worldbuilding: I need an economist...

[kaigou]

or a philosopher, or a historian.

Okay, the theories on world population control are pretty diverse, and as far as I know, China is the only country (so far) to actually attempt some kind of a major population control. In contrast, Japan's population is holding steady and/or decreasing minutely, as a result of the economic pressures and social changes resulting in people waiting longer to have children, having fewer children, and some folks not bothering at all.

But here are the primary situations facing the worldbuilding experiment I'm working on:

1. the population is significantly higher than the resources can support
2. the government (secular) has been forced to institute controls on the birth rate
3. for various reasons, a significant # of the population is sterile

Without sitting down and figuring out numbers, I'm postulating that if the death rate continues at a steady pace (barring sudden natural disasters and war), it's still too low to balance out the birth rate against the actual population. So, more deaths required, fewer births allowed, until the population reaches a point that's feasible and manageable against the number of resources.

China, currently, has a huge number of baby girls up for adoption, who have been abandoned to the government's care. Part of the feasibility of doing this is that there are other countries who have resources/room for the children. If, however, that were not an option, I'd think the government would be forced to clamp down harder, rather than have the burden of unwanted children shifted onto them. I do know that a Chinese friend told me that although she's a Chinese citizen, she may have as many children as she wants (especially while out of the country, and it helps that she's educated middle-class for China). The clincher is not that her children will be forcibly removed, but that if she returns to China with her two sons, she will lose all health insurance/support, education options, etc, for her second child. As far as the government would be concerned, her second child simply would not exist; China's cost of living is apparently quite high in contrast to possible incomes, so the cost makes such an option completely out of the question for 99.9% of the population. (I'm disregarding, of course, the issue of minorities being exempt from this rule, as well as the fact that my friend could have two sons because she was outside China when they were born and thus out from under the government's control.)

What are the theories on overpopulation? Would such a situation result in anarchy? I've posited a lottery setup for potential parents taking their turn at a chance to have children - "this year, seventy-three children can be born; seventy-three fertile couples will have a chance to concieve; those who cannot will be removed from the lotteries and the unborn # added to next year's lottery". Might a black market situation where the mafia hires itself out to slaughter/destroy large neighborhoods in hopes of introducing more deaths to raise the # of parental couples selected in the lottery? I can't think of any historical examples of such, to demonstate that such callous disregard could occur on the level required, if the proportion were greater than one to one, say, five deaths for every birth. CP has pointed out that even now, we have a recurring pattern of negligence for the elderly - cutting back medicare, attempting to privatize social security - and wouldn't the same possibly occur for those people ranked as 'neutrals' (sterile by birth, drug exposure or malnutrition)? That would shift the gender wars dramatically: male, female, neutral, based solely on one's ability to reproduce. If someone were determined to be neutral and infertile, would this create a second-class citizenship? Is there any historical example of situations where this has occured? I'm thinking of the mulattos and quatroons in Louisiana, where recognition of black ancestry was enough to drop one on the social scale, but it's not like you can look at a person and know they're fertile or infertile.

Glad to hear any/all speculation.

This world-building stuff is kinda fun.

Comments

[wanderingwidget.livejournal.com]

I am ignorant in the realms of politics and history, however I'm quite good at speculation. I'd say that if you were to have a plausible world based on ours (as close as possible in technology etc) then what you'd end up with would be 1. a massive economic gap, in other words the middle class would have to dissappear. 2. there are many ways to control birth rate, historically the united states government has forcibly infertilized (de-fertilized, made unfertile?) the females of populations they did not wish to see grow (native americans, the insane and mentally handicapped, etc). 3. As with anything that the government controls you'd get crime-rings or somesuch rising out of the opportunity (ie- we got the mob from prohibition); so perhaps there would be a baby black ring, or a series of underground pediatricians and obgyn's to serve the needs of women giving birth illegally.

Gee, that was fun. I'll be interested to see what you decide to do with this strange new world. ^^

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

2. there are many ways to control birth rate, historically the united states government has forcibly infertilized (de-fertilized, made unfertile?) the females of populations they did not wish to see grow (native americans, the insane and mentally handicapped, etc).

