This is a "cultural forecasting" market. Low fertility rate is currently a "right wing" issue in the culture war. Bringing it up in left wing spaces functions as a kind of "blasphemy" (it is seen as you legitimizing bad things from the other side, like white supremacy / great replacement theory etc).
I saw Hank Green (popular youtuber with a left wing audience) make a video last week where he tries to explicitly change this. This market is my attempt to give us a mechanism to register our predictions about whether this change in culture will be successful (and potentially influence it).
How I expect people to make their predictions
I expect the initial most likely outcome to be "NO", because this would be a significant cultural shift & the likelihood of it happening over the next 2 months should be low.
If you watch the video, and the reaction of it in the comments, you may be convinced that the persuasion method he uses is effective & scalable, and that if other nodes in the culture adopt it (like Ezra Klein) it may work. Then it's just a matter of it getting visibility / the message being remixed & reused.
Alternatively you may conclude that it was ineffective, unlikely to trigger a significant cultural shift (perhaps by testing it with your friends or with your internet audience).
My personal position
This prediction market is an attempt to test my ability to make accurate cultural forecasts. My actual prediction on whether this shift will happen in the next 2 months is currently maybe ~20% chance, but with this prediction market I raise that to be ~70%. Because I think Hank's video demonstrates a persuasion technique that is very effective and can be reproduced, & if others want this change to be amplified, this is the toolkit for how you do it.
The important pieces of the video from a memetics perspective is:
He spends the first half of the video explaining how we often form opinions due to ideological reasons, not because the thing is actually good or bad, or true or false
He explains that not everything has to be polarized. There are no ideological battles around heat pumps, everyone just knows they are efficient & good
He then constructs a new narrative around the fertility crises (calls it "demographic change") so that blue tribe adopt it as an issue without the framing of the red tribe. This is necessary because if caring about the issue implies you are pro-conservative-traditional-families etc, then it will be rejected.
I'm running this market because I want to prototype ways we can do "open memetics" that are transparent, safe, and pro-social. This is in light of the University of Zurich scandal where they did an experiment on human subjects without disclosing it. Disclosing it would have altered the results, but I think this can be used as a "feature, not a bug". When you create a cultural forecasting market, it has the potential to accelerate the thing, if people actually want the change to happen.
TODO: resolution criteria
I'm trying to think of good, rigorous resolution criteria. I assume everyone accepts my premise (that fertility crises is a right wing issue). If it changes I think it will be fairly obvious (should be something that would reach IRL/normie circles). We could just resolve it with a poll? Alternatively can make a list of milestones of it being a talking point in specific outlets.
I think I want it to only resolve to "YES" if the belief of the average person in blue tribe shifts from "this is not a real problem" to "demographic change is a real problem we'll have to factor into how we design cities or how we plan our future". It should be overwhelming enough that most people would notice someone in their circle updating to this belief.
Update 2025-05-03 (PST) (AI summary of creator comment): Resolution is based on collective perception, not the creator's personal perception.
Even if major media outlets (like the NYT) run stories on the topic, the market will resolve NO if the stance of "normal" people (average members of the blue tribe) regarding the fertility issue does not noticeably shift towards recognizing it as a real problem. A change only within specific media outlets or some pockets of the population, without broader grassroots change, is insufficient for a YES resolution.
1,000People are also trading
this reddit post complaining about pro-natalism being pushed got popular, then has been deleted & locked https://www.reddit.com/r/Vent/comments/1keibtg/i_genuinely_look_forward_to_population_decline/
comments are generally (1) very anti this push (2) calling it out as propaganda
if we're trying to push this narrative honestly, will need to resolve this counter arguments. For example, I think Hank Green & NPR's way is the best: pointing out that it's one thing to try and get more people to have babies, another thing to help people who already want to start a family but are putting it off because they don't have the support they need. The latter I think everyone can get behind
It won't simply because the blue side is kind of antinatalist to a degree and they seem to agree with corporations that it's just better to import already adult men of working age from outside the country for cheaper workforce(rather than having children again and having them be the young workforce that's needed)
So I doubt it'll change anytime soon, at least not before 2027.
Open a market for every year if you wish to, I'll participate.
@BlackCrusade at the same time, last week NPR did a segment that was like "yes pronatalism is a right wing thing...but it doesn't have to be!"
@Defender I'm glad they did, but I just don't see it changing in time for this market.
Although the market is your personal opinion on if it's changed, so really it's betting on your perception.
@BlackCrusade yes it's betting on perception, but not on my personal perception, the collective perception. I don't have clear resolution criteria but I think we'll know pretty clearly if it does or doesn't. Even if NYT etc keeps running stories about it, if the stance of "normal" people around us don't change then the market will resolve NO
(if it changes in SOME pockets but not others, then we may find that out as we try to resolve the market).
@JackSmith1b84 one data point is that NPR is actively pushing it: https://www.npr.org/2025/04/30/nx-s1-5382208/whats-behind-the-pronatalist-movement-to-boost-the-birth-rate
You can kind of see the same formula (because both they and Hank Green are facing the same issue, it being right wing coded and needing to reframe that)
they also have told you that they are pushing back against some of those racist ideologies that historically have been a part of the pronatalist movement
Thanks for the video. Very insightful and open minded.
@digory I'd say it's the part at ~7:00 where he says: "I think this is absolutely a real situation that will require real attention, but because the right has become loud about it, I don't see anyone on the other side even recognizing it"
I think it's the most explicit he can be without alienating the audience / triggering the knee jerk reaction of "this is right wing propaganda", which some of the comments on the video depict:
Yeah let’s have a level headed discussion about how Hank wants to gaslight his predominantly female fan base into thinking low birth rates are a problem.
@Defender predominantly female fanbase ? What? He's a nerd talking about science stuff, I would assume it'd be the opposite like how most science/gaming stuff has a strong male majority.
@noney she's actually not wrong about that! Vlogbrothers do an annual census of their audience. The latest one I can find is 2022, but their audience is 60% female to 30% male.
at ~23:00 here: https://youtu.be/o8IOkHx-bkY?t=1414
I think the main reason the audience sticks around is because being part of this community makes them feel like they are contributing to a better world (through all the projects that they do, and that the audience funds), and their takes on current issues that are positive & not dumbed down. I think the former is basically like a version of Mr Beast but for adults, and less gimmicky. And the latter is like Ezra Klein
@Defender this is honestly very surprising to me as from other science/math oriented channels I frequent I remember one of them joking about how it's like almost entirely males.
I would also like to note that the percentages there do not add up to 100% so it seems people can choose multiple options?