I think rather than limiting the amount of children we have, we should start taking one tax break away AFTER TWO kids. So Three kids is only one tax break, four kids is none, and five kids would require paying. If you can afford five kids you should be able to pay it. If you can't, you shouldn't be having kids.

A tax break was introduced by Romans to help encourage people to have babies to help strengthen the depleting army. There should not be any need for it any longer. It seems too many people I've come across, with more than two children, are not only getting a tax break, but getting government aid. I don't think the rest of us tax payers should fit part or all of the bill.

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Obviously, people never read the Shadow Children series by Margaret Peterson Haddix, where child count is strictly kept to 2 kids, and any other kids are killed or forced into hiding. Or Ender's Game, though the population laws aren't as focused on in that book.
I think imposing laws on the number of children a family can have is kind of ridiculous. Ok, maybe people shouldn't be having 8 children (*cough John and Kate cough*), but a family with 3, 4, or more kids can still be perfectly fine.
I also dont like the way the writer listed "The case for the prosecution". Sure, children can be a burden, but that's not all they are. They're actually human beings too, yet this article treats them either as an "investment" or a "burden".

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Absolutely limit population. Either we transcend our primitive urges to allow our DNA to continue on intelligently and of our own choice, or the ways of nature will do it for us just like any other rampant, unchecked growth. Look up what a Malthusian Event is...

Not only should it be limited to 1 offspring, but parents should have to qualify and prove that their child will not be a burden in any way. And it doesn't take a scientist to realize that if there were only a few million of us instead of a few billion, we would essentially have unlimited resources.

It's all in the oxytocin. Transcend or it's the end for humanity.

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I don't think the government would ever try and go down this road as only the coldest of human beings would want it enforced. The only way to actually enforce it would be to have mandatory abortions or sterilisations and it's going to have to be a pretty nightmarish future if people are ever going to even consider that.

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Interestingly, Japan shows us an example of simply letting population, economic and political pressures run their course. Japans population is estimated to drop by 25% over the next 30-40 years (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aging_of_Japan).

Point being, there need not be explicit controls on this kind of thing, it tends to work itself out, one way or the other.

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Increasing the population to support you in old age is a ponzi scheme. Eventually the population must stabilise, so some generation is going to have to face a declining number of young people to support them.

I guess you want this to happen when your kids or grandkids are old not you - so that you can live well, even if it means making bigger problems for those that follow us. Don't worry, you're not alone - it's normal in our culture to steal from the future for today.

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The thrust of this article is that children are a burden on the tax payer, but I wonder if the author considered how large families function in parts of the world where there is no concept of a "welfare state" that takes care of its own.

Take any poor country in sub-saharan Africa, for instance. The literacy rate is very low, and people have practiced subsistence farming for many hundreds of years. As long as males and females are healthy, they will continue to have children for the following reasons:

1) The parents get free child labor
2) The mortality and birth survival rates are abysmal
3) They don't understand that sex equals preganncy
4) They've neither seen, nor heard of, nor had access to contraceptives.

In a modern, Western civilization, I believe that gradually reducing the additional tax break, beyond a certain number of children, would provide little incentive to stop having children. On the other hand, if the government were to reduce the amount of welfare assistance per child, eventually people will get the point and make the rational choice not to have children because they simply cannot afford it.

In my opinion, the blame for large families lies partially with the Catholic church, which is famous in its denouncement of all forms of birth control. In Western societies and in some poorer Latin American countries, a vast majority of the population is still Catholic and would probably adhere to this law out of fear for their salvation.