Yep. A corrupt government, or a society that did not encourage the existence of NGOs (non-profit watchdog groups, that is) could easily sink into eugenics control. A number of scifi stories - often the more pendantic, fable-ish kind - have posited such a government. The women forced to undergo such a treatment, in those cases, were (obviously) *not* pleased. However, if I posit a shortage of birth control, it's feasible that those capable of giving birth, having done so, would be like many Chinese couples who opt for vasectomies/hysderectomies and from there on can have sex quite happily without risk of pregnancy.

I've been thinking that having a low percentage of the population able to bear children - albeit a percentage able to produce more children than the death rate can balance, still - would circumvent the wish to sterilize those seen as unfit. Those 'unfit' parents just wouldn't be in the lottery ring, and would be knocked out most likely by virtue of having chromosones that would indicate a congential birth defect in any children. Asuka raised the question last night of whether abortion would be legal; I'm not sure. I'm guessing it would be - if a couple accidentally conceives when it's not their turn, I've been positing some pretty severe consequences (such as forced sterilization) but I suspect it'd be more realistic to expect forced abortion, instead. That would indicate it's legal (to a certain extent, in some circumstances). Probably pretty expensive, though, as the govt does offer alternatives to unprotected sex.

Following that logic, I'd bet this would be a world where rapists would probably be forcibly sterilized, and failing that, emasculated via surgery. I have no idea what they'd do to women who raped a man (ignoring that currently some states still don't legally consider it possible for a woman to rape a man, but we'll not go there).

(Actually the idea of "woo, have a baby, and the govt pays for permanent birth control!" is rather amusing, considering how many parents I know who complain bitterly about reduced sex once the kid is born. If you'd spent three, six, even ten years married and unable to have sex except on rare occassions with your spouse, I'd think the time of parental leave to conceive a child would consist of pretty much screwing each other into every known surface...and once the kid is born, continuing like that for some time to come. Like finally having the lid off the proverbial steam kettle, perhaps. An amusing thought, at least.)

[sintari.livejournal.com]

Yes! Wanderingwidget is exactly right. I spent a whole year of my undergrad studying the U.S.'s eugenics program. Its like she said - 29 states passed laws to sterilize the "feebleminded," mentally ill and basically, the poor. North Carolina and Virginina (and probably other states) had paddy wagons where they would go out to the remote rural areas and round up as many preadolescent children they could find, tell them it was time to "have their appendix removed," and then sterilize them. Apparently this became so common in some rural areas that people came to expect their appendectomy.

The theory behind eugenics was based on Sir Francis Galton's (a cousin of Darwins!) alarming discovery that the "unfit" were outbreeding the "fit." He advocated positive eugenics (smart people from good families having more children) and negative eugenics (the poor, insane, or anybody who was thought to be genetically inferior forcibly stopped from having children.) In turn, his population theories were based on the work of Thomas Malthus. I didn't got into Malthus much, but I'm 99% sure he was working from a model similar to one you're talking about, with the earth unable to house the current number of people. He might be worth checking out.

Okay, done now. I actually don't think that will help you much, but you never know. And If you ever have any questions about eugenics - ask me! Ask me!

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

Yep. I did my thesis on Native American nonprofits, and in the course of picking that, came across a number of case studies (mostly anecdotal) about forced sterilization. Going to the clinic for just about any type of surgery (or even none at all, but being put under nonetheless), and many women discovered after the fact - then, or much later - that they'd been sterilized. Rampant abuse of a population that's just heart-rending and horrendous.

I'm aware of the theories behind eugenics. I wonder what it would change if the population is that much over the top. I am aware that posited along with excessive population are certain side effects - lower birth weight, higher malnutrition, illnesses, all sorts of bad things that come from not enough resources to feed a population that's squeezed into really tight spots. With nature so randomly creating sections of the population unable to bear children (and the military's drugs and drug testing doing its share, as well - think the speed they currently give fighter pilots) - I can't see there being a huge push to narrow the population *further* except by those potential parents desperate to up their own chances. If the majority of the population has, by birth or accident, become 'neutral', there's two ways to go: either the minority/fertile rules over a second-class majority, or the majority/neutral rules over a second-class breeding population.

Odd, hunh. I do know there have been holes poked in Malthus' theories, but I guess we'll have to wait until habibti signs on and we can hear the economic end of things.

