Many doomsday predictions are cited to express the urgency of the ‘problem’ of population growth. It is commonly held that reducing the population levels provides a partial solution to poverty, while some environmentalists consider the population problem as one of the most pressing ecological problems. The over-population argument is simple. Global population is 7 billion today. It will rise to 9 billion (or whatever) by X year. The planet cannot support this size population. Disaster will loom. Thus reducing the global population growth rate is crucial if disaster is to be avoided. But is there an overpopulation crisis? For sure, world population has risen over the past century from 1.6 to 7 billion and the problem of overpopulation appears to exist in large parts of the world where people are subjected to famines and disease.
Population projections are determined basically by the number of children women bear. The number of children a woman of child-bearing age will have during her lifetime over the last half-century has fallen from 4.91 to 2.36. In order to replace herself and her husband, a woman must have two children, plus a bit more on average to make up for women who never give birth and for children who die. In most of the advanced economies, the rate is 2.1 . According to Joseph Chamie, a former director of the United Nations Population Division, historic declines in fertility rates is occurring, resulting in a halving of the world’s average rate to 2.5 births per woman in virtually every country. 75 countries, or close to half of the world’s population, are experiencing fertility rates below the replacement level and by mid-century that number is expected to nearly double, reaching 139 countries and by the end of the century, it will be 184 countries with the global fertility rate falling below two births per woman.
But why is global population still climbing? Because of lifespan.
John Wilmoth, director of the population division at the United Nations, explains that the decline in child mortality and increased life expectancy are the primary reasons for the population growth. Since 1960, longevity has increased almost 50 percent, from low 50s to nearly 70 globally. But it is not at the beginning of the lifespan where the problem is found, for although children consume without producing, they are the future who will build their communities and the world. They represent future production that outweigh their current consumption. The problem is either voluntarily or out of sheer necessity, old people cease to produce, but they do not cease to consume. In fact, their consumption of resources, such as in health care, increases.
Environmentalists should ask themselves, what will be the solution if people reject socialism as the answer? Is it the euthanasia of the elderly and the culling of babies?
The EU Commissioner for Justice, Franco Frattini pointed out in 2007:
‘In spite of the recent enlargement, which has pushed the EU’s total population up to some 490 million, the number of people living in the EU is set to decline in the next few decades. By 2050 a third of them will be over 65 years of age. Labour and skills’ shortages are already noticeable in a number of sectors and they will tend to increase. Eurostat’s long-term demographic projections indicate that the total population is expected to decline by 2025 and the working age population by 2011.’
Italy’s health minister, Beatrice Lorenzin, commented after the news that the country’s birth rate – 8.4 per 1,000 people – is its lowest since the foundation of the modern state in 1861. ‘We are at the threshold where people who die are not being replaced by newborns. That means we are a dying country.’
Italyis not the only European country facing a population in decline. Germany has fewer children than any other country in Europe. The lower number of young people in Europe could put its social systems under strain in the future because there will be fewer taxpayers to fund care for the elderly.
The percentage of over 65s in the total population has doubled in France between 1901 and 2005 and nearly trebled in the UK. Europe faces the ‘profound structural challenge’ of almost half its population being aged 50 or over by 2050, according to Eurostat. Dr. Robin Niblett, the director of the think-tank Chatham House, said that significant net migration is necessary to keep worker-dependency ratios across the EU at their 2020 levels. In order to keep the workforce at its 2010 level, total Europe-wide immigration of 25 million is required by 2020.
The anti-immigration lobby should ask themselves how they will reverse the population declines if they reject the idea of a world without borders. Is it to turn women into baby-making machines?
ALJO
Italian Holiday Maker on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 11:03 am
Oh yeah, Chatham House and worldsocialism.com know exactly what is good for Europe: import 25 million to keep the workforce at 2010 level.
Because, you see, nothing is more important than keeping the workforce at 2010 level.
Meet the new workers, or “testosteron bombs” as Geert Wilders uses to call them:
http://www.geenstijl.nl/mt/archieven/2016/07/woensel_doet_het_verdomme_weer.html#comments
Nothing will change in western Europe until it escapes from the Empire, just like eastern Europe escaped from the Soviet empire in 1989.
We need a 1989 of our own.
