US Population Reduction is the Root of the Progressive Agenda

The earth has a limited abilty to sustain more people, living in increasing affluence, and using increasingly destructive technologies. There are many scientific and government papers reporting that both our national and global populations are over that limit by a factor of two or three -- even if we stop using fossil fuels immediately. We must either cut our standard of living by more than half or cut our population by half. We can choose to reduce our population in a controlled way or nature will do it quickly as we overload our resource base. Below is an incomplete survey.

To avoid future drastic reductions in our standard of living due to energy and resource shortfalls, in addition to conservation efforts we must:

1. Advocate an optimal sustainable U.S. economy with a smaller population and consumption. The Holdren-Ehrlich formula I = P x A x T states that human impact (I) on environments are equal to Population numbers (P) multiplied by the Affluence (A) of the society (consumption per capita), multiplied by the level of environmental harm done by the Technologies employed (T). Either our population or our standard of living will fall by at least half. (A variety of United Nations in university studies have suggested an optimal sustainable US population of less than 200 million and a global population of between 1.5 billion and 3 billion to maintain a reasonable standard of living. http://www.ecofuture.org/pop/reports.html , http://dieoff.org/page136.htm, and http://www.optimumpopulation.org/opt.more.climate.html among others.) The “growthist” mantra that better science makes unlimited growth possible has no basis in scientific fact.

2. In order to bring these issues into the public consciousness, we must ask Congress to debate the pros and cons of U.S. population growth and optimal US population size. A good starting point for this is the Letter of Transmission of the 1972 Rockefeller Commission Report to the Congress. The letter states, "After two years of concentrated effort, we have concluded that, in the long run, no substantial benefits will result from further growth of the Nation's population, rather that the gradual stabilization of our population would contribute significantly to the Nation's ability to solve its problems. We have looked for, and have not found, any convincing economic argument for continued population growth. The health of our country does not depend on it, nor does the vitality of business nor the welfare of the average person."

3. Insist that sex education in schools be factual and age-appropriate with proven programs to discourage children from having children.

4. Support Freedom of Choice and universal access to reproductive health care. This would include appropriate counseling for minor children without the consent of the parents.

5. Remove tax credits and deductions for more than two children. Since the United States government should not have policies that give economic incentive to those who unfairly strain the carrying capacity of our economy by having excessive numbers of children, and since there is significant scientific evidence* that we should be trying to reduce the population by approximately half, there should be an additional taxes imposed on persons who have more than two children. *See http://www.npg.org/

6. Call for replacement immigration (immigration no more than emigration) with immigration numbers tied to U.S. resident unemployment numbers. Illegal immigrants currently in the United States can be encouraged to leave voluntarily through employer penalties and disincentives.

Scientists have been aware of, and have been tracking, the development of energy, resource, and environmental problems we face today for over 50 years. The basic concepts have been available to us for much longer. The failure that has led to our current problems is the result of our leaders' lack of interest in planning beyond their own political careers. This must not continue. While the problems we face today seem large, they are the beginning of a cascade effect that, without significant intervention, will reduce our standard of living precipitously at some time in the next 20 years. Our current issues with oil supply are trivial compared to the effect of the coming sudden and major disruptions in food or water supplies. These are foreshadowed by the increasing frequency and severity of global famine as well as water supply shortages that are becoming common even in major US cities.

History is littered with the remains of those who failed to use their intelligence to plan -- those who became addicted to convention and refused to see the future consequences of their actions. The United States is well on its way to joining their ranks. We are at least 30 years past assuring a smooth transition to a sustainable economy. Failure to act now exposes us to natural processes which will provide citizens of the United States with a future of poverty approaching that of the current Third World countries. Democratic republics do not survive with citizens in extreme poverty. We must take a variety of decisive actions now to choose a prosperous and democratic future.

Views expressed on this page are those of the authors and not necessarily those of Campaign for America's Future or Institute for America's Future