[sarolynne.livejournal.com]

Dude, I love world building. It occassionally distracts me from actually writing the story. By the time I get the world as I like it, I'm sick of the idea. ;P

One question you might want to address is why they have companions in the first place. I mean, why not create some other kind of birth control program? Women go in for their shot every couple months, and if one should accidently get pregnant, they're forced to abort? Why is this the system they developed? Is there some moral grounding? Does BC not work for some reason? Are they afaid of side effects from the hormones?

Curiosity, you know. This makes sense as an absolute method, but why so extreme?

Did they perhaps enforce BC in the past, and found that it wasn't effective enough?

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

Good questions. I'm retconning - I created that system because I thought it raised some interesting questions about how we view sexuality, intimacy, and gender relations - but lemme think about how it would work in practical application.

I was discussing this with CP the other night, and pointed out that a fertile couple has three options: 1, mess around (short of having actual sex), 2, abstain, 3, take same-sex partners to blow off sexual tension as needed. I don't know how many in the population would take the third option, or even the second. (His comment: more people might take the 3rd option than currently indicated; if the Kiernsey scale of bisexuality is accurate, there might be folks who'd explore that side once the religio-social stigma is removed.)

And I'd expect that a number would go for the first option, as they do now when messing around prior to actually wanting to produce a child. (By this same token, it makes sense there would be three genders: male, female, neutral, and two infertile people who marry - regardless of original gender - would simply be an infertile couple, end of story.)

But when resources are really low in a society, and it can't produce the food/goods it needs for its population, I guess the question is what gets shafted. If the govt sees its programs as 'good enough,' would it push pharmaceutical companies to develop preventive medicine (like cheaper, higher quality contraceptives) or corrective medicine (a post-sex pill). Or would the focus be on dealing with viruses and illnesses sweeping through the population as a result of crowding?

I suppose it depends on whether the govt is proactive or reactive; the latter might mean it's too busy scrambling to deal with the latest cases of meningitis to bother with encouraging companies to make more condoms. Companies will go where the money is, after all; condoms sales might be a steady sale but if the actual fertile population is a small percentage of the overall population, the companies making birth control might see it as better to keep it regulated - just like they did for years with the damn yeast infection medications. They made more money requiring doctors to write prescriptions than they did selling it over the counter, open to competition, and I was out of college before you could get the meds without having to see a doctor, get a pap smear, blah blah blah. Given that companies, first and foremost, want to make money, I'd think they'd prefer such shots and whatnot to be regulated. That would mean the fertile couple would have to have solid health insurance, money to pay for the visit/meds...and those couples on a lower income would have to pick option two or option three.

[elanivalae.livejournal.com]

Damn, I wish I had more time to sit around and speculate about this. It's a great topic.

Have you read The Handmaid's Tale and/or Ender's Game? Both have interesting speculation along these lines.

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

Ender's Game, yes. Again, eugenics come into play in that society, but it's brushed over in the course of the story to focus on the issues of children in war. I had to read Handmaid's Tale for a college class, and frankly it put me to sleep. If I wanted to be bashed over the head with gender issues and feminism and the evils of an authoritarian society, I'd slam my head against Bell Hooks instead.

The problem with stories like Handmaid's Tale, The Fifth Sacred Thing, Logan's Run, Atlas Shrugged, 1984, etc., is that they're not really science fiction, nor do they often posit a realistic government/society. It's pushed to an extreme to illustrate the author's point about the evils of that society. I refuse to believe that at some point in the future we would care so little for children and/or the act of procreation (regardless of gender or sexuality) that children would become a commodity. Nor do I believe that a society would willingly accept murdering everyone over thirty as a viable way to control the population. And while there have been fully authoritarian governments on this planet, outright dictatorships, it doesn't seem to have coexisted with poverty and bad health and limited resources - and stayed a government for long. Look at the Soviet Union, for instance. Three, four generations isn't much compared to the longevity of some government systems.

Socialist democracies may, by definition, control many things that in the US are privatized: health care, public transportation/communication, entertainment - hell, in Sweden I was informed there's a list of what tobacco products can be imported, and retailers must order from that, period. However, the democratic aspect of this socialism does mean that, within specified boundaries, people do retain some control of their country's future.

