News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:U.S. Population Growth Has Been Driven Exclusively by Min... by TedDoesntTalk on Saturday July 04, 2020 @09:14PM (#23735999)
The policy existed but, after talking with some Chinese friends about this very topic, they said the system was corrupt. Anyone who want to get around the system just had to bribe a local official, and there were zero consequences.

Take this as anecdotal, of course.

Re:U.S. Population Growth Has Been Driven Exclusively by Min... by stevendaniels on Saturday July 04, 2020 @09:44PM (#23736080)
The policy wasn't as simple as the English name for it. It encompassed many other rules including the ages men and women could marry and the ages they could have kids.

For certain people (mostly ethnic minorities) there was a higher limit. In rural areas, the limit was usually more relaxed than urban areas.

Many women who got pregnant before they were allowed had to have abortions. Some women were forced to have IUDs, and some women were sterilized.

So, depending on who you were, where you were, and how old you were, the one child policy might have restricted you to one child, or it didn't.

Re:U.S. Population Growth Has Been Driven Exclusively by Min... by bilbo0s on Saturday July 04, 2020 @09:28PM (#23736037)
It wasn't even a bribe, It was worse than that. It was literally, "You can only have one child unless you pay for each extra child you want." I mean, getting around the policy, was actually written into the policy. Which is kind of insane if the purpose was to control birth rates.
Re:U.S. Population Growth Has Been Driven Exclusively by Min... by orwin on Sunday July 05, 2020 @07:28AM (#23737939)
Wait, it's not that simple. Depending on where you were working and living, the policy was different.

National-level, f you worked for the government (military, healthcare, PCC) you weren't allowed to have more than one child without loosing your job (if you were grunt-level) or paying and having your career path stilled (if you were CO-level).

For other workers, it was more or less a "state-level" implementation with governors deciding how to enforce the rule. In most places, farmers had the right to have two children and could ask to have one more. City workers only one and had to pay different amount depending on the city and the governor for the second. Some governors were really, really hard on enforcement (forced abortion...) while other were more lax and made people pay acceptable amount for the second child.

Still, even without hard enforcement, the illegal child have no paper, cannot join legal school and isn't present on the family register (and can't work/live anywhere legally). This is one of the 3 internal problem the Chinese government will have with the generation.

Re:U.S. Population Growth Has Been Driven Exclusively by Min... by booleandilemma on Saturday July 04, 2020 @09:38PM (#23736061)
But wouldn't even require paying for extra children discourage people from having children?
Re:U.S. Population Growth Has Been Driven Exclusively by Min... by astronautjones on Saturday July 04, 2020 @09:49PM (#23736094)
aren't you doing that by having children anywhere?