night just to submit them.

And actually, so these essays got really popular. And, and there it promoted mini marriage proposals to this alleged widow. People are like, so. Will you marry me? And I'm just like, oh my God. And they dunno, it's a

Malcolm Collins: 16-year-old

Simone Collins: brother, not the, for months. For months. It remained a secret. And she, he's like, catfishing.

His first career move is to catfish men. No, he should have said he should have sent back. Like,

Malcolm Collins: send me diamonds. Send me. Yeah.

Simone Collins: Send, send di send money. Oh my God, yes. But yeah, so, so actually his, his his older brother, in response to all this like, virality of silence do good, the desirable widow, he, he published an ad in the paper asking Silence Do Good to come forward. And Benjamin Franklin, he's, he's an incredibly egotistical man. He eventually confessed that he was the real author. And this really angered his brother who kind of was probably like jealous of all the intention, but like, this, the, the fallout of it actually led Benjamin Franklin to leave, like, to break the agreement of the apprenticeship and, and go to Philadelphia and start his own life.

And. It's, it's, he has this, also this story. And by way,

Malcolm Collins: this, this Benjamin Franklin guy she's talking about, he actually did a lot of stuff after this. You might be surprised to know this is, yeah. Crazy upstart actually did a few things after that. A couple

Simone Collins: things. But you, he actually made a lot of money from those couple things that he did.

And, and at one point, the first time he goes back to Boston, what does he do? But show up at his brother's printing shop with his like fancy clothes and his pockets full of silver. Just pisses off his brother so freaking much.

Malcolm Collins: And didn't he like give out money to other people and

Simone Collins: stuff like that? I think he did.

Yeah. I think he like gave them some money or something and like everyone at the printing shop is like, wow, your little brother and his brother is just like, I just, oh, he's such a pompous Turkey. But again, he, he's a pompous Turkey. Yes, he really is. Yeah. Also, he wanted the Turkey to be the national bird of the United States, but my larger point is that.

We do not need to delay adulthood as much as we are. Not only are we saving people from a youth that is literally terminal for a huge portion of, of people they want, they want to end it. They hate their youth so much. Like clearly these are not the, the best days of your life. But we are. We are missing huge career opportunities.

I mean, think about like the time that people have lost spending, you know, wasted time in school where they're not learning anything useful right now anyway, so I would, I would one just total culture change on this infantilization of youth thing, and I would change the standards of success in secondary education.

So like, basically like national standards for what high school successfully does from college enrollment. Or even graduation to annual tax return performance or, or some measure of financial independence and social independence. Because I think right now, like I, I don't know how it was for you in high school, Malcolm, but like for me it was, the purpose of high school is to get into a good college.

Just period. It wasn't like, be a productive citizen, be able to support yourself, be able to pay your taxes, be able to like. Get married. So I, I would also then introduce basically trade school and adulting classes in high school with adulting being kind of the modern euphemism for home economics. So cooking, cleaning, repairs, financial management, like taxes and investment and budgeting.

Just like to actually use secondary school to create productive tax paying adults capable of thriving and being happy. Yeah. And then I, I would get super involved in matchmaking. I wanna bring back the London season, as you know, like we we're already creating a we, we call it the index, or like a group of families that will sort of share and compare each other's cultures and traditions to see like who's thriving and learn from each other, but also.

Get their kids together in matchmaking events. Exactly.

Malcolm Collins: So the, for people who don't know, what we wanna do is we wanna build like Discord or whatever messaging platform is popular in the future group for our kids and the other kids who are in this network so they can get to know each other and flirt.

And then say, Hey, I wanna get to know this person better to us, and then they can go live with, for a period, like a few weeks or a month the parents of the daughter. Mm-hmm. Because I think it's better to send the, the guise to the daughter's house 'cause they'll be more vigilant you know, have, have more motivation to be vi.

And they can get to know each other and spend time together and under the context of the parents and they understand, oh, my job is joining a family, right? Mm-hmm. Like, it's impressing the parents, it's impressing the siblings. And if I like this environment, in this culture, this is something I want to replicate.