In some ways, China might be a more applicable example if it weren't for that society's emphasis on boy-children. This has produced a number of hidden pregnancies (with contraceptives harder to come by in that regime), which are then dumped if they're not male. A curious side-effect, as a Chinese friend pointed out to me, is that the new generation of Chinese children (up to about age 16 or so now; I think the law was introduced in the mid-80's?) are unbelievably spoiled. Previously, a family was expected to have several children, and any wealth was spread between the children. Having only one child - and that being *it* for your chances - means the one child gets the full effect of the attention and affection that any parent will naturally give their children. It's apparently running rampant now for these only-children to be quite selfish, demanding more and more as the One And Only Child in the family. This is especially distressing to many older Chinese, given their tradition of filial piety to the family; having the roles reversed in just the course of one generation has to be somewhat of a bizarre shock.

But then, that's part of what I mean by the unlikelihood that people would be consistently callous in the areas of children and family. Once the child is born, I would expect my posited world to have scores of children who have everything possible lavished upon them, as living proof of the parents' fertility. Almost as though children become a form of visible weath, in their own right, off-setting any second-class citizenship the fertile minority might feel against a neutral majority.

More to consider, eh? Not that this might ever show up in a story - again, I'm not into pendantic lecturing - but it does make for some interesting tensions and constraints on any characters. And that's part of the fun...

[branchandroot]

My first thought is that you do need someone to do the demographics, because I'm not sure whether huge overpopulation actually could be combined with significantly minority fertility. It sounds like a biological backlash in and of itself.

Supposing it to be possible, though, I think you need to address two things before you dig into the social ramifications of crowding/reproduction. One, why did technology fail so spectacularly? While it's true that there's only so much raw material to go around, exceeding the carrying capacity of a whole planet requires that we not be able to refine and expand our caloric production, and we're already doing that every year. That's where Malthus went wrong, after all. He assumed no technological advances in production at all. It's why we've already, I believe, overshot his estimated limit for population. So, why has technology not been able to keep up in this world?

Two, why is there a shortage of birth control? Not just the Pill, but all the other forms of getting rid of unwanted children (toxins, mechanical abortion, abandonment/exposure, killing the mother). Are there social prohibitions against taking steps like that? And, if so, why have they persisted in face of such overcrowding?

That said, what seems most likely to me is a class divide. The upper class, having the luxury of proper medical care, might treat the process of reproduction as a career choice, those who don't make that choice being voluntarily sterilized. The class identification could be strong enough to enable that kind of system, centered around the reproducers despite them being outside the channels of material power.

The lower class, not having access to the medical tech to correct mistaken conceptions, might have to resort to more strenuous methods of controlling the fertile members. Shunning, for example. Death for repeat offenders. Not as a government policy, but as a social reaction. All really effective methods of controlling people come from inside, not outside; they get you doing it to yourself.

I suspect there would be two contradictory pressures. One, the desire to have, or participate in the production of, children. The other, to not endanger everyone's survival by producing any more children. I could see a lot of attention focusing on the fertile people. Whether it wound up expressed as privilege or supression would depend on a lot of other factors, I think.

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

Yah, thanks for reminding me re Malthus - I knew there was an issue with his conclusions, but I couldn't remember what it was; it's been years since I've studied economics with any amount of seriousness.

And frankly, I guess it would be perfectly feasible for folks to get rid of unpermitted pregnancies by a variety of means - not as in govt-allowed but as in, crap, hide that. (heh.) Just as it's done in China now, so I would imagine folks would continue to do such. It's not like when abortion was illegal that this stopped people determined to get one - although it was out of the question for folks without the money/means to travel to Canada pre-1970. I'd think illegal/back-alley abortions would be seriously punished, though, since many do result in serious damage to the woman - and if she's fertile, that's the last thing you'd want.

I guess what I need to do is pause from rewriting Dancing and take a look at why China chose to introduce population controls. They do have resources, after all, and are not exactly cheek-to-jowl in all parts of the country. Was it a preventive measure on China's part? Or an answer to the inevitable population jump if large families continued to be the norm?

Attention would definitely be focused on someone who is not only fertile but capable of bearing a child without congenital birth defects. A'course, I can always take the post-apocalyptic cop-out of "massive war and nuclear damage in large parts of the earth made agricultural areas unable to produce enough food, destroyed genetic information in some people, blah blah blah" - I do so hate doing that, since it begs the question of how the population could still be so massive as to be unmanageable within a limited geographic area.

Off to run errands. Will continue to ponder. Head hurts.

