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Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Population Control: Two Paths

You could take China's path: Forced abortions, sterilization, and other punishments for women who have more than one child. This policy has resulted in:

    Average Population Growth Rate: 0.70% (2005-2000)
    Total fertility rate: 1.75 children born/woman (2007 est.)

Or you could take Sweden's path: increased gender equality and economic justice.

    Average Population Growth Rate: 0.10% (2000-2005)
    Total fertility rate: 1.66 children born/woman (2007 est.)

10 comments:

Saudi Stepford Wife-Daisy said...

Excellent comparison! Decreased birthrates are the natural outcome of a good education and career/work/economic opportunities for a country's women.

Kuri said...

Yes and why is this so complex? Allow women the freedom to control our reproductive capacity and look! Low and behold we can get it right!

Peter Dodson said...

Timely topic given the need to reduce the world's population. We think 6.7 billion is unsustainable - how about 10? Yikes!

said...

maybe the fact is not so simple.

KevinG said...

Good point. Now all we have to do is transform China into an advanced western democracy complete with economic prosperity, economic security, and a different view of the state's role and individual rights ;)

You're right in the broader point that as liberalism and economic prosperity take hold in countries and as women are given more equal opportunities the birth rates tend to fall. All of that is good and all things I support but I'm not sure you can directly compare China's options and Swedens. As the previous commenter states: maybe not so simple.

Red Jenny said...

Of course it's not so simple. However, forced abortion is simply wrong.

DBB said...

How much immigration does Sweden allow?

Unknown said...

With increased baby-killing in the West we can help Muslims take over.

Allahu Akhbar!

Anonymous said...

Lowering population levels will probably not protect the environment. If you look at China the amount off pollution it releases increased the fastest after it started population control programs. Population control only controls the number of people, not the number of devices that generate pollution or the overall amount of pollution generated.

Because stopping population growth misses the real problem it doesn't protect the environment.

Red Jenny said...

Anon, I absolutely agree with you that population control != environmental protection but I do think a decreased birth rate is probably not such a bad idea, for more reasons than just environmental.

Many women CHOOSE to have fewer kids when they have meaningful alternatives and access to birth control. Bring preggers for a significant portion of one's adult life, not to mention giving birth numerous times, isn't most people's idea of a good time! In any case, if anyone needs to breed less it's wealthy westerners with large environmental footprints!