That’s always been my hypothesis, that welfare and inflationary monetary policies increase time preferences. Keep such policies in place over time, and you end up with a large, illiterate underclass that ends up defining society from the bottom up.
Following up on this, I’m not looking for responses, but just want folks to consider.
Do you produce more than you consume? Think about how much labour and capital investment goes into the goods you own, from cars to cupboards full of food and television with hundreds of stations.
Have you paid for this? Or is it part of the fiat/debt empire, and is a chimera?
I’m guessing most folks in the west, do NOT produce more than they consume, or will consume over their lifetimes.
I agree, and that is why things are becoming urgent. The state is not just going to collapse, it is evolving into a self-sustaining enterprise.
It hurts a little to use a CIA web page for data, but here goes:
The sub-Saharan African nations have the highest birth rate per capita in the world, but they live in abject poverty. The more prosperous and “Western” the country, the lower the birth rate per capita. I can’t explain the Eastern European nations off the top of my head, and it is late. So statistics don’t make causation, but prosperity tends to reduce the birth rate (more options, less desire, putting off, etc.) Tragically, sub-Saharan Africa also has the highest infant mortality rates, highest rate of HIV infection, and lowest life expectancies.
The sub-Saharan African nations also top the death rate per thousand chart. Wealthy places (but not necessarily western) and young places have the fewest deaths per 1000.
Based on this evidence, and an (admittedly brief) analysis of the situation, I would conclude that on the whole prosperity brings down the rate of population growth. Richer people have more options and tend to voluntarily delay having children. Subsistence farmers and those with no access to medical devices have no will or ability to delay having children. In fact, they must have children to have workers, support the family, etc.
So an answer is to allow the free market to do what it does best, bring the most real wealth to the most people possible. If history is any guide, then a rising level of wealth can lead to a decreasing birth rate. If it doesn’t, and resources do become scarce, then it can also provide the best way to economize or find new resources.
Alternatively, we can use the tool of the State, power, to affect population growth. Simply add bullets, a virus, or gas, and walaa! instant solution to the overpopulation “problem”.
PS China’s population problem was created by Chairman Mao’s policy “The strength of China comes from the number of her people.” The parents of the current generation of adults were exhorted by the state to have many children. Most of the young adults I have met in the cities are children of the one child policy. But they have 5-10 uncles and aunts, because their parents were the result of the “lots of children” policy. One step of interventionism always leads to the next, and the next, and the next. China is now very worried about the rapidly aging population, and all of the problems this causes a welfare state.
Then Liberia should be a an overflowing fount of productive human capital at this point. Of course, it’s actually hell on earth.
It’s not the number of people; it’s their quality.
There is a strong correlation between lower birth rates and economic development. However, most wealthy nations also come with a welfare state, and in the early days of economic expansion the growth rate exploded, it did not decrease. So whether more wealth necessarily implies lower birth rates seems debatable to me, as the welfare state also comes with its own incentive structure.
-Jon
The People’s Republic of China tried to take that correlation and work it backwards. They thought that by enforcing a one-child policy (at least with regards to most of the population) they would get more economic development. This is like thinking that if you somehow burgle a diploma from a university you will instantly have the knowledge that you would learn if you took all the classes needed to get the degree listed on the diploma.