Population Change

For John, BLUF:  My whole life I have been receiving messages about the dangers of population growth.  Maybe that isn't the future.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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THE WORLD MIGHT ACTUALLY RUN OUT OF PEOPLE

From Wired Magazine, by Reporter Megan Molteni, 4 February 2019.

Here is the lede plus two:

YOU KNOW THE story.  Despite technologies, regulations, and policies to make humanity less of a strain on the earth, people just won’t stop reproducing.  By 2050 there will be 9 billion carbon-burning, plastic-polluting, calorie-consuming people on the planet.  By 2100, that number will balloon to 11 billion, pushing society into a Soylent Green scenario.  Such dire population predictions aren’t the stuff of sci-fi; those numbers come from one of the most trusted world authorities, the United Nations.

But what if they’re wrong?  Not like, off by a rounding error, but like totally, completely goofed?

That’s the conclusion Canadian journalist John Ibbitson and political scientist Darrell Bricker come to in their newest book, Empty Planet, due out February 5th.  After painstakingly breaking down the numbers for themselves, the pair arrived at a drastically different prediction for the future of the human species.  “In roughly three decades, the global population will begin to decline,” they write.  “Once that decline begins, it will never end.”

I don't buy into a never-ending decline in population.  The rest makes good sense.  Some people love having and raising children.  Others don't.  The trend is the don't folks outnumber those who want lots of children.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff