From: dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska)
Subject: Re: Save the Planet and the Economy at the Same time!
Organization: VEXCEL Corporation, Boulder CO
Date: Wed, 30 Dec 1992 21:32:17 GMT

In article <1992Dec30.193316.11510@daffy.cs.wisc.edu> tobis@skool.ssec.wisc.edu (Michael Tobis) writes:
>A fine example of McCarthy's law:
>
>In article <5916@bacon.IMSI.COM>, jordan@IMSI.COM (Jordan Hayes) writes:
>|> James L Wilson <jlwilson@bellahs.com> writes:
>|> 
>|> 	the real dilemma:  too many people putting too great a stress
>|> 	on a planet with a finite amount of resources.  When we can
>|> 	come up with a real solution for curbing the current population
>|> 	growth ...
>|> 
>|> Except that it's not really a population problem; as it is, a 2-kid
>|> family in the US puts something like 37 times the amount of strain on
>|> resources as a 15-kid family in Burma.
>
>I suppose it depends on the resource in question, but I'd certainly like
>to see where you got this 7.5 x 37 = 277.5 factor. Out of a hat?
>
>In any case, with a long-term growth rate of 0 in the US case and 750%
>per generation in the Burma case, in 2.79 generations (assuming all children
>grow up and have families similar to the one they grew up in) the impact
>of the Burmese family will have caught up to that of the American family,
>and thereafter rapidly surpasses them.

These parameters are probably not linearly related.  If the population
in Burma continues to grow at its current rate, it is likely that per
capita consumption will decrease since their economy does not generate
the wealth to increase consumption at that rate.  Although poor
countries may have increasing GNP's per capita, physical consumption
tends to decrease with large population growth rates.
>
>Also one notes that the most severe loss of wilderness areas is now
>occuring in poorer and more heavily populated countries.

I do think that biodiversity problems are concentrated in these
countrues.  Part of this is due to presures to supply exports to
consumptiojn in the developed countries but I do not know how this
component compares to that driven by poverty.
>
>The belief that a low-tech existence would allow the world's population
>to grow indefinitely is surprisingly common among people who think
>of themselves as committed to environmental protection. Unfortunately
>it is completely incorrect.

I agree that it is incorrect but I was not aware that it is common.
It isn't among the people I know.  There is a "fond" attitude about
low-teck lifestyles, but I wasn't aware that they were tied to
continuing population growth.
>
>Indeed, if you make the rough but plausible approximation that family size is 
>inherited, simple calculation of any particular environmental impact shows
>that limiting family size to replacement rate is BY FAR the most significant
>contribution any individual can make to sustainability.

If per capita consumption is kept constant, that would be true.  I don't
think that that is the case, however. 
>
>mt
>


-- 
==============================================================================
A thought for the holidays:
   "Wine is living proof that God loves us and likes to see us happy"
	- Benjamin Franklin			dean@vexcel.com
Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.econ