A counterintuitive perspective

China's fertility rate is a problem, but not the core issue. The core issue is the dependency ratio—how many young people are needed to support one elderly person.

The numerator is too large, the denominator too small—either way, it's a losing equation.

Raising the fertility rate won't solve it either.

Children born today won't enter the workforce until 2045, but the crisis will peak in 2035—distant water can't quench a nearby fire.

Only two paths remain:

Either increase the denominator or decrease the numerator.

What follows is even more counterintuitive:

Caring for the elderly is a uniquely human, anti-evolutionary behavior.

In the past, it yielded returns—the elderly had land, skills, and social networks. Supporting them was an investment, exchanged for inheritance rights and survival knowledge.

But now, knowledge is ubiquitous, land is worthless (a mere plot), and families no longer need elders to allocate resources.

The biological foundation of moral obligation has vanished.

Yet moral narratives remain locked in by institutional civilization, becoming evolutionary scars.

Here's something even more counterintuitive:

Elderly welfare, working population living standards, and fiscal sustainability—you can only choose two.

In reality, we've already chosen:

Implicitly sacrificing elderly welfare.

DRG cost controls, narrowed medical insurance coverage, and the dilution of rural healthcare resources—all happening, just unspoken.

These are packaged as "rational healthcare" and "dignified old age."

Finally, the most counterintuitive statement:

The pandemic was a natural social experiment.

Excess elderly mortality in other countries caused short-term shocks—healthcare overload, social panic, economic paralysis.

But the mid-term effects are now clear: pension expenditures dropped, labor shortages drove wages up, inherited properties flooded the market, and fiscal pressures eased.