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I DEFINATELY THINK THERE SHOULD BE A LIMIT ON THE NUMBER OF CHILDREN THAT PEOPLE ARE ALLOWED TO HAVE. I ALSO THINK THAT WOMEN SHOULD HAVE TO TAKE SOME TYPE OF INTELLIGENCE TEST BEFORE THEY ARE ALLOWED TO REPRODUCE AT ALL! THERE ARE WAY TOO MANY FAMILIES THAT COULDN'T EVEN FINANCIALLY AFFORD THE FIRST CHILD THEY HAD YET THEY CONTINUE TO KEEP "POPPING" THEM OUT FOR US TAX PAYERS TO HAVE TO SUPPORT. IT IS UNBELIEVABLE TO ME HOW THIS IS CONTINUALLY ALLOWED TO HAPPEN. WOMEN THAT MAKE HORRIBLE MOTHERS THAT JUST "KICK BACK" WHILE COLLECTING FOOD STAMPS & WELFARE ALONG WITH ANY OTHER HAND-OUT THEY CAN GET. WITH ALL THE FREE & DIFFERENT KINDS OF BIRTH CONTROL AVAILABLE THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO EXCUSE FOR "ACCIDENTAL" PREGNANCIES IN THIS DAY & AGE. IT MAKES ME SICK HOW THIS IS CONTINUALLY ALLOWED TO OCCUR & THE FACT THAT THESE WOMEN SHOULD BE SO ASHAMED OF THEMSELVES & OBVIOUSLY ARE NOT. THAT'S WHERE THESE TESTS I MENTIONED ABOVE COULD WEED OUT THESE LOSER WOMEN! THIS NEEDS TO BE STOPPED! MY OWN HUSBANDS EX-WIFE IS A PERFECT EXAMPLE OF THIS. SHE HAD HER FIRST CHILD TAKEN AWAY AND HAS SINCE HAD 7, YES SEVEN, MORE CHILDREN ALL ON PUBLIC ASSISTANCE. NASTY, NASTY WHITE TRASH WOMEN LIKE THAT SHOULD HAVE TO HAVE THEIR TUBES TIED AFTER THE VERY FIRST CHILD WAS TAKEN FROM HER TRASHY SELF. JUST VERY DISGUSTING PEOPLE NEED TO BE STOPPED LIKE MARIE.

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My major concern is the ever increasing demand being placed on the environment. Natural resources are in diminishing supply due to overuse, insufficient recycling, and rampant pollution. It seems like the same ol' argument and it is because it's valid.

I see the real possibility of future water wars. It's not so far fetched. We've been poor administrators of our resources because we could be, but that's no longer the case.

Population control is easily achieved without going to the lengths of the Chinese Communist Party. Education, easier said than done, is the key, and too, convincing some religions and sub-cultures that it's in their best long-term interest.

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Your argument, Mr. Writer, only perpetuates the problem. If our generation doesn't enforce limited pregnancy, then who will? We don't have many more resources to use at the rate we are, and we certainly can't afford to produce emissions and pollution at the current rate for another three or four generations. By limiting the birth-rate now, rather than later, we will indeed suffer when we are old. But isn't it worth it to know that our children will be protected, and that our planet and race will survive as long as possible?

As for not going ahead with pregnancies that will lead to disabled children, I actually agree, though not for fiscal reasons. I think that the only reason the rates of genetic disability have been increasing is that in the past the children died, and today we're doing our gene pool a disservice. Not only that, but their quality of life is minimal at best, and we're basically forcing them to live a life that isn't complete.

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Firstly, @ Mike
Be careful not to confuse the issue. This article is not about limiting the number of "existing" children. I think the author is treating the topic appropriately for the context in that he is viewing future children as statistics. This issue is strictly about the numbers, the sanctity of life only extends to the living.

That being said, I think that putting a limit on children into legislation is incredibly foolish. Reproduction is not a crime and should never be treated as such. Not to mention trying to get legislation like that signed into law would be a TREMENDOUS waste of time and money because only a dictator would ever be able to pull it off. The debate would only be another farce that would cause us all to draw lines in the sand against one another. We would have bigger problems on our hands if this type of legislation were possible.

The real problem here is ignorance, plain and simple. The real crime here is abuse. We need to be teaching REAL sex education in schools. Basic anatomy, STD scare tactics, and abstinence are NOT cutting it by any measure of the imagination. Kids need to be taught how to have safe sex. There is no force on this earth that will ever be able to keep it in their pants without some kind of computer chip implant or frontal lobotomy.

Here are the things that I think should be taught: Safe sex with contraceptives, the real financial costs of children, the other costs of children (mental and physical tolls on parents), costs for society, and here is a crazy idea, why don't we stop treating sex like something mystical and taboo that they should be ashamed of, treating sex like that gives many kids the idea that it is the only way to consummate a relationship.

Information is power, folks. The way sex ed is taught in schools today is analogous to expecting someone to be able to flawlessly assemble some IKEA furniture from a picture of "how it should be." Sure the bright ones might figure it out eventually but the result is a bunch of barely functioning crap that can only called functioning at all because we've found a use for it as a doorstop.

This issue really isn't about saving the future from the problem of overpopulation, this is about saving us from (*cough John and Kate cough*).