Simone Collins: Yeah. And this is, this is kind of playing with the Puritan tradition of sending out where parents would also sort of head off the issue of. Teens being rebellious against, rebellious against their parents by just being like, okay, well how about you just not be around me and be around someone else's parents?

Mm-hmm. And so they'd go and apprentice under a family, maybe like neighboring family or a family, one town over, and they would both learn a meaningful skill, but also live in a household of adults that weren't their parents. So they didn't have this immediate need. Kind of be rebellious for rebelliousness sake in a way that hurt them.

So even if, you know, these relationships don't work out or they're like, you know what, we're actually not that good of a match. Like they're, they're learning about a new family culture. They're learning about the adult's careers which helps 'em normalize to things, especially if this is like a high achieving family.

You know, it's, it's helping them understand, Hey, I could do this. This is not. Rocket science, even if it's rocket science. Like this, I, I, anyone could do this if, if they just learned the stuff you need to learn. So I think it's, it's great. The final thing I would do is, you know, for those who continue to go into higher education, higher education should be seen as the thing that you do while you become a parent.

Malcolm Collins: Just I agree. I agree. Education and parenting, early parenting are two things that go together. Yeah. It's just, it's just perfect for the next generation. They will for the people who survive.

Simone Collins: I hope so. Yeah. I would, it'd be really cool to like work with universities to help them create parenting programs and like housing and, and daycare programs and all these other like, sort of support things that would make it more feasible.

So, yeah. Is is there any, so that's the one way in which I'm like, okay, Putin got that part right. Everything else is just not good enough. Too little, too late. He's, he's screwed. But what else would you add to, to make teen pregnancy great again? I mean, there was my K-Pop, Bel Korean mm-hmm.

Scheme that I'd proposed whereby we would just give huge advantages to dynastic families in South Korea with the, the demand that each. Family, like each child of the dynasty have a ton of kids themselves to make having a lot of kids and having a lot of kids young, super prestigious and high class.

'cause I think the trashiness element is a really big issue here. But yeah. Anything you would add to this to, to make it cool?

Malcolm Collins: Well, I mean, I think that a lot of people are actually doing what they need to do to, to make this, what we need is a version of Elon. Who is more monogamous? I, I would say that is attainable for the average person.

Simone Collins: Oh. Like an aspirational public figure who has a lot of kids and makes it look really glamorous and cool.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. And we're seeing that more within conservative circles. I mean, this is something that we're seeing people talk about more and do more. I mean, I, I, I don't know how, I dunno,

Simone Collins: every time the media covers a family like that though, like the duggars, it's.

People GK at it, but they're, they certainly don't want it. And the shows keep emphasizing. No, no, we've

Malcolm Collins: changed all that now. It's the, the tech elite.

Simone Collins: Yeah, the,

Malcolm Collins: the, the te the techno fascist takeover, the Mother Jones cover piece on us.

This looks. Cool and edgy, and who doesn't want to be a part of that, right?

Like, I wanna be, if you had told me when I was in middle, middle school or high school, there's gonna be a, a cover piece on you that's about the techno fascist takeover. I'd be like, wait, are you, are you sure that's. Awesome. That is so cool. No, it's not even like the takeover of the good guy because he wants the good guys to take over.

It's, it's the takeover of the ballers. I mean, and that's, that's where we are right now. We're at baller stage. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. So, you know, I'm not, I'm not at all worried about the way the press is framing us, except for that one slate piece, which is like, please stop talking about this couple.

Well, so

Simone Collins: the problem though, look at it though, like, when, when the media talks about our actual family life, they're like, it's a life devoid of love. The children are beaten and sad. They're no, no, like a

Malcolm Collins: barracks. You see that and you think that looks bad, but actually that looks pretty badass. Because anybody who sees the faces knows the children aren't beaten, but they're raised with expectations.

And Malcolm,

Simone Collins: the, the, the phrase is they're raised by hand.

Malcolm Collins: They're raised by hand tally with no, no, no, no. But expectations and discipline. And I think we live in a society today where when people hear. Oh. This couple is all about, you know, discipline and expectations, but also very tech focused.

A lot of people are like, bro, that sounds like something I'm into.

