This is an interesting question, which was only lightly addressed in the interview, but enough evidence was brought to light to suggest that it would be very difficult for any economy to grow strongly enough to use up a population growth of eightfold in a hundred years. Even an economy that is growing very strongly does not do so in a steady line.
Agreed! My contention was that he didn't state this clearly. Rather he argues that economic issues are not the main point, rather reproduction. But AFAIK it is the ratio that is the issue.
This kind of problem is only exacerbated in an honor-driven patriarchal society which practices polygamy, which concentrates the honors and the women to an elite group of men. This describes many Muslim and Arab societies.
Excellent observation. That is what he should have noted. I agree. Same problem to a degree in Africa, where the male sons, and the older ones, tend to inherit the property. Kenya, which divided up much of their land decades ago, now faces the problem that the current generation's kids will end up with an acre or two, not enough to farm, while their grandparents had a reasonable farm. Duh!
He doesn't say "below one" but "below 0.8". I think we both have to go read more than this interview.
I don't tend to buy the hand wringing about Europe, Japan, China, etc on demographics, because after a couple of generations of falling populations, I'd expect to see it become popular to have larger families. I do expect to see the worlds population level off, but I doubt it will stay precisely even. This shouldn't be a great problem.
The problems come when one ethnic group declines, and gives their country to an imported ethnic group whose population is growing by leaps and bounds. That leads to major problems I think. This is the problem that europe, Israel, and even the USA face. It is very difficult to deal with because of the historical horrors that humans have perpetrated on each other. Not an easy problem, but one people should talk about and search for solutions prior to maximum stress building in the system. |