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I wrote about why we have too few young people already, here:
http://listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch_listcultures.org/2009-August/004174.html
"""
We can support quadrillions of humans in the solar system (see my previous references to Dyson, Bernal, Savage, O'Neill, and there are many others), or about a million times our current population on Earth. We essentially had the specific technological ideas in the 1970s we needed to do that, even given refinements since then. So, a focus on zero or negative population growth for the human race as a whole right now, as opposed to just limiting the population currently on Earth (which might be sensible, even though I think we could easily grow 10X on Earth), has created a "Peak Population" crisis that we didn't need to have for 1000 years when we filled up the solar system (and by then, we would have better technology and better social ideology to deal with changing demographics of moving from a triangle to a square of population by age).
Sure, let's set a population target for some carrying capacity on Earth the same way the health and fire departments limit the maximum number of people in a restaurant. But, you don't limit the human population of a city (or the solar system) the same way you limit the number of people that can safely be in a restaurant (the Earth). That is ultimately the mistake that gloomsters like Catton make -- they confuse the two, mostly IMHO from lack of imagination, but also because some profit from artificial scarcity, as well, as in Catton's case, the hypocrisy of having four children while telling everyone else to have less.
"""

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If you're on " public assistance " ... YES , absolutely .. otherwise it's nobody's business!!!

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This all comes down to whether people think they should have the right to force their own beliefs on others.

If a person believes the world needs to limit population no one is forcing such person to have kids against their will, even if the majority of people don't agree with that individuals viewpoint.

If everyone agreed on this issue, there would be no need for a law of this sort since everyone would naturally decide to limit the children they have in accordance with their belief.

However, for the people who believe that its their God given right to have children, those who disagree with them want control and want to force their opinion on such people regardless of whether they agree or not. That is just plain wrong.

Therefore, you cannot have the opinion that a law of this sort should be passed without also having the opinion that it is ok for you to force your opinion and beliefs on people who don't agree with you.

Also the implications would trample on our rights of religious belief, and our rights to make our own choices about what to do with our own bodies and our health, because implementation of this policy would require people take birth control (which for some women and men is deadly and causes severe health effects), get sterilized (and be subjected to pain and potential side effects of surgery), or be forced to get abortions (which some people are adamantly against). To think that it is alright to force people to do these things against their wills is selfish and against the better consciousness and interests of us all.

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I've thought about this issue a lot in my free time, and I'm not convinced that the either of the majorly proposed ideas would do society any good. As a biologist looking at things from an ecological perspective, I propose there is another option that is being neglected in the debate, and it is perhaps the best of all possibilities;* it is in fact the middle ground of the debate, which has yet to be established in the collective thought.

A logical and factual pattern in population dynamics states that if the generation length of a population is decreased, the total population can decrease quite rapidly. In fact, given just a few generations, the population observed will have an even smaller number than would yield from forcing a strict limit on offspring capacity.

Now, applying that factual observation, all that must be done to reduce population is enforce a minimum age before-which people can not reproduce (e.g., 25).** People will still be able to reproduce to their heart's content while, miraculously, the population as a whole steadily decreases naturally.

What does such a plan entail? Two things: (1) An absolute projection into the minds of every single teenager and young adult that, if they want to contribute to the betterment of humanity, all they have to do is exercise birth control by any means necessary until the age of 25 (this means competent sex education, not this abstinence bullshit***) and (2) Leave abortions up to women, not society.

* The two options being: (1) set a limit on childbearing capacity; and (2) leave things be as is.

** Where are most people in life by the time they're 25? Don't most people by that time already have things established for the most part? By that time college graduates are (hopefully) already settled in their craft, high-school graduates are (hopefully) matured and settling in theirs crafts, etc.

** It's biologically normal for teenagers to want to fuck each other. I say give them the tools they need to do it smartly and safely, then let nature take its course.

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AB SO LU TE LY we need resitrictions on the numbers of children born - and I'll go further - we need also protect children from being born with disabilities.

Under 'normal circimstances', I;d say reproduction is a right. If there was a thing like nornmal circumstances, but currently I'd say looking at the world, at technology, at resource depletion and at imminent unheaval we sure aren't anywhere near normal circumstances.

Everything, and I emphasize, *everything* is abnormal and will only get more abnormal. Every person now born will have to content with a far nore challenging world, where the mere presence of someone growing up more or less compels us to guarantee him or her a set of living conditions and societal minima we can't even properly guarantee 90% of people in the world. Right now we are devaluating human value - we are knowingly and willingly treating most people in society as janitors, and actually expect them to be grateful for receiving a subsistence handout.

