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August 17, 2006
SouthAmerica: Overpopulation is at the root of the problem in various areas of the world.
I wrote an article about this subject that was published in July 2000. In Brazil the people who can afford the least to have children â the complete destitute â is the group who has a lot of children. The poorest group of society is the one that is reproducing the most.
In Brazil we can put some blame on this problem in the Catholic Church â a very influential institution in Brazilian society. (Not long ago 90 percent of the Brazilian population was catholic â even tough things changed a little, Brazil still is the country with the largest number of Catholics in the world.)
In Africa, they have even a bigger problem than in Brazil. In Africa they have a large number of illiterate people and the problem is compounded by the fact that they have various civil wars going on, and many people are cut off from normal communications channels. It is very hard in many cases for many African governments to communicate with its own population.
Here is what I said on that article that I mentioned:
"Brazil started the century in 1900 with a total population of 17 million people. Brazil ended the century with an estimated total population of 170 million people. When the population of a country grows ten fold during a period of 100 years, that country is asking for social trouble, as is happening in Brazil. It does not matter which system a country has: capitalism, communism, or socialism; this magnitude of population growth is a prescription for disaster.
"Today some people wonder why there is so much crime in Brazil and why its civil system is breaking down. People look for simplistic answers to the problems. They consider drugs, or something else, as the reason for the breakdown. However, the obvious reason ( population explosion ) is never understood as being the cause of the problems.
"In the United States, Americans built an economic system in which the economy has to grow, grow and grow, and can't be allowed to stagnate. Growth, growth, and more growth is the mindset of Americans. The United States had only five million people around 1800, when its Constitution and Bill of Rights were drafted and put into effect. The United States population had increased to 76 million people by 1900, but they had new lands, which they had bought or conquered since 1800. The United States could still afford to continue growing at that point in its history."
Today there are many studies estimating the optimum population the United States can support based on its resources, wealth, location, environmental considerations and type of economic structure. "Among these studies is one by David and Marcia Pimentel, professors at Cornell University. They suggest the United States should aim at a population of less than 100 million people. University of Maryland professor Robert Costanza reaches a more pessimistic estimate of 85 million people."
Based on the various studies it seems that up to 150 million people can be an acceptable limit of population for the United States. Above this number Americans are looking for trouble.
The United States reached the 151 million people mark in 1950; by 1970 the US had increased its population to over 200 million people. The country again increased its population to an estimated 275 million people by the year 2000.
Is it really surprising that the prison population started exploding in the United States since 1970, after the optimum population for this country of 150 million continued growing in numbers?
With the accelerated advances in technology and automation which we have today in the United States, the optimum population for the United States probably should be reduced to an even lower amount of people. Maybe the country should not have a population larger than 120 million people.
Most people don't understand and don't give much thought to the power of geometric progression (exponential growth) and its effect on population growth. For example, to show the power of exponential growth, in the 1980's more than 10 million legal and illegal immigrants arrived in the United States. This group of people will grow in numbers to approximately 25 million people by the year 2035.
To give another example, the estimated 25 million total legal and illegal immigrants who came to the United States during the 20-year period from 1980 to 2000, will grow to approximately 60 million people by the year 2040.
Government officials and the business community only think of their immediate needs of keeping labor costs down. They never think about the consequence of a growing population on future generations and its impact on the future of the country.
Governments such as the United States and Brazil have learned nothing from the past. They brought slaves from Africa to accommodate their needs a long time ago, never giving much thought about the consequences of their actions on future generations.
Today the United States is making the same mistake again regarding its immigration policies. The US is still letting one million people immigrate to the US per year, even though today the United States has a population of 275 million people; a number which is probably double the optimum population.
The limit to population growth in Brazil
If we do the same type of analysis for Brazil, we might come to a similar result. Brazil probably should not have a population larger than 80 to 100 million people as its limit. Today, Brazil might have twice the population which could be considered an optimum and desirable number of people for the country based on its natural resources, size, location, type of economy, etc.
Population explosion is, in my opinion, the most important problem in Brazil. It is the cause of all other problems in Brazil today, including poverty and destitution for a large segment of the population, drugs, crime, corruption, etc.â
Source: July 2000 â âOverpopulatedâ
http://www.brazzil.com/content/view/6963/73/
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