To answer the question in the last paragraph: Europe already has 500 million and would be better off with 100 million less. ALJO pretends to be concerned about Europe, but what they really want is destroy it through mass immigration.
Hello on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 11:26 am
Muslim and negro imports everywhere. Does Europe get what it deserves?
It almost seems.
Davy on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 11:42 am
We are to late for a demographic easing. We are now far beyond carrying capacity considering peak oil, abrupt climate change, and a deteriorating economy. It is a matter of scale. It is a matter of macro inbalances and the timeframes associated with these inbalances.
We are part of a complex system that will not degrowth without significant loss of carrying capacity potential. We must reduce consumption and population but doing so leads to collapse. This is a catch 22 that is rarely acknowledged. It is only the acknowledgment of this predicament and the acceptance of some kind of die-off that will allow for rational and functional mitigation of the worst of what is ahead.
The worst thing we can do is continue with attitudes that confidently believe we can solve these problems with the same knowledge that got us into this mess. We must accept defeatism as our starting point. We can then begin some kind of rebirth along with the coming die-off.
In the interim live each day as if it were your last. Practice relative sacrifice. Downsize with dignity and beat the rush. This is now out of our hands and it is only the humility that comes with this realization that will bring any kind of salvation. We can always find salvation from within ourselves and within our locals. We must shrink our world if we are to begin this process. Globalism is the reason we our no longer in balance. End your connections to globalism to begin this process. Good luck.
penury on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 12:04 pm
What Davy said.
sidzepp on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 12:24 pm
Thomas Robert Malthus acknowledged population growth back in 1800 and forecast that the earth had reached its carrying capacity at 7 billion. To look back at the last two centuries and see that the population of the planet increased seven fold, skeptics will laugh and point out to the wonders of science and technology in creating an environment that would allow humanity to flourish.
Yet the fact that in the last fifty years the population has doubled should raise questions on how we handle our relationships with the planet and each other. And where it might be true that science and technology has allowed ourselves to create longer life expectancies, fight hunger, decrease infant mortality, and combat a host of diseases, it is also created an assault on the planet that has created mass consumerism.
Our current lifestyle will not continue to sustain the population and the lifestyle that we attempt to preserve or to strive for. As resources become more difficult and costly to obtain, as underdeveloped countries continue to show the greatest population growth and do not have the resources and food to sustain that population there will continue to be mass migration for people seeking to survive. As conflicts continue to rapidly proliferate there will be more mass migrations. What is happening in Syria is just the beginning.
The developed world is shouldered with a debt burden that has become more difficult to bear. This will create problems of a different sort. They will become less tolerant of absorbing the masses from nations in crisis. They will become more desperate to obtain the resources necessary for preserving their status quo. Trumpism, Brexit, are all symptoms of this malady and will rush fast forward to embrace xenophobia in an effort to preserve.
onlooker on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 12:34 pm
Well said by Davy. I add we are fast reaching and have reached tipping points economically, socially,and environmentally due to the already humongous population and also consuming patterns. Their is no “solution” or natural easing or mitigation that will occur. Collapse as Davy pointed out is already baked into the pie via die-off and a total disintegration of our current economic and social systems. We must as a species have now the foresight and imagination both to survive this epic turbulence headed our way and to prepare for a totally different world on the other side of this bottleneck.
Northwest Resident on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 12:45 pm
“It is only the acknowledgment of this predicament and the acceptance of some kind of die-off…”
Or kill-off. That’s an option too, perhaps a more humane and merciful one that simply allowing the starvation and disease-infested natural die-off to run its course.
Top military planners have no doubt pondered this situation for some time. We’ll have to wait to see what kind of rabbit they pull out of their hat.
Apneaman on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 12:53 pm
Population is near 7.5 billion today and growing.
7,434,012,444-Current World Population
http://www.worldometers.info/
JGav on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 3:43 pm
Yeah Davy: “End your connections to globalism to begin this process” is right; however, you know as well as I do, that said ‘disconnection’ doesn’t happen overnight. Some have a head-start. Good for them! Others are aware but have little or no means available to adapt (wouldn’t it be nice if they could be given a little boost, as opposed to a kick in the ass?) Many others still just don’t want to know … Sorry to say, but it seems clear there will eventually be enough ugliness to go around … and around.
