Black Holes, Denny’s Fist Fights & Japanese Handjob Culture - Rabbit Hole #4 - #1118

**Chris Williamson** (0:00)
Speaking of shiny heads, Tim, have you ever been to South Korea?

**Tim Ferriss** (0:03)
Yes, I have.

**Chris Williamson** (0:04)
Okay, would you like to go back?

**Tim Ferriss** (0:06)
I would, yeah.

**Chris Williamson** (0:07)
Well, South Korean president calls for hair loss treatment to be covered by insurance, suggesting that government-funded lux maxing may increase the birth rate. His interesting proposal characterizes hair loss as, quote, a matter of survival.
How do you feel about that, Tim?

**Tim Ferriss** (0:23)
I think that is not the right solution to the problem. They have tried a lot in South Korea, so I have spent time there. I would love to go back.

**Tim Urban** (0:32)
It is often very distressed for the people living with it.

**Tim Ferriss** (0:35)
There you go.

**Tim Urban** (0:35)
How do you feel?

**Tim Ferriss** (0:36)
I am not distressed because I shaved my head, starting with wrestling at like age 12, so I got used to it, thankfully.

**Chris Williamson** (0:41)
But you walked it in.

**Tim Ferriss** (0:43)
As soon as I saw the option to white-knuckle or shave my head, I decided to shave my head. But I think the stickier part here is actually some systemic issues related to things like rent in South Korea, because they tried a stimulus of something like $2 billion to encourage procreation, didn't work. When you look at some of the issues in South Korea that are not obvious originally, because people point to idiocracy like comps where they're like, well, everybody's waiting later, they're getting more educated, but in South Korea, for instance, if you want to build a family, meaning you're going to need a larger apartment, there are very straightforward things that are a problem, like your safety deposit or security deposit for the apartment is like 12 months rent, and people can't afford it. So they're like, I can't afford it.

**Chris Williamson** (1:36)
That's maybe an actual deposit for a house.

**Tim Urban** (1:39)
That's so many months rent for a security deposit.

**Tim Ferriss** (1:42)
It is, and they're like, I can't afford it, therefore I can't have kids.

**Tim Urban** (1:44)
Who can afford a year of rent if they're renting?

**Tim Ferriss** (1:46)
And I may be getting the month slightly wrong, but I talked to some Koreans and they're like, no, it's like, I want to have a kid, and here are the reasons I can't. So I don't think fixing hair loss is going to actually solve that type of problem.

**Chris Williamson** (1:56)
Tim, we're playing in the margins here because we can't get into the housing problem. And the margins happen to be the top of the head. That's what matters most. The most interesting explanation I've heard for South Korea is K-pop. In order to become a K-pop star, you have to sign your agreement, your artist agreement says that you're not going to be in a relationship while you're doing it. So they have created the most popular cultural export and import I guess or internal stars have no families, no kids. Think about what happens when you do that.
Inversion, easy as fuck. The only way you can become a K-pop star is if you've already got kids.
That's my solution anyway.

**Tim Urban** (2:33)
Yeah, because also these becomes like role models. Now these role models have no kids.

**Tim Ferriss** (2:38)
Those kids don't need rooms. What are we talking about here?

**Chris Williamson** (2:41)
They can go on the road, on the tour bus. Well, there was that guy in Georgia to try and fix-

**Tim Ferriss** (2:46)
The country or the state?

**Chris Williamson** (2:48)
The country of Georgia.
In an attempt to try and improve the birthrate there, it's very religious, very Roman Catholic. There's a rock star preacher guy and he said, I will personally baptize the third child of any family in the country. All of these families speed ran children to get to the third. He's done a meaningful increase in the birthrate because these families wanted this guy that was basically the most popular person in the entire country to do the thing on the kid.

**Tim Ferriss** (3:20)
Or you could just do what certain billionaires like the CEO of Telegram has done and say, I will pay for IVF for as many women who would like to have my-

**Chris Williamson** (3:29)
Sperm-donoring his way to-

**Tim Ferriss** (3:31)
100 plus.

**Chris Williamson** (3:33)
Yeah, he's a 2026 Genghis Khan.

**Tim Ferriss** (3:36)
Yeah, he's doing it the nicer way.

**Tim Urban** (3:38)
It's weird that most people don't do that. It's programmed to- It's like we're programmed for the instrumental part of it, like the sex, but the actual evolutionary goal is not part of the programming.