According to the CIA World Factbook, as of July 2008 the world population was estimated at about 6.7 billion people. The echo effect, however, will be taking a toll on the world’s population here soon. The echo effect will be seen in the reproductive rates of the soon-to be-reproducing Generation Y, which roughly consists of those from their mid-20s down to young teenagers, though this can vary by source. The echo effect simply means that though there was a decline in birth rates after that of the Baby Boomer generation, all of the children had by the Baby Boomers will be reproducing soon, and some have already started. This means that a large influx of people will start having consuming children of their own all at once, causing for a large increase in birth rates beyond the average steady increase.
One major factor in the world’s population is that rural populations exceeded those of urban communities. According to the 2007 revision of the World Urbanization Prospects of the United Nations, 2008 marked the first year the urban population rivals that of the rural population. From this point on, the urban population is only expected to increase at a faster rate. This does not suggest, however, that rural and urban populations are evenly distributed throughout different continents. In Asia and Africa, for example, six out of 10 people live in a rural community, and approximately 75- to 78- percent of the world’s population live in a developing or less developed country.
The revised report also says the world’s population will increase by 2.5 billion people by 2050, which some argue is an extremely underestimated figure. Other sources, such as the World Population Awareness non-profit organization (WPA), say the population will double by 2035. Regardless of which estimate most accurately predicts the future of the world’s population, overpopulation hangs over the head of every individual.
What resources are we going to exacerbate with such a large increase? Where are these people going to live and work? While I do not condone or agree with genocide and other non-humanitarian forms of “controlling” the population, the effects of overpopulation on the Earth’s resources, the amount of disease, available food surpluses and poverty all must be examined and evaluated for tactful ways to deter the population growth.
WPA suggests some of the following for every individual/nation:
• Have less children
• Decrease the consumption of all resources
• Recycle more, have better production/disposal of toxic and human waste
• Less urbanization of farmland and depletion of soil
• Less urbanization where water is scarce
1 comment:
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. Our policies that encourage high rates of population growth 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 third world 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.
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, 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 overpopulation debate without drawing attention to the book that explains the theory.
Pete Murphy
Author, "Five Short Blasts"
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