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Innovate new resources? hmmm Innovation just allows us to draw down on a finite resource base at a faster rate. It dosen't come up with extra resources.
I am a conservative/libertarian. The reason this question is posed to other conservative/libertarians is because I already know what the left thinks.
So much focus has been on the whole man-caused global warming non-sense, that a real and huge threat seems to have been overshadowed; the earth's exploding birth rate. What happens when we have more people than natural resources? Will the poor starve? Wars increase? Species go extinct? Forests be wiped out?
As a freedom loving person, I HATE, repeat LOATHE the idea of a government mandated "child allotment" per family. Nothing strikes further at the heart of freedom. But what is the solution? I know this may still be many years out, but simple math says the day is coming. ?????
We have enough food and resources currently, but it doesn't get to a large number because of politics and economics. You could fit all the world's people in Texas.
There is one giant problem with all of this- the planet simply does not have the resources to sustain any further economic growth. We are currently living as if we have 1.5 planets rather than one. At a western european standard of living/consumption rate we could sustain a world population of 2-2.5 billion. At US consumption rates 1.5 billion.
Not true, there is sufficient arable land in the US alone to feed the entire world's population. There is a carrying capacity to the Earth, it's true, so we must eventually reach neutral or negative population growth. The only way that's going (besides raising the death rate, which is undesirable) to happen is to make it stop being profitable to have children. In 1st world countries, children are a liability, thus low birthrates. In 3rd world countries, children are still a sound investment, thus high birthrates.
As the market works and resources naturally shift to the 3rd world, the countries' economies develop, the level of education rises, and birthrates diminish.
And in the far far future:
A model for low-impact low-birthrate economic "improvement" (rather than expansion) will need to evolve in order for humans to reach steady-state population and not overwhelm the resources of the biosphere.
Birth rates have gone down in most of the world, maybe too much in the case of the industrialized world. Much of Latin America has also seen a dramatic decline in birth rates over the past 20 years.
It seems Africa and most of the Muslim nations are the only places left with high birth rates.
There is no population problem, there is no way in this country we can regulate the birth rate. Th countries with the highest birth rates will be the economic super powers of tomorrow.
Americans already have a stable birth rate, the problem for the USA is out-of-control immigration, millions of impoverished people coming here with very high birth rates because they've discovered the the USA government pays them to breed.
I don't think the government should do anything about working taxpaying Americans, we need as many of those as we can get, but the welfare class should not be paid to lay around and breed, since they are government dependent, the government has the responsibility to limit them. In exchange for welfare handouts, sterilization should be required.
And immigration needs to have some kind of control because the USA has population growth like the third world nations which we will soon become. We don't need high unemployment with huge population increases all brought on by unlimited immigration.
As women's education goes up, the birthrate goes down. Educate the women and, viola!
Quoted for Truth.
I just realized you've summed up my two long-winded posts in a pair of short sentences.
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For Conservatives and Libertarians: What should we do about the real threat to the globe, the BIRTHRATE?