Gee, I hate to appear as such a ‘negative’ dude but we’ve already kind of painted ourselves into a corner. Reality has sufficient bitchiness in it that, when it bites, it hurts!
Who was it? Kenneth Boulding? who said: “Anyone who believes that exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman, or an economist!”
Go Speed Racer on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 3:58 pm
The Detonator on the Population Bomb,
is the “Haber Bosch Process”, very interesting
reading because most of the Nitrogen compounds in our bodies
were created artificially in a man-made
reaction process.
LINK:
http://people.idsia.ch/~juergen/haberbosch.html
Go Speed Racer on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 4:24 pm
It’s the Religion of Peace again …
http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/04/middleeast/baghdad-car-bombs/
Rick Bronson on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 5:42 pm
Seems Mexico has overtaken Japan to become the #10 country in population.
http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/
And it looks like Nigeria will overtake Pakistan soon for #6 spot.
World population is 7.4 billion and its growing at the rate of 80 million / year. But the growth rate has slowed significantly.
Because of the increase in base population, it will continue to grow even with reduction in growth rate.
We have 10 billion in reach soon.
dooma on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 7:25 pm
The explosion will be the result of a cake-shaped bomb covered with pink icing (see pic above). “quick Nanna, blow out the fuse, I mean candle”.
JuanP on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 9:15 pm
Happy July 4 to all Americans! I just kicked out my last guests. Our balcony is right in front of the Miami Beach fireworks show so every year we host a short party from 8 till 10 for our friends and family. The fireworks lasted from 9-9:30. My last guests just left. Will we still be doing this next year? I think so, but who knows.
ohanian on Mon, 4th Jul 2016 10:07 pm
Anyone who believes in indefinite growth in anything physical, on a physically finite planet, is either a mad man or an economist. In fact, an economist is a mad man by definition.
seen from sirius on Tue, 5th Jul 2016 6:50 am
I’d like to believe the author’s agreeable fantasy, it’s easier going to sleep at night believing he is right, unfortunately he isn’t! the “population bomb” remains more than ever a life-threatening phenomenon for all living beings (including man himself, paradoxically) on this Planet.
Cloud9 on Tue, 5th Jul 2016 7:11 am
A population that has gone three days without water will begin to sort itself out rather quickly. In a week’s time, the demographic will be much younger as the villages and nursing homes here in Florida turn into charnel houses. Three weeks without food will reduce the threat of the majority of the urban population. If by some chance or design you can avoid the horde for a couple of months, your chances of survival should go up exponentially. I won’t make it but my kids might if I can get them out of Largo before the normalcy bias wears off.
Kenz300 on Tue, 5th Jul 2016 7:45 am
Too many people demand too many resources……yet the worlds population grows by 80 million every year…..
How many charities are dealing with the same problems they were dealing with 10 or 20 years ago with no end in sight.
Every problem is made worse by the worlds growing population. IF you can not provide for yourself you can not provide for a child.
Birth Control Permanent Methods: Learn About Effectiveness
http://www.emedicinehealth.com/birth_control_permanent_methods/article_em.htm
John D on Tue, 5th Jul 2016 9:45 am
A stable to declining population that lives 10-15 years longer than in the past does more damage and consumes more resources than the same number of people living the shorter lives.
roccman on Wed, 6th Jul 2016 2:43 pm
Those in power are not about to allow a pesky killoff to stampede over a facility like CERN. Rationing and a rubber boot on the neck is for lunch – eventually laws will be rolled out that prevent folk from having kids…old folk will die first – then the sick and those requiring medicine – those with “pry it from my fingers first” taped on their foreheads will then be next – until we have a COMPLIANT global prison population on a tight calorie and energy consumption diet. Those who think nuclear war is “just round the corner” – keep waiting for it – may have a bomb here or there go off to froth up the crowd, but important infrastructure will be preserved. This killoff will be stair stepped into oblivion -Peak Oil is a temporary predicament – temporarily… then, when those in power have built a LIGHT (as in lite bulb)raft out of this material existence, “the people of wal-mart can have the raped smoldering earth”.
Those in power know that to make a new world – the old world has to be destroyed – the bird flies to abraxas from the broken egg shell – the egg shell is existence(i.e., your perspective of existence). It’s all about cosmology! Really – it is.