Dean K, you are not a current or former economics of business (or similar non-science degree) are you by any chance?

Regardless you have been successfully indoctrinated by the economists and business community into the believing that there are no limits to human expansion due to our technology.

Our technology and its application is also subject to the ecological limits of finite planet Earth Dean.

Perhaps you should head back to school and broaden your education with some rationalising Earth science.

Dick has done what he wished to do over the years and now pontificates others to nanny state subservience. If dicks canvas was trimmed earlier, would he now hold these narrow views or is he just trying to hold on to his Vegemite sandwiches while prescribing others to less choice in their productive pursuits and expression.

Mr Windy,
welcome to OLO, you're a breath of fresh air in a mostly fetid environment. You quoted me above and I just wanted to say I agree with the tendency of your comments. The big end of town would certainly suffer most from a halt in population growth. Though unless Australia opted out of the growth paradigm in a sustainable manner, we'd all suffer.

I prefer not to deal with fantasy, however, and this article and most of the contributions in favour of halting population growth are precisely that. However much we discuss it, the reality is that the population will grow, will be force-grown to serve its master, economic growth. It seems inevitable that despite the plethora of historical precedent, and contemporary empirical evidence, even out "advanced" civilisation hasn't learnt the rudimentary biological facts about life on Earth.

The best comment made somewhere above I think is, well the gist of it, what is to be gained, qualitatively from population growth? Will we be happier with bigger crowds, greater sprawl and more intensive accommodations?
There is nothing to be gained qualitatively from a larger population, but much to be lost. I aver therefore that however it is rationalised, the real motive behind population expansion is economic.
Until the sustainable population adherents wake up that the real enemy is global capitalism, and go after it, they're just whistling in the wind. Looming Peak Oil, AGW and the GFC have done nothing to halt the economic growth obsession and populations will continue to follow suit until the whole thing collapses.

Here come the pro-growthers, bleating like cats on a hot tin roof. How much of their histrionics is driven by the realisation that their property portfolio are grossly inflated and ready to pop at any moment?

What would you know about society Cheryl?

I don't get to spend time with my family during the week because I'm caught in traffic and struggling to make ends meet as the government sucks my finances out of me to provide infrastructure for migrants. My son's school is overcrowded and he is in a room with two composite classes (four classes). He might get lucky in our underfunded education system and get a degree or a apprenticeship in a trade but, more likely, some work-ready scab will be imported off the shelf from overseas as a cheap option for our socially conscious businesses.

The best performing European economies have low pop growth rates and higher per capita spending on health, education and transport (not that better PT helps in Melbourne, it just slows our 18thC road system unless we want to re-engineer our entire rail system). The GDP per capita and income per capita is also higher in these European countries too. Here's a clue: the govt's in these clever countries use taxes to maintain, consolidate and improve existing infrastructure.

You can't win this argument on society, economy or environment. What have you got? Nothing! Bloated, pointless gasbags.

What's that? We can all move to rural areas? Oh yeah, sure. Once we get past commuting distance farmlets with a horse and sheep for cashed up "tree changers" we can drive 4 hours a day to work for a basic wage (and that's not the inflated average wage, that's the real $50K pa that most low income families live on)? Or we grow mung beans in our back yard and live off that?

What do you clowns know about the realities of over-population that average people face? You're just blowhard ideologues who need a rocket up your....

Rhian,

Compare this paper on real wages in Italy from 1270 to 1913.

http://www.paolomalanima.it/default_file/Articles/Wages_%20Productivity.pdf

Figure 10 in this paper shows it all, but here are two quotes:
"Over a long period, an inverse correlation between population and wage rates dominates: at least from the beginning of the series until 1820. Wage rates increase only in times of population decline, such as the golden age for workers between 1350 and 1450, and the 1630-1750 period."

"From the ratio of the cost of the basic requirements for survival - the poverty line - to the average hourly wage, we deduce that in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries workers had to work 500-1000 hours per year simply to survive, whereas in the nineteenth century about 1500 hours were necessary."

In 2006 our Productivity Commission modelled the effects of increasing skilled immigration by 50%. This is the best possible case for economic benefits from population growth. They found (p. 191)

"Most of the economic benefits associated with an increase in skilled migration accrues to the immigrants themselves. For existing residents, capital owners receive additional income, with owners of capital in those sectors experiencing the largest output gains enjoying the largest gains in capital income. On the other hand, the real average annual incomes of existing resident workers grows more slowly than in the base-case, as additional immigrants place downward pressure on real wages."

More specifically, the expected per capita gain in income (p. 198) was only $383, and hours worked per capita were increasing faster than growth in average income, implying that average income per hour worked would be falling. They didn't consider effects on the environment, congestion, etc.

http://www.pc.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/9438/migrationandpopulation.pdf

Their findings are consistent with studies in other countries, such as the 2008 House of Lords report in the UK.

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200708/ldselect/ldeconaf/82/82.pdf

Our politicians and the media are trying to tell that there are marvellous economic benefits from population growth because the elite are more concerned with total than per capita GNP, i.e., population growth is good for them, but not for the rest of us.

Mmmm...
1. I wonder if Dick understands longevity and the roll it is playing in our demographic momentum, or demographic swelling.
2. 500,000 extra in 2010? Not sure about that. 150,000 natural and 54,000 permanents, so maybe half of Dicks number.
3. I also wonder what Dick feels and understands about peak population and then global decline, as predicted by the UN under various scenarios. The most I recall was half our current global population by 2150.
4. Japan is in population decline and has a huge Ageing population problem.

Or they emigrate to a more affordable country, as our 87,000 Australian permanent departues last year attest.

Currently approx. 1000 skilled emigrations per week. Mainly 25 to 35 year olds as the largest group.

So, we experience peak emigration, due to cost of living, housing affordability and tax systems, while the public argument seems to be focused on immigration levels declining. Note, the govt has hold of this lever and immigration can be turned back on at any time. No so for our emigration, and that requires more attention. It is impacting our NOM greatly at the moment....

Dick never mentions our emigration rates rising and hitting historical highs?

"For Dick to use his affluence and power more effectively and with more significance, he could offer to repay the outstanding HECS debts of the first 5000 to return after being away for at least 5 years, back to OZ?" - demografix, April 20, 2011