How Black Mirror’s Darkest Episode Explains Plummeting Birth Rates

Video Description

Common People, the first episode of Black Mirror's the 7th season, was one of the best I have seen from the series in recent times. While there is a lot of analysis out there on this episode, I want to take a different approach to understanding it. We can understand this story in terms of how the removal of value from the populace by rent seeking entities leave nothing for the next generation and, as such, people refuse or are unable to have children. Edit: Thank you all for watching and sharing your thoughts on this video. As someone that makes YouTube videos, it always a great feeling when people respond to your work. I want to clarify a few things, which in hindsight I should have included in the video. 1. Disposable income is NOT equal to the "surplus value" I am referring to. A simple google search should make this clear. "Disposable income is the amount of money left after deducting taxes and other mandatory deductions from a person's or household's total income, available for spending or saving." The surplus value I refer to in the video is savings. I use the term "surplus value" because I want to frame the discussion about value generation and value flows. Who generates it, and who captures it. 2. While a lot of you have said that the final call to "save your money" undermines the message of the video, know that short of completely upending our current system, saving money is a good hedge and a viable path to security, stability, and happiness, for most people. 3. Finally, I assumed - as a finance guy - that it would be understood that savings will be invested responsibly. I should not have made this assumption, as some people actually believe that saving money in cash is enough. It is a start, but certainly not enough. Investing money responsibly in a diversified portfolio with a low expense ratio had been a historically proven way to generate wealth, well above the rate of inflation. Thank you all again for watching, stay tuned for more!