[branchandroot]

Hmmm. Maybe a mishap, not with nuclear weapons, but with bio weapons? That's the kind of thing where one stupid little mistake really could have horrible, wide-ranging, long-lasting effects. And also a situation where the nations/governments involved might feel a moral obligation to care for the victims, no matter what the strain on resources. And where the ability to have undamaged children could be vital and needed at the same time that reproduction still exceeds the death rate; it could also explain a reluctance to terminate damaged children, since they are seen as victims, too.

This would require almost worldwide first world lifestyles before the crash, I think. No one else has quite the cultural dedication to altruism as a nation whose stomachs are, by and large, filled already.

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

Well, if China can institute population controls within its own borders, I don't see why an idustrialized first-world nation like the US, or Canada, or the EU or even Japan, couldn't do the same - and at the same time introduce massive immigration impediments for folks coming from those *other* countries that are killing their own as a means to control population.

Hmmm.

[windsorblue.livejournal.com]

Here's what I'm curious about, and it's something you faintly hinted at in the second chapter of the story, but I'm not sure how intentional it was or how far you were planning on going with it...is there an inherent pressure on fertile couples to have babies whether they want to or not? As in, you're capable to reproduce when so many aren't, ergo you must reproduce because it's your duty. If you have a government that is actively regulating who's allowed to have children, does it then make the childbearing choices for those who have been deemed suitable?

Aside: if there's an inherent abuse possible within a lottery system, I would think that it would be rigging that system in order to "reward" those that have curried favor (made generous contributions, maybe...?) with the members of government, rather than a development of black market mass-murder-for-hire...or perhaps the two in tangent.

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

I agree that rigging the system would come into play; every govt has its corrupt areas. (This is why I love NGO watchdogs; for all that they don't always manage to change the world, they come closer than companies or govt would without them around.)

I would think the greatest amount of pressure would be - both govt and societal - on those people who have several qualities: 1, are fertile and healthy enough to bear/produce healthy children, and 2, are *wealthy* or *secure* enough, financially, to provide education, materials, and medical care necessary to keep the child in one piece through adulthood. So a wealthy person might receive far more pressure to bear a child than a person in the poorer end of the scale, not solely because of genetics but also because of what that person/couple can provide for the child. I'd bet the social pressure would show itself the same way it does now: "for the children! we're doing it for the children!" and thus education gets money while social security gets shafted.

And like the situation in China, where a second child would simply not be recognized, I wonder if societal pressures would shift to create a situation where someone capable of bearing and raising a child...that anyone who opts not to, who has those abilties, would then be facing some kind of ostracization. That it might be one thing to be infertile, through accident or birth, but another thing to choose such. It's starting to feel more and more like those capable of bearing children are actually facing the raw end of the stick, rather than the blessed end, due to the pressures on them.

Hrm. I wonder if it's possible to remove the overpopulation issue and still retain the question of 'who is allowed to reproduce'? Or alternately, just limit the number of babies born to couples, and let society do the rest of the work itself in limiting who can/will/when, etc?

[mikkeneko.livejournal.com]

I'm in a hurry, but I'd just like to posit briefly the development of institutions of control other than governmental ones. Socities under pressure such as this can change in a number of ways to compensate; perhaps a change in religions? Abstinence or ritualized infanticide cults? Or perhaps a reactionary shift in the other direction, set up in opposition to the government?

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I'd guess there would be a strong move towards abstinance for those fertile - 'save yourself for having a child, don't risk it ahead of time!' - but talk about the conflicts. If you know your level of fertility at puberty, that's got to be the worst time to introduce such a pressure. If, say, in a high school class of 1,000 people, 100 are fertile...the other 900 can go have happy wet weasel sex and not fear the repercussions of anything other than disease. There'd probably be two strains: one insisting abstinance for fertiles, and the other insisting neutrals/infertiles must abstain out of some kind of twisted sympathy. Y'know, the old "if I can't do it, neither can you" kind of law.

