RUTHFULLY YOURS

Population Connection (formerly Zero Population Growth) proclaims that ever since the group’s founding “[t]he Western Hemisphere as a whole is now below [population] replacement rate.” When they formed in 1968, “only four nations were at or below replacement rate fertility… today there are nearly a hundred such nations.”

To cement the direction of progressive solutions for the earth, one letter to the editor took issue with the fact that “some of [the] authors talk about ‘slowing down population growth.’ We have to talk about ending population growth. If all we want to accomplish is slowing down population growth, then we’re just debating whether to go over the cliff running or to go over the cliff walking.'”

It would appear that human extinction is the ultimate goal.

The group is outspoken about Trump’s “trying to cancel all funds for bilateral international family planning assistance” while they maintain that in the U.S., Trump “and his congressional accomplices attack [their] friends at Planned Parenthood day and night. And from Neil Gorsuch to district and appellate judges, Trump schemes to shove [the] courts to the far right for decades to come.”  As such, Population Connection is hosting hundreds of college student activists to raise the alarm and be “an unapologetic voice for population stabilization.”  Too bad that Population Connection completely ignores the Project Veritas  expose depicting Planned Parenthood engaging in the illegal and immoral act of selling baby parts.

Thus, given their ideological bent, President John Seager and his group would herald Europe’s ongoing demographic suicide.  Moreover, it is vital to keep in mind that progressives do not mourn the death of Western values.  It is integral to the progressive/leftist game plan.

Giulio Meotti writes that it is estimated that there “will be a reduction of about 25 percent in the Greek population by 2050. Even more worrying is the forecast of the country’s statistical agency (Elstat), according to which by 2080 the population of the country could fall to 7.2 million.”

Moreover, “births in public hospitals have dropped by 30 percent and Greece has become a world leader in abortion.” Only Italy has a higher percentage of older people.

Furthermore, “[i]t is no coincidence that the three European countries considered at risk of default in the present period — Italy, Greece and Portugal — are also those most overwhelmed by the demographic winter.”

Peter Kotecki at Business Insider explains that “[a]ll around the world, countries are seeing dwindling birth rates and rising life expectancy. Aging populations are leading to greater spending on healthcare and pensions, but the number of people working and paying taxes is steadily decreasing. As a result, these countries are at risk of becoming ‘demographic time bombs,’ signifying a crisis of too few working people. Demographers say countries need fertility rates of 2.2 children per woman to maintain a stable population, but many nations’ birth rates, such as those of South Korea and the United States, have fallen below 2.”

The US birth rate has remained below ‘replacement level’ since the 1970s, which means not enough children are being born to keep the population at a steady level.

In Spain there are more deaths than births each year and some towns are already nearly abandoned. It is vital to realize that Spain is “a demographically dying country and a land of great investments for Saudis and other emirs” — all of whom are ultimately concerned with establishing a global caliphate — hence the population increase in 2017 in Spain resulting from Muslim migrant arrivals.

And while “[t]he number of immigrants to Italy rose last year and the number of Italians leaving the country decreased… neither trend is reversing Italy’s path toward a demographic time bomb.”

Then there is Bulgaria, whose population is shrinking faster than any other nation in the world. Bulgaria’s fertility rate is only 1.46 children per woman.  In 2017 Bulgaria’s deputy labor minister, Sultanka Petrova, stated:

The decline in the active population is a social and economic bomb that will explode unless we take adequate measures.

Latvia’s population is steadily dropping, and many citizens are leaving the country to look for jobs in other parts of the European Union.

Some South Koreans cite a lack of financial stability as one of the main reasons they are not having children. In order to stem the decline, the “South Korean government has offered cash incentives to people who have more than one child, as the fertility rate currently sits at 1.26 children per woman — too low to maintain a stable population. “

Likewise, the Japanese government is offering cash incentives in an effort to encourage women to have children. Researchers are worried about a demographic time bomb in Japan, where the lowest-ever number of births was recorded in 2017.

Japan has “one of the highest life expectancies in the world, leading it to face a steep decline at one end of the lifecycle and a boom at the other. Similarly, the proportion of the working age population is falling, which constitutes a significant challenge for the economy.”

In fact, “[e]conomic concerns are one of the most frequently cited reasons for Japanese people to get married later in life or remain single. Women who need, or want, to work face difficulties in combining employment and child rearing, due to the limited availability of childcare services, unfavourable employment practices, and a lack of flexible working conditions.”

The United Kingdom’s birth rate has fallen to its lowest level in a dozen years.

At 0.83, Singapore has the lowest fertility rate in the world, but economists say the effects of a demographic time bomb can still be reversed by recruiting immigrant workers.

China’s fertility rate keeps dropping despite the government’s 2016 decision to allow families to have two children instead of one (a policy that had been in place since 1979), so local authorities are taking steps to encourage more childbirth.

While the importation of foreign-born migrants may show an increase in actual population numbers, how will it affect the fabric of a country’s culture if said migrants do not assimilate.  One need only look at Europe and see that Western values, language, and culture are being effaced.

In addition, the effects of population decline include:

• serious labor shortage and fewer qualified participants for the workforce.
• a strain on mental health as “witnessing a region’s population loss can have a significant impact on the wills and spirits of those few who are left behind.”
• threats to a competitive spirit in business.
• an increase in angry young men as a decline in population “often causes gender inequalities.”
• a “brain-drain” in rural towns as depopulation results in the migration of people from rural regions to more urban ones.
• disproportionate aging which “burdens most of the work on the strata of society least capable of completing it; increasing the welfare state and causing great strain on the governments trying to meet the needs of the aged.
• a vulnerable situation where countries with suicidal demographic numbers leave themselves open for any foreign invasion.

Despite the aforementioned adverse issues, John Seager of Population Connection strongly disagrees with many practitioners of the ‘dismal science’ when it comes to the impact of lower birth rates.

He asserts that “no one need worry about slower (or better yet, zero) population growth. In a world plagued with all manner of shortages (clean air, fresh water, food, common sense), we face no people shortage.”

Despite recent declines in family size, the United States population continues to grow by about 3 million a year, due in large part to the fact that nearly half of all pregnancies are unplanned. But what about those few places with slow or no population growth, or even (as with Japan) actual decline? Not to be simplistic, but there is a clear answer that works everywhere: Invest in people. That means providing great schools along with top-notch health care facilities. It also means removing barriers both physical and attitudinal that often prevent gainful employment on the part of older workers or those facing physical or mental challenges or those who are trying to fulfill family responsibilities as caregivers.

These approaches increase per capita productivity, which can be even more important as population growth slows. While there is no magic wand that will solve all the world’s problems, reducing population growth by smashing barriers to all reproductive health services is a great place to start.

Counting on unplanned pregnancies negates their own ultimate desires to ensure that no births occur in the first place.  Moreover, such vague generalizations obfuscate the actual reality of too low a birth rate in many parts of the world.  Why is death or the end of potential life such an anathema to leftists?

In 2016, John Seager and Lee S. Polansky wrote The Good Crisis: How Population Stabilization Can Foster a Healthy U.S. Economy. They emphatically continue to maintain that “no one need worry about slower (or better yet, zero) population growth.”

And if they are wrong, it will be too late for many countries.