Simone Collins: Oh, you know what? Actually there was one show that did kind of make it seem cool. What was it called? The umbrella factory. The umbrella. Oh, yeah, yeah. Academy. The umbrella Academy, yeah. Because it was like a large family. Yeah. Then again,

Malcolm Collins: went off the, the whatever when once her face went trans.

Yeah. I don't

Simone Collins: know what happened

Malcolm Collins: with that.

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: That was like a, a, a car crash in fast motion. Well, because, no, I mean, this is what we see so frequently when people go trans is the whole world becomes about them and you show that they're in any office, that they're in, everything like that. You just get more and more self-centered and more and more focused on personal self affirmation and everything you're doing.

And then it spirals everything into chaos and destruction. Yeah. Yeah, but the, the, the, the outside of that, outside of that you should watch it by the way, if you're interested in this phenomenon. And, and larger things about why people generally fail at things after they become trans, though wakowski effect.

We talk about why formerly successful people end up sucking at something they used to be really good at after transitioning. Yeah. Which just weird, sad that this happens, but it does reliably happen. In fact, I can think of almost no one, it hasn't happened to. Who's transitioned after becoming a public figure?

I mean, like, first they were public figures. Yeah. But there are

Simone Collins: people who have transitioned then become public figures and they're doing great. Yeah. So it's kind of like you, you're rolling the dice and either you have to kind of figure out a new specialty and really thrive in it, or just don't expect to keep being good at the thing you were good at before.

No, you're basically

Malcolm Collins: re-rolling your birth stats. Yeah. Like your, so much of your biology changes. No, it

Simone Collins: really, it cannot be understated how much hormones be they. Natural and endogenous or hormones that you consume can affect you. Like I know firsthand, like both going through pregnancy and seeing how Yeah, Simone actually has

Malcolm Collins: emotions when she's pregnant.

Simone Collins: It's, it's weird. Yeah, because I, I, I, I have problems. I have to take the same amount of hormones as like a trans person just to basically like, have, have periods in between pregnancies. 'cause that's, I just, my default is sort of nothing. And, it. Yeah. When I actually, when pregnancy kind of kickstarts everything and everything starts working again, I'm like, whoa.

Like, but also it's not like everything down to, like, the things that taste good to you change. Of course, these are profound, you know, it shouldn't be any surprise. At any rate, though, I'm really glad that Meghan brought this up, because normally when we talk to journalists and news crews about prenatal and we talk about, you know, the, the drop in birth rates.

Largely being, you know, people having kids later and a drop in teen births. We're like, and that's a really good thing, you know, this is great. You know, we want people to have kids later. Megan makes a really good point that, you know, maybe, maybe we can moderate that statement a little bit. Like there was an argument to be made

Malcolm Collins: when we got into this movement.

I really didn't, I wasn't sure that I would encourage my kids to have kids when they're still teens. No, I, because I wasn't sure that they'd be able to find partners. I think 18,

Simone Collins: I think eight. I, I would be worried if they had kids before.

Malcolm Collins: But not, not teen years, but I, I'd say like the sweet spot for me when our kids start having kids is 18 to 21.

Simone Collins: Yeah, I think 21, 21 we would be great.

Malcolm Collins: And that's, and that's, and that's when we're really gonna focus on finding them a permanent partner.

Simone Collins: Okay. So let's see. When, when will we, when our, when will our oldest turn? 21? I'm just checking 'cause I have this in my spreadsheet. Octavian turns 21 in. 2040, I'll be 52.

You'll be 53. That's not too bad.

Malcolm Collins: That's not so bad. Yeah, I, when my dad turned 50 and I was still a kid, and I go to him and I go, you're dead.

Simone Collins: You're so indelicate. We just had my, my father visiting and you're like, well, it's great that you know you're hanging out with the kids before you die. And my dad's like, I'm not, but it's, you know what, memento, Morrie, you and I are constantly thinking about how we could die at any point.

And we're trying to think. Absolutely. I don't mind. Yeah, it's not like an old thing. It's just like anyone could die at any time and you better appreciate every freaking person, you know. Go, go hug whoever it is you care about because. Oh gosh. Ugh. But yeah, I, I yeah, fifties, a new 40, et cetera. 'Cause we, we even infantalize adults now, so we'll try to leverage the, that, that otherwise toxic dynamic to our benefit at that point.

