Is population collapse really a bad thing?

[Anonymous]

I'm sitting bumper to bumper in a big city in south America now to go roughly 5 miles. I think I could have walked quicker. If population dropped to 1900s or even 1800s levels as many experts say it will (and I agree)... Is that the worst thing?

Assuming this happens from people not having sex, not a mass plague or war.

[Syntosi]

Yes that is very, very bad. Every economic model and system we have today is designed with a growing economy and growing population in mind. If we dont have one of these, such as a growing population, then society will implode one way or another.

[Asker]

Yep I've heard that but if real estate became super cheap because lack of people, and rent or mortgage is usually our biggest bill, could that potentially help the retirement system? Also there will be a f--k of a lot less unemployment

[Syntosi]

Real estate constitutes most of the savings that a middle class family has AKA the value of their house. If that goes down then that will push most middle class households into the lower class. Also the problem is not really that there aren't enough homes for people, the problem is that rich people buy them all up and rent them out which would not be solved by having fewer people.

As for retirement, its almost entirely supported by a system where there are more people being born than the previous generation. The many subsidize the few. If the birthrate stagnates or declines then that is going to put more and more burden on working adults to support the people in retirement.

As for unemployment, that is a problem that only really exists short term. If there is unemployment then that allows new businesses to start up as they have a large pool of people to hire from. As such unemployment tends to be caused by temporary disturbances and can often be followed by economic booms with an explosion of new businesses and innovation.

Generally speaking you want around 3-4% unemployment since not everyone WANTS to work or for whatever reason is between jobs which for the record is about where Bidens unemployment numbers were at the point Trump came into office.

[PaleDale]

It'll all be over soon

[DrPepper12]

Who cares how people die as long as we get to cull ourselves down to about two billion that would be great.

[OneViewpoint]

The dead do not care how they died. Let them die for Jehovah, Jesus, and Allah.

[exitseven]

I have been saying this for years. Too many people. They are everywhere like dog shit.

[Anonymous]

yes because the effects will get drastically worse over time and lead to extinction

it's like a frog slowly getting boiled alive

[OneViewpoint]

Uh no. It doesn’t work like that.

[Opinion Owner]

@OneViewpoint yes it does work like that. each generation is having fewer and fewer children. some having no children with increasing economic burdens piled onto future generations and restricting them from having kids of their own

[OneViewpoint]

@opionowner,

No it does not work like that. You've bought into the capitalist propaganda that the only way out of our problems is to "grow" our way out.

Think about your stupidity for a moment. Growth has worked from the bronze age through the iron age, medieval times, the dark ages, the Renaissance, colonialism, the industrial age, and the early part of the information age. Not a bad run for a few thousand years.

But now we have 8 billion people who all use energy, consume food, use manufactured products, and create pollution in the process. We live on a ball of rock that is finite. We live here with thousands of other life forms in an ecosystem. We are using up the finite resources too fast. We are polluting too much. We are killing the ecosystem that keeps us alive.

And yet you would argue that we need 10 billion people? Or is 12 billion enough? Can the Earth support 50 billion? What happened when the human population was say, 3 million? Did we die off? I guess not, we're still here. Did we die off at 4 billion? The answer is no again. So why would we cease to exist if we returned to a population size of 4 billion? Your argument is asinine.

The only people served by this growth mentality are stupid extremists who have blindly bought into a simplistic Capitalist solution to everything that is rooted in the past... GROW GROW GROW. Sorry pal, but you're trying to apply yesterday's solutions to tomorrow's problems. That was then. This is now. We have a new problem. It's time to think about a different solution to different problems. I know that's hard for you and it's scary. But, that's reality.

Lastly think about this. Studies have been done with rats and mice. When overpopulation increases unchecked, the mice and rats turn to cannibalism in a fight for scarce resources. Disease spreads like wildfire. They wipe themselves out. Until the population resets at a sustainable level. That would be how human civilization ends too. Another dark age.

[jahaims]

If you understand economics yes