Cat stuck up a tree? Population
Sore back? Population
High power bills? Population

LOL! Oh you make me laugh Cheryl dear!

Not enough money to pay for extra infrastructure - population growth (more tax revenue)
Aging population - population growth (more tax revenue and aged care workers)
Rising unemployment - population growth (stimulate housing industry)
More technology needed - population growth (more Einsteins)
More environmental restoration needed - population growth (more tax revenue)
Urban sprawl - population growth (to make high density living economically viable)

<There are major problems in Africa with population.>

That means that you are not a pop-growth zealot, so I apologise for repeatedly describing you as such. So what makes a society prosperous? I would venture it to be the acquisition, dissemination and application of knowledge. Of course, for the application part you require a physical infrastructure. But even where infrastructure is lacking, the acquisition and dissemination of knowledge can still make a difference. Such is the case with Kerala.

<Population growth here is about right.>

Well, that is very encouraging, but it raises the question of how things might change with a higher or lower growth rate? There must be some things that you wish to avoid in either case. What might they be, C?

<You are the enemy and will be treated as such in this debate.>

Yes, I enjoy a pantomime as well.

"That means that you are not a pop-growth zealot, so I apologise for repeatedly describing you as such. So what makes a society prosperous?"

Fester our population was growing at about 2% per year in 2008 or so under the Howard Coalition government and is still growing at roughly 1.4% now according to the latest Bureau of Statistics figures.

That gives population doubling times of 25 and 50 years.

That is a third world level of population growth and Cheryl thinks it is 'about right'.

She is every bit a population growth zealot as far as Australia is concerned!

There can be and should be no compromise with the Cheryls within Australia on that basis.

Zero net population growth (NOT zero immigration Cheryl) is what Australia needs ASAP, both for the sake of our own country and our own childrens' futures and for the sake of setting the example on the global stage.

That will require radical reforms to both our banking and economic systems in order to prepare for it.

It may even require, for a time, withdrawal to some extent from the global economy, re-instatement of trade barriers and re-building of economic (particularly manufacturing) self sufficiency in Australia.

Self sufficiency is a major defence strategic and internal political stability issue.

Let's remember that peak and declining oil will be upon us in the coming decades and it will be increasingly difficult to sustain the global economy any way.

Australia may not always be able to source our reqired manufactured goods and defence assets from overseas at all or at a price we are able or willing to pay as a result.

So kids when it comes time to vote in the next election remember this about the Stop Population Growth Now Party and their agents of decay.

Population growth is falling in Europe but it's rising in Africa. The anti-pops want to cut funding to Africa because our food aid creates babies.

Their sole economic theory is to raise trade barriers which would throw Australia in to deep recession and throw hundreds of thousands of people out of work.

The anti-pops don't believe population growth will steady and then start falling over the next 50 years. They believe in case A - the worst case scenario. That means we're all doomed.

They are against capitalism and technology and for a Pol Pot future. Boyszone will be Brother Number One.

But kids, we're all doomed anyway because sooner or later we're going to run out of oil, food, minerals, etc. And don't forget the Mayan Prophesy which still has seven months left to happen.

The anti-people lobby are big on cutting the population in Australia. The population of Australia is currently about the same as New York City - 23 million. If the anti-pops get their way a quarter of the people will starve to death.

The hydra-like head of the anti-pops in Australia is Sandra Kanck and John Coulter - they supported the GST which killed the Democrats.

The anti-pops are instrumentalists. That means they believe they can measure how much energy a baby will consume over its life time and accordingly, tell the mother how many kids she can have per square foot of energy/land. I can tell you she will be allowed to have between zero and one. That's Kanck's Law.

Who is going to enforce that law and how? Also do you think that method is valid and scientific as it involves averaging the averages to come up with a number - say 5.

They are against civil society, democracy and capitalism. Their idiotic and grade three understanding of economics would destroy the economy within months.

Cheryl,

The global population will certainly stop growing. The issue is whether people will stop it themselves in a humane way or whether they will solve the problem in the time-honoured human way - by killing each other to make room for themselves and their own people, however defined. In assuming that everything will be hunky-dory, except possibly in Africa, which can be cordoned off, you are ignoring environmental overshoot (see my previous link to the GFN Atlas) and demographic momentum. If 42% of the children in India now are malnourished and 59% stunted, while the environment is being degraded, do you seriously believe that conditions will not get worse if the population nearly doubles due to demographic momentum?

So far as Australia is concerned, a society goes through stages of development. In the first stage, people start settling a previously uninhabited island or a continent where a sparse native population can be easily dispossessed or killed. (Malthusian trap societies such as 18th century England aren't big on the rights of outsiders.) Every new resident, of course, demands a share of the infrastructure that has already been built, puts pressure on the environment, and dilutes the per capita stock of natural resources. But at that stage, there are enormous natural resources per person, and the the people are far more at risk from the environment than the other way around, apart from the issue of introduced pests. Prosperity is limited by the labour supply, and it is good for everyone (apart from any hapless natives) to grow the population.

Eventually a point is reached where prosperity is limited by resources, not by labour, and further population growth does not make the average person any better off. We have reached this stage in Australia already (see the 2006 Productivity Commission Report and their 2010 annual report for the lack of per capita benefit). People become aware of negative impacts on the environment and quality of life that are not easily quantified economically.

(cont'd)