Nevertheless we simply assume those left out of the loop, those unable to get by, make a decent living, to curl up and die. They don't, and we will face increasing problems with a percentage of people that are simply incapable at a base genetic level to cope with the world that is unfolding before our very eyes. So we lock them up or except them to live in ghettos. So what will stop those people born who realize they were born in a 'full' world and never had the freedoms and opportunities all of us had to lash out in anger? I know I would...

We are overpopulated, despite the immense irony of vast tracts of deserted land everywhere. Yet, even that will only get worse. Seas will be emptied of fish in a decade, rather than a generation. Whole tracks of world will become even more uninhabitable. Most mineral resources we use are effectively depleted before 2050 and we sustain massive populations on agricultural pesticied and fertillizer we know we cannot produce for much longer. Worst of all oil is clearly running out, and we have no alternative, except for those alternatives that will aggravate all of the above.

The combination of natural limits couples with the bestially competitive character of human nature is why I say the last thing we should have is steady population growths. The argument of caring for the elderly is offensive to say the least - if we take children solely for caring for the elderly generations, than that is an open call for slavery. Say we did in fact had a new generation for the benefit of taking care of the baby boomers, and in 20 years time all those newly born decided to emigrate, would we go as far as force them to stay, because?

But look at the facts - we became older throughout the 20th century, in average numbers as well as in lifespan. Either this process of lengthening lives stops, amd we have other things to worry about - ot it doesn't and last we can afford is more people. And this is what will happen - medical science is very close to efectively reverse engineering the human biology. We can argue over what degree of understanding we'll have but everyone in the field will agree that this will produce functional treatments resulting in unambiguously increased lifespans - by 2020 most forms of cancer will be treatable - that is good for a good five extra years for everyone alive today, statistically speaking. Add vatgrown organs, resveratrol, the M prize, tissue regeneration, stemcells, and nano-medicine to this and by 2030 chancs will be fair that everyone in the rich world, many in the third world and probably everyone reading this has a statistically mean chance to gain a few decades to his or her life - if not more. That is good for instantaneously adding a billion people to the world. What's worse, medical advances won't exactly come to a standstill 20 years further. Will some people by 2050 have a fair shot at living 150 by then? That would in effect double our effective global populations by 2100.

http://www.onlineconversion.com/world_population.htm
http://www.di2.nu/pop_sim.html

Finally, I vehemently think it is child abuse to willingly and knowingly inflict debilitating affliction on a human being. Consequently doing nothing and have the same occur is morally equivalent. Hence, if a parent has an opportunity to know he or she will pass on a range of afflctions to his or her children, and does nothing to stop this, should be held accountable to child abuse. The argument that it has always been a lottery should not serve as an excuse (parents who withheld necessary food supplements to children already born have been convicted of neglect) - hence I strongly favor that the legal system will pretty soon have to contend with the question whether or not we allow unrestrained, unmonitored reproduction/parenting.

This sound terrifying and has the odour of fascism, but I hasten to add it sounds no more terrifying than the alternative - forcing invalidation and serious affliction on millions of people every year, or having to pay as a society for those who cant fend for themselves, and the indignity this bestows on those people - or even worse - the full realization that we let people be born for which there is effectively no guarantee on a happy or filfilling existence and who have no outlook other than a life of welfare or prison.

Last but not least - what jobs will we give all people born today, considering out deeply rotten socio-economic excuse for a system? If you have any doubts about the validity of that question, read this article:

http://www.marshallbrain.com/robots-in-2015.htm

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cutting down on the number of children you can have , bloody hell what next , this goverment have meddled with everything they can meddle with why dont they just concentrate on sorting these banks out and getting this country back on its feet instead of meddling with peoples lives all the time .

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I think what they are saying is stupid, i am a mother of 5 and I have worked since I was 14, I worked my way through college, had my first child at 23, but six weeks after she was born i went straight back to work. Only recently I have had to give up work due to personal reasons. My children are bright with a great deal to give to this world. Telling someone not to have more than say 2 children is like telling someone who can't have children not to bother as we are not going to pay for IVF. I do agree however there should be an age limit on how old mothers can be to have children, not because they can't have them, but on the fact they are not thinking of the childs needs...what would happen to a baby if a 60 yr old mum suddenly dies, also can the older women run round like a 30 year when a child wants to play tag or water fights with them.


I think the goverment needs to look at other ways out of the problem and also do something about the amount of people entering our very small country who have never paid a penny to our health system etc yet get it all for free!

Jane

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