As people argue as to whether or not global warming is a good thing, the UN is starting to figure it out. The real problem is too many people.
Climate change, the rate of extinction of species and the challenge of feeding a growing population are among the threats putting humanity at risk, the UN Environment Program said in its fourth Global Environmental Outlook since 1997.
“The human population is now so large that the amount of resources needed to sustain it exceeds what is available at current consumption patterns,” Achim Steiner, the executive director of the program, said in a telephone interview. Efficient use of resources and reducing waste now are “among the greatest challenges at the beginning of 21st century,” he said.
Maybe this will give rise a to a market for child free credits in much the same way low emission industries can sell their carbon credits, childless people should be able to sell baby-credits to prolific breeders.
The enire article is here
Malthusians are always jumping on something that is going to render us extinct. First it was food. Later on, the coming ice age. But people keep living longer and better lives. The data does not agree with Malthus or his acolytes.
I’d love that, DI. It makes more sense than anything else proposed for our environmental ills, and I already have a couple of people I know I could sell mine to. Brilliant! Just think of the secondary market, too: “retiring” baby credits just as we retire carbon credits. Of course, it would restrict over-production to those parents who could afford the extra credits, thereby market-selecting for those people actually capable of raising extra kids. The republics should LOVE this! Plus, just think of the confusion it would cause in political both camps! I love it, I love it.
Jim, this one is John Rove’s, a contributor who began posting about a month ago.
It might be time to finally reel in the religious crazies who are against family planning. I know…contraception leads to more sex, and more sex is a horrible thing…
Here’s another angle at trimming “deadweight”:
Consider the following scenario. Scientists determine that, following careful empirical study and the meticulous application of cost-benefit principles grounded in utilitarian ethics, men ought not to be allowed to live beyond the age of 86 and women beyond the age of 88. You can easily see how the utilitarian calculus would lead to this conclusion and policy recommendation. By the time people cross those age thresholds, they tend to be frail, infirm and doddery. Many no longer enjoy life and may even wish they were dead. Some have failed to “shuffle off this mortal coil” only through inertia and lack of commitment, others because of religious convictions that proscribe suicide, yet others because they are too decrepit even to attempt unassisted suicide and because assisting suicide is a criminal offence in most countries.
Because but few of these old folk still make a productive contribution as workers, home makers or child minders, they also impose a serious financial burden on the community. Many no longer pay taxes but are net recipients of government transfers. The medical expenses incurred by and on behalf of the very old tend to be high. In the UK, with its tax-funded NHS, the elderly impose a non-trivial health-tax on the rest of society. In addition to the financial/fiscal burden imposed by the elderly, they impose negative externalities. They drive too cautiously and fail to make due progress; they slow down other pedestrians on busy streets and during the rush to catch a bus, train or tube. Their Zimmer frames clog up passageways and entrance halls. They also are at times not very pleasant to look at, especially when they take out their dentures in a restaurant. Finally they can be highly irritating, because they tend to bang on about the good old days.
A utilitarian paternalistic government would know what to do in this situation. It would rewrite the intergenerational social contract to include mandatory involuntary euthanasia at age 87 for men and at age 89 for women. The week before my 87th birthday, I would receive a note informing me that in a week’s time I have to turn up at my local NHS hospital to be humanely executed by lethal injection. Those who have served in the armed forces could opt instead to be executed by firing squad. The penalty for failing to turn up would (of course) be death.
http://blogs.ft.com/maverecon/2007/10/beware-of-peril.html#comments
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