POPULATION EXPLOSION
The greatest enemy of man today is his own over-population. It is feared that the world population which is more than 5 billion today will be doubled in 2028.
Malthus, the great economist, observed that whereas the world population was increasing in geometrical proportion (1, 2, 4, 8, …), the food supply was increasing in arithmetical proportion (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, …). So before long a stage would be reached when the population will outstrip the available food supply and there would be a great struggle for food and shelter. He predicted that unless mankind acted to check the growth of population voluntarily, natural factors like war, famine, epidemics and other disasters would intervene to check the population growth. It seems Malthus’ prediction has come true for Africa and Asia, and especially India.
Population of India which was about 235 million in 1901 has risen to about 840 million by now and is estimated to cross 1 billion (1000 million) by the end of this century. Annual increase in India’s population is almost equal to the total population of Australia.
The reason for this staggering increase in population is the high birth-rate and low death-rate especially in Asia and India. Poverty, ignorance, early marriages and religious beliefs are some of the causes of high birth-rate. Lowering of death-rate is due to improved health and hygiene and reduced occurrence of natural calamities like floods, famine and epidemics. Indeed blessings of science have been our bane.
Galloping population is eating up all our natural resources and a time will come when there will be scarcity of almost all things. There will be a scramble for food resulting in mass starvation. In his efforts to grow more food man will destroy forests and turn the fertile lands into deserts. Ecological imbalance resulting from the destruction of forests will spell man’s doom.
Governments have been trying to check the population growth by means of various birth control measures and family planning programmes. But the measures to check population will not succeed until poverty is removed. But prosperity cannot be brought about if there is overpopulation. Thus there is a vicious circle in which poverty is perpetuated among the overpopulated and the overpopulation is perpetuated by poverty.
The only remedy is to flight the population problem on war footing by taking very harsh measures to check the growth pf population. Though these measures are bound to be unpopular in the beginning, people will welcome them when they enjoy the long-term benefits of controlled population. If man does not limit his population, he is doomed.
Popularity: 2% [?]
Comment by Pete Murphy on 14 October 2008:
Rampant population growth threatens our economy and quality of life. I’m not talking just about the obvious problems that we see in the news - growing dependence on foreign oil, carbon emissions, soaring commodity prices, environmental degradation, etc. I’m talking about the effect upon rising unemployment and poverty in America.
I should introduce myself. I am the author of a book titled “Five Short Blasts: A New Economic Theory Exposes The Fatal Flaw in Globalization and Its Consequences for America.” To make a long story short, my theory is that, as population density rises beyond some optimum level, per capita consumption of products begins to decline out of the need to conserve space. People who live in crowded conditions simply don’t have enough space to use and store many products. This declining per capita consumption, in the face of rising productivity (per capita output, which always rises), inevitably yields rising unemployment and poverty.
This theory has huge implications for U.S. policy toward population management, especially immigration policy. Our policies of encouraging high rates of immigration are rooted in the belief of economists that population growth is a good thing, fueling economic growth. Through most of human history, the interests of the common good and business (corporations) were both well-served by continuing population growth. For the common good, we needed more workers to man our factories, producing the goods needed for a high standard of living. This population growth translated into sales volume growth for corporations. Both were happy.
But, once an optimum population density is breached, their interests diverge. It is in the best interest of the common good to stabilize the population, avoiding an erosion of our quality of life through high unemployment and poverty. However, it is still in the interest of corporations to fuel population growth because, even though per capita consumption goes into decline, total consumption still increases. We now find ourselves in the position of having corporations and economists influencing public policy in a direction that is not in the best interest of the common good.
The U.N. ranks the U.S. with eight other countries - India, Pakistan, Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, Bangladesh, Uganda, Ethiopia and China - as accounting for fully half of the world’s population growth by 2050. The U.S. is the only developed country still experiencing third world-like population growth, most of which is due to immigration. It’s absolutely imperative that our population be stabilized, and that’s impossible without dramatically reining in immigration, both legal and illegal.
If you’re interested in learning more about this important new economic theory, I invite you to visit my web site at OpenWindowPublishingCo.com where you can read the preface for free, join in my blog discussion and, of course, purchase the book if you like. (It’s also available at Amazon.com.)
Please forgive the somewhat spammish nature of the previous paragraph. I just don’t know how else to inject this new perspective into the immigration debate without drawing attention to the book that explains the theory.
Pete Murphy
Author, “Five Short Blasts”