Btw, I'm not postulating a world govt. I've done my research; such is out of the question, realistically (as if any of this could be remotely realistic). It's more likely that some countries would take stronger measures - cut all social security for the elderly and abandon them completely, or send off its citizens in pointless wars as a way to cull (especially if the draft is enforced for lower-class or questionable-value citizens). Hell, some govts have gassed and massacred entire sections of its population, so I imagine there might be places in this world where it's really Not A Good Place To Visit. Or live, for that matter. But I wanted a world where - for all the population controls issues - the rest of the time it's not so bad as to warrant rebellion. Decent housing, okay economy job-wise, moderate inflation, some opportunity to rise in class level, freedom of religion, okay medical care...

I think my brain just broke.

[mikkeneko.livejournal.com]

Hmm, I wasn't really thinking of world vs. individual governments. I really was thinking more about... ahh cults isn't the right word, but it's sort of what I mean, only without necessarily having wacko/charismatic leader aspects to it. Have you ever heard much about the Mizuko?

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

I just put that in about world govts because often the assumption is that "how it is here is how it is everywhere" - I do so dislike the Star Trek episodes where the Enterprise meets "members of a race" and the aliens all look the same, pretty much dress the same, have the same language...but you look at our planet, and it's different from state to state, let alone across the globe.

But yeah, I know what you mean about cults. For lack of a better term, we'll use that; sects would indicate they're all branches of one thing. But organizations down to rough community groups...yeah, I got the basic idea. I think it would also depend on the cultural history, and the societal pressures, how those cults shape up and act out.

[sevenall.livejournal.com]

I'm neither an economist nor any of the other cool things you mentioned, but it seems to me that the overpopulation issue is actually contraindicated by some of the social pressures you've put into play so far.

The value placed on reproduction for the sake of Healthy Children and the second-class citizenship for the neutrals points to underpopulation rather than overpopulation. Enforcing population control doesn't necessarily have to imply that the government want less children to be born, only that they want the right children to be born.

In a society where overpopulation is a problem, the neutrals might even be desirable for the government, since they can be part of the workforce but not contribute to the increasing population.

How they'd be viewed by the fertile population in the society is another question, of course. A high ratio of neutrals born would also imply a high level of damage to the gene pool. But with a reduced gene pool, the government would try to encourage higher birth rates, wouldn't they?

What I'm thinking is that after a war or a biological catastrophe of the magnitude that I envision as background to your story, the workforce is reduced and has impaired ability to produce healthy children -- this is why they can't support the elderly and the sick, no matter what natural resources which may exist or not.

There's a book called "Courtship Rite" about a world where food is very scarce -- some of the science is iffy, but several systems to control population is at work. One is organised and society sanctioned cannibalism (which is not meant to give anyone ideas!), another is to breed children in creches and bring them up competing/fighting against each other and grant the survivors entrance to a clan. Some clans have developed genetic traits that must be preserved and that are still developing, the one that can tolerate higher amounts of a semi-poisonous food grain than any other, for example. "Courtship Rite" is pretty funny, because the soft sciences are highly advanced, the hard sciences not so much -- there's also a lot of gratifying smut.

For some sobering perspective, forced sterilisation of people with epilepsy or certain mental disorders was legal in Sweden until 1976. Don't remember when sterilisation of diabetics was outlawed, but it was outrageously late.

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

I heart my favorite neuroscientist.

In a society where overpopulation is a problem, the neutrals might even be desirable for the government, since they can be part of the workforce but not contribute to the increasing population.

Good point. I'm starting to lean more and more towards a neutral-majority being the predominant class by virtue of two things: disposability (not like you're risking the gene pool), and sheer size.

How they'd be viewed by the fertile population in the society is another question, of course. A high ratio of neutrals born would also imply a high level of damage to the gene pool. But with a reduced gene pool, the government would try to encourage higher birth rates, wouldn't they?

Wouldn't that be dependent on the order of events? If, for instance, the population is excessively high, but technology is keeping up (barely) with supporting it. If, at that point, biological warfare or some kind of massive natural/manmade disaster impacted the economy and/or ecology (including the ability to reproduce), then the resource levels would plummet (after a delay of what's already produced having been consumed). If the population is also decimated but not the extent to balance the reduced resource levels, then the birthrate would need to be controlled artificially until the deathrate, resources, and birthrate leveled out again?

I'm not thinking that a govt would necessarily enforce such constrictions for a long period of time. It seems to me that once a population stabilizes - supply to demand, in general terms - then some of the restrictions would be lifted or modified to meet new situation criteria.