But yeah, I I'm, I'm glad we talked about that. Good talk Malcolm.

Malcolm Collins: Good talk. Love you. Tonight. We're doing faux right? Yeah, these scraps. And you're gonna do some onion and some, oh, did we

Simone Collins: not get basil? Do you just want me to use the pesto?

Malcolm Collins: Yeah, just eat a bit of the pesto.

Simone Collins: Hmm. Okay. Well at least we have the green onion.

So I just, I put those things on top at the end. Right. So,

Malcolm Collins: Well, I mean, the, the basil can be cooked with it. I, I, I think,

Simone Collins: oh yeah, I'll put that in the stock itself. Yeah, well, especially because yeah, we're not having bigger leaf, so I You want it with the chives and the Yeah. Is there, yeah, it called for onion.

Anyway, I'll go.

Malcolm Collins: No onion is always info.

Simone Collins: Confetti

Malcolm Collins: style or like No, no, not confetti style. Ring style. Oh, it gives it like a crunch and something to like pick up with like your chopsticks or something.

Simone Collins: Oh, okay. So it's not, is it not cooked? How long do I boil it if I'm boiling it?

Malcolm Collins: Well, I mean, you don't cook the beef by boiling, I don't think info.

I think you cook it out. No, no, no. I'm gonna

Simone Collins: pan sear the beef and then I'm gonna serve it on the side, and you're gonna put it on top if you want to. But in terms of the onion, what am I doing?

Malcolm Collins: It, it's cooked with the, the noodles and everything is my understanding.

Simone Collins: Okay. So it's, it's very lightly cooked 'cause you still wanna crunch.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Very lightly cooked. And the the, the don't you be generous with the beans, sprouts? In fact you, you, you might wanna do like about equal proportions of beans, sprouts, and noodles. Because beans, yeah, I was thinking just

Simone Collins: half. 'cause we're probably gonna do this for two nights. I was just gonna do half the beans sprouts.

We got.

Malcolm Collins: Okay. Yeah, I mean, that's a lot of bean sprouts. Okay. Okay.

Simone Collins: Maybe a third.

Malcolm Collins: You're right.

Simone Collins: And then I can

Malcolm Collins: being a little aggressive there, but do,

Simone Collins: I can saute in, in, in soy sauce for the third, third, what do you think on Wednesday?

Malcolm Collins: Saute and soy sauce.

Simone Collins: Yeah. The third amount of bean bean sprouts.

Oh yeah. That'd be

Malcolm Collins: really interesting. Yeah, sure. Cool. And then I can ask Bread. Was your homemade peanut butter homemade bread? Homemade peanut butter? Well,

Simone Collins: hmm, I need to do another round of sourdough. That's not whole wheat for you. 'cause you don't believe in whole wheat. It's against your religion. So hold off on that, but we'll get there.

I love you too. I'll go get started. You're wonderful.

Malcolm Collins: You are wonderful.

The thing that I always hate in my romance mangas is when they do a time skip in a, in a romance manga, you know, to like future or future time in their marriage and they don't have a bunch of kids. Aw.

Simone Collins: Sad. That always makes

Malcolm Collins: me so angry. I'm like, what?

Simone Collins: Where are the chil? You're like, every protagonist's mother-in-law.

Where are my grandchildren? Well, what do you mean they

Malcolm Collins: have two children? This is not acceptable.

Simone Collins: It's beautiful. Malcolm, you've, you've reached a new stage in your evolution.

Speaker 14: You're gonna what? You're gonna smash you, you're gonna smash me with a dinosaur? Yeah. Why? 'cause I'm gonna smash a dinosaur. Do you like smashing? Yeah. Uh, did you smash the baby dinosaurs already? A I didn't. You did? I didn't. You didn't, I saw you smashing them.

Why? Why do you like smashing? I like smashing bricks. You like smashing bricks? Yeah. Do you wanna hug? Yeah. Okay. Here you can come here and look it down. I do one. Aw, you're so sweet. Right? I tell not School bus on the projector. You want me to put on Magic School bus and the projector? Yeah.

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