One is NOT enough

The intellectual argument from Maine defies the actual results of mainland China. Ignoring the actual consequences China’s 35-year-old law prohibiting more than one child to families in densely populated areas, Sarah Conly, an associate philosophy professor at Bowdoin College in Maine, has found the perfect solution to combat global warming: limit couples to one child. She even wrote a book, “One Child: Do We Have a Right to More” Conly even goes so far as to scold China for recently lifting the ban on more than one child.

China tried it, China now wants couples to have at two children.

Be careful what you wish for, Ms. Conly, you may get it. As many countries have gotten just what they ardently discussed, hyped when they insisted the population explosion needed to stop; that couples should limit their family to two or fewer children.

For decades citizens have heard the message. Countries supported education programs emphasizing small families of preferably one or two children. The couples announcing their third child too often have heard derogatory comments. We will not discuss the crude remarks that follow when the number of children increases to four, five or more.

The re-education program has worked.

To sustain its current population (without immigration) the women in the United States need to have 2.1 children. To make that number come out right, some women need to have more than two children. Less developed countries may need as many as three children per couple to sustain their current population. Conly wants to shrink the population numbers. That may happen without her book.

Currently, the U.S. reproduction rate is 1.9. Other developed countries have seen similar diminishing numbers in reproduction. Italy is 1.4 and is considered a dying country because more people die each day than are born. Affluent Germany’s birth rate is 1.4; France, 1.7; England, 1.8; Syria, 3.0; and poverty stricken Afghanistan has a birthrate of 5.4.

Since 1980 with its One Child Policy, China has seen the desired drastic drop in births. When the policy was instituted in 1980 China’s population had a 3 percent growth in population every year. The leaders looked ahead and feared massive shortages. From the top down, China instituted a coercive program penalizing couples for having a second pregnancy. To that end officials encouraged and even at times forced an abortion on unwilling mothers. Chinese officials aimed for a population of 1.2 billion by 2000. They just about got it. In 2000, China’s population 1.26 billion by 2000.

In the 15 years since the population stabilized, Chinese leaders belatedly realized that country has too many old people and not enough young — especially not enough young women. (Given a choice, many Chinese families preferred having a son as their only child. To achieve that end they practiced gendercide and aborted girls.)

Not only did the population stabilize in China, a few years ago the officials realized that the one child policy threatened to shrink the population in this developing country before it became a rich, developed country, such as Canada with its 1.61 reproduction rate. Still developing China lacks enough women for the number of men and has fewer young adults entering the workforce and replacing the retiring workers. So Chinese leadership and intellectuals looked at the numbers and gave 11 million couples permission to have two children.

About eight million couples rejected the idea. They did not want more than one child according to a family planning commission poll done in 2008. So China dropped the whole one policy.

It may be too late. As personal money increased and China inched closer to becoming a rich, developed nation in recent years, families have decided that they did not have enough money or time for more than one child.

The same pattern can be seen in other, richer countries around the world. Educated, financially comfortable, married couples are not reproducing at a rate necessary to sustain the overall population.

Depending on an individual country’s death versus birth rates, reproduction needs to be 2.1 children per couple in developed countries and up to 3.0 children in developing countries, according to Wikipedia. If a country continues to have a reproductive rate too low to sustain the current population, then as the aging population decreases in its contribution to the tax base, the lower number of young and middle-aged adults contributing to the tax pool could mean that country is heading for an economic collision.

In 1980 China advocated one child as a national, civic duty. With more time free, women entered the work force and the country has gained financially. Without guidance, the families discovered the convenience of smaller families. A convenience that many have discovered around the world. Sounds great! With fewer children couples can enjoy more luxuries and more free time. Statistically speaking, however, a civilization or country can not continue indefinitely as it currently exists when its reproduction rate goes too low. Some say the breaking point comes when the reproductive rate hits below 1.8.

So yes, wish for a good education, specialized working skills, a good job, enough money to support the family and not too many children. Just remember, whether in China, Germany or the United States, in one sense, in order for any country to continue as it exists today, that wish needs to be tempered with that reality that having children, maybe even three or more becomes a civic duty. A civic duty that insures that each nation will have enough young adults ready to replace aging workers in the coming years to sustain the improved circumstances. With that in mind, Conly might be wise to apply the concerns of global warming to other facets of the nation’s life style.

Joan Hershberger is a staff writer for the El Dorado News Times.


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