But if I catch the govt's attempts to modify/control things in those first, say, twenty years of the new situation, then the society itself would be in significant flux. There might be extremist cults that have sprung up, or things like the KKK trying to clear out undesirables from breeding or even just using resources, but...

Uh. I had a point. Somewhere. Brain hurts. Head happy, though.

[sevenall.livejournal.com]

I heart my favorite neuroscientist.

Aw, I bet you tell that to all the neuroscientists.

I agree that sequence has a lot to do with it; also the conditions pre-war/catastrophe. I'd argue, however, that in a totalitarian state where the resources/available technology can barely keep up with feeding and keeping all the people warm, a lot of people are going to go hungry and be cold, while the government spends money on researching spear-head technology instead. *coughNorthKoreacough*

And the death rate won't stay constant either -- I think that was the point I started out to make, then forgot all about. There'll be a whole generation, maybe two, where a considerable part has been killed in war/biocatastrophe or will die from delayed effects. The death rate is going to increase further, as the old and sick succumb to hardships, the level of fitness required to survive has just been raised . You might also have an accelerated death rate among the neutrals, due to genetic and developmental damage, and with them being the majority of the population, the average life-span might decrease significantly.

I'm not sure how a government would respond to damage to the gene pool, since there's no guarantee that a fertile couple will produce fertile offspring -- the odds may even be against it in your universe. They might be facing extinction a few generations down the road...so it does make sense that what restrictions there are would be lifted.

Now my brain hurts too. Chokma, please.

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

In a non-totalitarian regime, then, the pressure would be mostly societal on people capable of having children. The pressure of "you're our last hope for the human race" kinda thing - pushing those people to have children, and to keep them healthy. I could see on the positive end of families/groups considering children born to be "everyone's" in a certain way, with a whole horde of aunt and uncle neutrals pitching in to make sure the next generation remains healthy.

Then there would be resentment among those who can't bear children, and I imagine there would be a black market development of people selling their children to wealthier families who desperately want their own chance at a child...hrm, I really don't like the idea of children as commodities (as a society-wide notion) but it does happen on a small scale, even now (and it's not like they're treated as commodities, for the most part, by adoptive parents; it's just the process by which they're obtained that's a bit cold-blooded to me).

What prompts a baby boom, anyway? I know WWII prompted one, where so many soldiers returned home longing for stability and peace and family - all the things that they'd been fighting for. The US baby boom lasted 17 years; Japan's (in the 80's, I think) lasted only three. If there were a massive baby boom like that again *and* predicted natural disaster on the horizon, would only the totalitarian states - (like China, North Korea, Soviet Union) which have control over so much of the people's lives - be the ones with the capability to forestall a continued increase in population against oncoming resource deficits?

Hrmmmm. Must go eat chocolate and ponder.

[habibti.livejournal.com]

Okay, you guys get really busy when I'm asleep.

It's an interesting problem. Thomas Malthus in the 19th century postulated something similar to what you postulate above and for a while people were running around scared. But the economic response to anyone who has ever postulated something like this is that as resources decrease, demand increases, price goes up, other resources that were more expensive become cost-effective, move to newer resource base etc. So the economic answer to the resource crunch is technological innovation and supply/demand theory. You might remember in the 70s the Club of Rome was predicting that we were going to run out of fossil fuels (oil etc) by now but since then the amount of proven reserves has increased so we haven't run out blah blah blah. The problem for Malthus and the Club of Rome is that technology did come to the rescue - in Malthus' time and after there were technological changes that made it possible for agricultural yields to increase and therefore invalidate his conclusions.

So just because the sun has always risen, doesn't mean it will continue to rise, right?. Just how much can we increase agricultural yields to feed the rising global population, especially considering they will be using arable land to build houses on? And when even the most expensive fossil fuel options are exhausted, will we really have buckets of land for wind and solar power or will we have solved the problem of making energy out of sea water - which right now takes more energy to do that you get out.

