[auscanman]

I found this article:Alberta baby boom in the news. Apparently Albert'a oil wealth is driving an increase in the birth rate per woman.

This reveals how economists' assessment of how to curb population growth (not that many of them actually desire this outcome!) may not be entirely accurate. Conventional wisdom has it that as women in developing countries receive better education and have amitions for themselves, other than solely reproducing, the birth rate will go down. This I don't dispute. Indeed, as women in the developing world compete with one another to climb up the social ladder they realize how much having too many children can hamper that aim. However, once a certain threshold of affluence is reached and the family has all its needs and the conveniences of the western world, and has disposable income, the obvious thing to do, thanks to the selfish gene, is to have as many kids as the disposable income will allow, as a status symbol of sorts. So the birthrate per woman can be expected to drop with improved education and the realization of opportunities that goes with it, however, beyond a certain threshold of the family's wealth (that would vary from country to country), the birth rate would again begin to ascend as income increases.

This is consistent with the declining birth rate witnessed through most of the developed world over the past few decades. As the percentage of income that has to go to fixed costs has gone up and disposable income consequently declined, the birth rate has plummeted. On aggregate, despite falling disposable incomes, women and families in developed nations must therefore still be having their basic needs met (as the birth rate is not increasing at the poverty end of the spectrum).

What is going on in Alberta is that the threshold where families have sufficient disposable income for women to have more babies has been reached. The educational attainment of women there is still improving, yet birth rates are going up, so economists straight correlation isn't entirely accurate.

The real significance I see in this article is that it hints at what are the best and worst means possible of reducing our excessive world population. The best way being to improve education and enhance wealth of women in the developing world, fostering an environment of competitiveness between them, while at the same time continuing to gradually erode the disposable incomes of women and families in the developed world, continuing to stress the importance of education, such that you reach a point where ideally everyone in the world has just enough to meet their survival needs, but where having children would largely be unafforable. The worst case, on the other hand, being a world of highly polarized wealth, with the destitute in the 3rd world, seeing no hope, having large numbers of kids and the wealthy in the western world also adding to population growth (although their numbers would be much smaller).

Obvisouly, the above is not viable, and I would not support such measures, but after thinking a lot about the issue and reading this article I'm convinced that the economic measures outlined above would be the most humane way to actually reduce population growth. Anyone have any thoughts on this article or issue?

[WildRose]

Hmmm......In order to know what's driving women to have more children, as in the case of Alberta, you'd have to examine a cross-section of these households to see if economics or education actually are contributing factors. As far as education is concerned, a woman in Alberta can pursue any education she wants, as long as she can afford it or doesn't mind big student loans. If the cost of education is getting too high, a woman may decide to forego a bachelor's or master's degree and opt for a technical diploma, in which case she could be settling down to have a family sooner and opting for more children.

Or, being that Alberta's job market is in a boom phase right now, more men currently have higher-paying jobs, which may allow for couples to afford more children even if mom decides not to work for several years or to work part-time. Sensing prosperity on the horizon for a while, these couples may now be comfortable with having more than the usual two children.

My guess is some will have more children simply because they enjoy childrearing more than working in an office or putting in 60 hours a week as a professional. I would also guess that many of those having larger families are not thinking about tougher economic times ahead.

[the_sword]

"I would also guess that many of those having larger families are not thinking about tougher economic times ahead"

In most countries with economic hardship larger families means strength. Some of my family in Lebanon still want me to come back and fight/defend against the almost nightly muslim attacks.

[Doly]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('WildRose', '
')Or, being that Alberta's job market is in a boom phase right now, more men currently have higher-paying jobs, which may allow for couples to afford more children even if mom decides not to work for several years or to work part-time. Sensing prosperity on the horizon for a while, these couples may now be comfortable with having more than the usual two children.

[linlithgowoil]

population limitation will never work. i'm a great advocate of sitting back and seeing what happens. i do not believe in preventing the birth of some to secure the future of others. that is not human, that is animal. *cue lots of idiots saying - we ARE animals!!! - YAWN*

please realise, nothing is forever. would you have preferred that man would have remained an ape and that the world would have just went on for a billion or so years and then been roasted by the expanding sun?

population control is wrong, that is why no sensible person will ever entertain the idea.