Declining population Growth Rates are a Good Thing

October 14th, 2007 at 06:30am Mike McGarry 214

Declining population growth rates are a good thing

But not when there lied about

                                       By Mike McGarry

“Facts do not cease to exist simply because they are ignored.”—Aldous Huxley
 

“Just the facts, Ma’am, just stick to the facts.”—Detective Joe Friday, Dragnet

Over the last couple of weeks during Immigration Wednesday on KNFO’s Con Games, two assertions were made that need addressing. First, it was said that most of the more developed countries of the world were declining in population numbers, and it was therefore assumed that was not a good thing. Well, it is a good thing.

Reducing population growth rates by establishing replacement levels of fertility (or even below replacement levels) and curbing immigration are, indeed, the only real hopes for sustaining viable futures for those countries—including, if not especially, for the U.S. The challenges resulting from not doing are insurmountable. The necessary adjustments of doing so would be just that, adjustments.     

The very best quick must-read on this widely misunderstood matter is by British environmental writer, Anthony Browne. Pop the Pop the Pill and Think of England was published in The New Statesman nearly five years ago, and it’s prudence and relevance have only been enhanced since. “Who's afraid of declining population,” Browne teases. “Only politicians, obsessed with power and prestige. The rest of us, particularly the workers, would be better off.”  Read on:          

The second assertion needing redress is one made by Con Games’ guest, Julien Ross, of the Colorado Immigrants Rights Coalition. Mr. Ross stated the U.S. population numbers were “declining.” Ross used former president Clinton as his source authority.  Really!

According to the U.S. Census Bureau the nation has engorged itself with more than 22 million new Americans since 2000, from 281 million then to more than 303 million today, the equivalent of the population of Colorado—times five.

Population growth is due to two factors: fertility (births over deaths) and immigration. U. S. fertility rate for the native born is currently at replacement level. Ergo, almost all of that alarming increase is from mass-immigration, that is, from immigrants and their children.  So much for Mr. Ross’s “declining” population numbers.

If Clinton did in fact say what Ross claimed he said—which I doubt—it figures that someone who can’t decide what the word “is” is, would also ignore Goal 8 (Stabilizing Population Growth) of his own 1996 President’s Council On Sustainable Development, to wit:  "Addressing immigration is also an important aspect of the broad question of population stabilization in this country. Immigration accounts for one-third of total U.S. population growth and is a significant factor in the overall effort to stabilize population voluntarily.”

The council’s members, which included Colorado’s former U.S. Senator, Tim Worth, concluded: “We believe that reducing current immigration levels is a necessary part of working toward sustainability in the United States.”

Oops! Mr. Ross, defender of the “rights” of illegal aliens, says presenting these facts is “fear mongering.”  Never mind.      

Entry Filed under: Politics, Immigration, Colorado, Telluride, Garfield County, Eagle County, Denver, The West, United Post