In terms of food, we have solved the problem right now by having huge stockpiles in the developed world and allowing millions to starve. So we don't really have a PRODUCTION problem - we can produce more food than we need - what we have is a DISTRIBUTION problem. Most conservative economists would have me pegged as a leftie right now for pointing it out but most neoclassical economists don't seem to realise that economics is a normative discipline not an objective one and we make decisions based on our utility and objective function every goddam day. (Sorry for the rant but it's always there inside me when it comes to my former profession - economists seems to have by-passed over a century of philosophical advances and it makes me mad - and it seems that once and economist, always an economist.) So, getting back to the problem - on a global level, we don't really have a food problem, we just don't distribute it properly so no-one starves. This is not necessarily the case in individual countries though - which is why we have development economics and world aid organisations. But if we just take the problem of China - trying to balance food, fuel, land, fiscal resources and taxation, infrastructure development, education, health care - that is a complex set of problems right there and it's an amazing question to ponder in terms of individual rights versus that of the collective - which I believe is inextricably intertwined with that of the question of balancing resource uses.

As for what prompts a baby boom - that's probably something that's overdetermined. Certainly after WW2 there were lots of boys coming back and a lot of pent-up demand! But studies show that a wealthier a society becomes, the fewer births there are. Look at the wealthiest countries - Japan, Switzerland etc. You can even see it within a country - poorer women have more babies than wealthier, educated ones. In fact, Japan's population is expected to decline this century and it's dependency ratio will increase dramatically - meaning that the ratio of workers to non-workers (children, the elderly etc) will be about 1:1. For every tax-payer, there will be a dependent. Japan is a creditor nation so it can live on coupons for quite a long time but it's economy will not be a productive, dynamic one. Add a natural disaster to that and who knows what could happen?

I have buckets more to write but must go - let me know if you have any questions.

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

So internal country issues can be one thing - China, for instance - while the overall situation is significantly different, if not possibly the exact opposite. In which case, what if there's a situation like Sev describes (above) where the deathrate's shot up, the genetic factors are damaged, and the birthrate must be boosted...if a select set of countries in the world have better opportunities, and immigrants flood into that country seeking its resources/education/money (as they do now, with the US, in some ways) - this would raise the *population* of that sole country but not the *birthrate*. So there could potentially be one country struggling with internal resource/population balance while the world as a whole is trying to up the birthrate and has the resources to do it?

Japan is a creditor nation so it can live on coupons for quite a long time but it's economy will not be a productive, dynamic one. Add a natural disaster to that and who knows what could happen?

Uh, not me? Are you gonna tell me? Or is this a trick question? *poke*

[habibti.livejournal.com]

Yes, the population would be raised but the birthrate would also be subsequently affected, depending on the birthrates of the new immigrants. If they are less-skilled, less-educated immigrants, they may have more children, if more skilled and educated they may have fewer children. But yes, the situation you outline could happen and is happening. There are programs in countries like France where a great deal of financial support is given to new mothers and their offspring. A similar situation is happening in Australia where the federal government gives a $3000 grant to parents on the birth of a child. I'd be really interested to see a writer take that type of situation to its logical conclusion (pokes back).

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

So, country A has: high immigration levels, high population, low resources as a result of influx, and seeks to control birthrate to compensate for increased immigration, where immigration + birth rate must = death rate (or close enough).

Where country B has: high emigration levels, medium population, equal resources, and seeks to increase birthrate to compensate for increased death rate and/or departure/loss of citizens.

The logical conclusion of a writer? Always the worst case scenario, man! Such as: children as commodity. Or parents/spouses pressuring women into having more children, as a way to increase the household income. However, for it to be widespread, there'd have to be several things at work: would the benefits from the govt/orgs substantially outweigh the emotional/physical/financial costs of a child (which are enormous; multiply exponentially for each additional child, it seems), would the alternatives present to a woman be substantially reduced (ie, women able to bear children are ostracized/penalized for working outside the home)? It would have to become a lifestyle choice - from the stuff I read today - for it to take any lasting effect. Until then, it's a temporary measure, and once it's no longer enforced/rewarded, people will go back to their original patterns of many or no children, whatever existed before the govt programs.

At least, that's the lesson in China, so far.

[habibti.livejournal.com]

I'd also like to see countries like China and India down the track - each trying to keep birthrates down, each preferring male children....

[solitude1056.livejournal.com]

Or, in China, a huge number of spoiled male children. I dunno. Mebbe ship 'em off to Japan? Hoo, there's one way to finally resolve the rivalry...or not.

Frankly, I dunno. That's really such an ground-in kind of cultural thing, and if anything The Great Leap Forward and The Cultural Revolution showed you just can't beat culture out of a society, no matter how hard you try...