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Devon
The Ministry doesn't do anything about population control - in reality, population control measures have never worked anyway. What has proven effective is empowering women to be in control of their own reproductive health, and improving people's security and quality of life - both of which the Ministry does emphasise, and which by the end of the book do have the desired effect of slowly reducing global populations (there is talk about populations eventually dropping to 2 billion - but this isn't a "goal", just the observation of a trend).
It's also worth noting that the various lifestyle changes that the Ministry brings about (or attempts to) negate the need to reduce the human population. Instead, their efforts bring the current population into a sustainable state. Population control is only necessary if we want all humans to live lifestyles of excess, as we often currently do.
It's also worth noting that the various lifestyle changes that the Ministry brings about (or attempts to) negate the need to reduce the human population. Instead, their efforts bring the current population into a sustainable state. Population control is only necessary if we want all humans to live lifestyles of excess, as we often currently do.
Maria Korolov
Yup, like Dan Plonsey said, as countries get richer, population growth automatically slows. When you're poor and don't have good health care, you need kids for labor, and because a lot of them die young you need lots of extras. Plus, you don't have birth control anyway.
When you're rich, kids take up a lot of your time and cost a lot of money. With good health care, they're less likely to die of easily-preventable childhood diseases. And you have birth control.
As countries get rich, more and more children get vaccinated and don't die, more and more people get birth control, more girls go to school instead of getting married right away and having babies.
In many countries, populations are actually declining steeply. In the US, we're heavily dependent on immigration to keep numbers up.
Here are a couple of very good articles to read on this topic:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/wo...
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/0...
When you're rich, kids take up a lot of your time and cost a lot of money. With good health care, they're less likely to die of easily-preventable childhood diseases. And you have birth control.
As countries get rich, more and more children get vaccinated and don't die, more and more people get birth control, more girls go to school instead of getting married right away and having babies.
In many countries, populations are actually declining steeply. In the US, we're heavily dependent on immigration to keep numbers up.
Here are a couple of very good articles to read on this topic:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/wo...
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/0...
Dan Plonsey
I don't remember this being addressed explicitly, but there is mention of empowering women, which could include increased access to birth control. Also, recently population in much of the world (outside of Africa) has begun to decline -- precipitously in some countries -- so perhaps little action was necessary. I recently read that China's population is projected to decline from 1.4B now to 730M in 2100. See:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/22/wo...
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/22/wo...
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