I predict that we will see the development of artificial wombs in the next 10-15 years and combined with rudimentary genetic modification this will result in a baby boom from the middle and upper class.
"Artificial wombs" for the rich exist today, and are called surrogates. Ultimately the bigger problem isn't the birth itself but the time, money and space required to raise a child after it is born. For more and more young professionals in urban areas the numbers simply don't work out.
Cancer progress in the last 40 years hasn’t been that great (I’m not discounting the hard work and incredible breakthroughs there have been, etc). I’d predict we’re closer to a cancer cure and other not so soon medical advances than a fully functional artificial womb. (10-15 years would be F-ing amazing but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was 100-150 years and aging was cured first).
Edit: bc I forgot, we can't even replicate human breast milk fully well!
Perhaps the level of love and care for a baby/child are positively correlated to the severity of challenges parents face during pregnancy and eventual pain a mother endures in the natural childbirth. Hazing rituals exist for a reason. Will the nature of parental bonds change when Amazon delivers your baby via an electric stork/drone ? Will abuse and neglect increase the way it does with step-children, for example. It's admittedly a dark thought but worth contemplating since that technology seems inevitable and is already possible through surrogates as noted by another comment.
I was thinking similarly. From neurological, psychological and human perspectives-- women spend their pregnancy bonding with their child before they're even born. They give their child names, learn their mood, play music or sing for them. They feel their babies kick and plan all the things they're gonna do together when the baby is born. Large amounts of oxytocin, the bonding hormone, are released to strengthen the emotional bond between mother and child. Not just oxytocin is released, but a variety of hormones prepare mother and child together.
I think the fact that we so naively try to paper over all of this with "it's cool we will just invent metal birthing pods to replace this" is part of why we have this problem in the first place. People didn't intentionally have children throughout history because it's logical, they did it because of emotions(99% of the time). We don't really emotionally appreciate the fact that women can CREATE LIFE. Like it's actually an amazing unbelievable thing. But it's rarely viewed as that
Sexless, genderless, genetically modified people grown in vats operated by the state and implanted with cybernetic backpacks that short-circuit decades of education before they're sent off to subvert alien civilizations and expand the empire is obviously the way to go; this demented legacy biology game we're trapped in is played out af.
Seems unlikely for a few reasons. But let's say that the technology gets there - what's the value of outsourcing gestation? Pregnancy is no doubt uncomfortable though some women also say they enjoy it, but on a practical level all it takes is a few hundred extra calories a day to incubate a baby. And women in less physical professions seem to be able to work for basically the entire period. The thing is that once the child is born it will take much more effort to raise and that cannot be outsourced to cheap technology at this point, and that work has always fallen more on women.
I don’t think genetic modification is a necessary pre-requisite. Having a market for sperm and eggs where the genetic value is known could be sufficient and this can be done with existing data science. Creating and testing a panel of IVF babies and selecting for certain genes and away from others would be a powerful evolutionary force.
Even if this tech was invented I don't think it would move the needle that much. A pregnancy will keep you away from work for a few months. Taking care of the baby is when the shit hits the fan.
