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How many people do we actually need? NOTE!!! I'm not suggesting that if we figure out we only need X people and X < population(2024) that we try to depopulate

by tzs 2y ago

How many people do we actually need? NOTE!!! I'm not suggesting that if we figure out we only need X people and X < population(2024) that we try to depopulate to X. I'm just curious at what X would we have enough people to have a nice world, with enough people to do the jobs needed to maintain the world and provide resources to continue improving the world. Thinking back to around 1985, when the world population was around 60% of what it was today and the US population was around 70% of what it is today, and comparing what life was like then to now, the things that are better now don't seem to be things that inherently needed an increased population in order to happen. My TV is a lot bigger now. My computer is orders of magnitude faster, with orders of magnitude more memory and storage, with much better peripherals. My phone is a cell phone instead of a land line, and is also a much more powerful computer than my 1985 desktop computer. And of course I've got internet now, whereas back then I had dial-up to CompuServe. My car then was a Nissan Sentra. A Nissan Sentra today would be more efficient and have a lot more electronics, but it wouldn't really be much better than my car in 1985 when it comes to meeting my transportation needs. My food and housing then was comparable to my food and housing today. My appliances today are more efficient, but like with the car the ones in 1985 got the job done well enough. I think I'd be as happy in a 1985-like world with current level electronics, communications, and appliances. The question then is how much of the improvement in those since 1985 depended on the population increasing?

rich_sasha 2y ago
I think the killer is that right now we don't need absolute numbers, rather relative numbers of N young people per old person. We are net producers of stuff up to some age, then become consumers as we retire, and need some producers to offset us. You could say, meh, you saved up money for retirement so you're good, but (a) that's just you, not most people, and (b) even then you need some young people to bake break, fight fires, look after you when ill and so on. I guess we will have to break this model, whether we like it or not, but right now we rely on exponential growth... The longevity, ironically, is making it worse, as there are more old people, and I guess by extension more frail people, who in the olden days wouldn't make it, all of whom need more care from young people.

by tzs 2y ago

rich_sasha 2y ago

I think the killer is that right now we don't need absolute numbers, rather relative numbers of N young people per old person. We are net producers of stuff up to some age, then become consumers as we retire, and need some producers to offset us. You could say, meh, you saved up money for retirement so you're good, but (a) that's just you, not most people, and (b) even then you need some young people to bake break, fight fires, look after you when ill and so on. I guess we will have to break this model, whether we like it or not, but right now we rely on exponential growth... The longevity, ironically, is making it worse, as there are more old people, and I guess by extension more frail people, who in the olden days wouldn't make it, all of whom need more care from young people.