3 ms·

A lot of people aren't worried about overpopulation in a vacuum. They are worried about overpopulation along with the rise of personal consumption and potential

A lot of people aren't worried about overpopulation in a vacuum. They are worried about overpopulation along with the rise of personal consumption and potential competition (read: perceived zero-sum games). The job market is already ridiculously competitive. Rent and homes are already crazy, partially due to so many people insisting on living alone and many countries still not having adapted to an increasingly more individualistic society. Telling them "it'll cool off in 20 years" is about the equivalent of telling them "yeah the problems we have now will continue another 20 years, deal with it".

vidarh 4y ago
A lot of people - most of the ones I end up arguing about overpopulation with in fact - are worried about it because they think growth is still heading for the skies and are arguing about it from a resource depletion and environmental angle. I can't recall the last time I came across the arguments you put forward, and I've hardly ever discussed this with someone expressing worry about overpopulation who has argued the problem is just that it's not flattening out fast enough. In fact, I often face people who insist I'm wrong when I point out projections show us heading for population decline. I'm not suggesting people believing what you're saying don't exist, but in my experience at least they're not the ones yelling loudest about overpopulation. That said, with respect to people worrying about it not flattening out fast enough, we'd face far worse problems if it rates started declining faster. We're already seeing pressure for higher pension ages to offset the coming decline in a working age population in many countries. Pressure for higher tax rates, longer hours, later pensions will come in short order if the demographic shift happens fast enough, and it will be massive unpopular.

vidarh 4y ago

A lot of people - most of the ones I end up arguing about overpopulation with in fact - are worried about it because they think growth is still heading for the skies and are arguing about it from a resource depletion and environmental angle. I can't recall the last time I came across the arguments you put forward, and I've hardly ever discussed this with someone expressing worry about overpopulation who has argued the problem is just that it's not flattening out fast enough. In fact, I often face people who insist I'm wrong when I point out projections show us heading for population decline. I'm not suggesting people believing what you're saying don't exist, but in my experience at least they're not the ones yelling loudest about overpopulation. That said, with respect to people worrying about it not flattening out fast enough, we'd face far worse problems if it rates started declining faster. We're already seeing pressure for higher pension ages to offset the coming decline in a working age population in many countries. Pressure for higher tax rates, longer hours, later pensions will come in short order if the demographic shift happens fast enough, and it will be massive unpopular.