fertility drops much below 2.1 babies per woman, the population will shrink unless offset by immigration.

The situation of the family in post-Fordist capitalism is contradictory, in precisely the way that traditional Marxism expected: capitalism requires the family (as an essential means of reproducing and caring for labor power; as a salve for the psychic wounds inflicted by anarchic social-economic conditions), even as it undermines it (denying paren

With the decline of the pressures of industrialism, and control and minimization of the number of children, the underlying gender realities emerge, and the institution of marriage becomes optional.

Globally, during this cycle:

-China has had strong industrial production, but weak consumer spending.

-Europe has been relatively weak both in industrial production and consumer spending.

-The United States has been strong in consumer spending, but relatively weak in industrial production.

In a globalized world, in other words, savings and investment rates are not set wholly or in some cases even primarily by domestic cultural preferences or by domestic policies. They are heavily affected by foreign policies through the trade account.