Live data from Hacker News

Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

economictimes.indiatimes.com

31–40 of 70 posts

Re: Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

#31
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it a classic rate equation? If all young people die immediately, sure, we're in deep shit. But with increasing productivity and improved health care a graceful decrease should be possible.

> increasing productivity Is it, in any real terms? > and improved health care Doesn’t this make the problem worse? I.e. longer lifespan for the aging population, and even more demand for healthcare professionals from the limited set of younger workers.

I'm talking about "health span" and not "life span".

Re: Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

#32
post #28
post #2

I can't read the article, so I'm just replying to the concept. I don't see a problem with this at all. Overpopulation may be the most important issue of our lifetime. I'm not a fan of excessive government control, but incentivizing low birthrates is our only hope of saving the environment.

I used to share the concern with overpopulation, but birth rates are often below replacement in developed countries. I now worry more about the long-term survival of humanity than I do about overpopulation. I expect all countries to eventually become developed and follow the same trend, and eventually the population just naturally dwindles because we become a post-survivalist society and don't care about propagating…

It's not as if humans were an endangered species, wouldn't be bad that the population gradually decrease to 4 billions and less

Re: Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

#33
post #28
post #2

I can't read the article, so I'm just replying to the concept. I don't see a problem with this at all. Overpopulation may be the most important issue of our lifetime. I'm not a fan of excessive government control, but incentivizing low birthrates is our only hope of saving the environment.

I used to share the concern with overpopulation, but birth rates are often below replacement in developed countries. I now worry more about the long-term survival of humanity than I do about overpopulation. I expect all countries to eventually become developed and follow the same trend, and eventually the population just naturally dwindles because we become a post-survivalist society and don't care about propagating…

> I now worry more about the long-term survival of humanity

I think humanity as a whole will do just fine: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/exports/world-population-...

Re: Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

#34
post #2

I can't read the article, so I'm just replying to the concept. I don't see a problem with this at all. Overpopulation may be the most important issue of our lifetime. I'm not a fan of excessive government control, but incentivizing low birthrates is our only hope of saving the environment.

Climate change and population growth are separate issues.

Increase in demand doesn't just impact climate change, but encroaches on land and destroys more of the environment.

Re: Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

#35
post #4

But we can't have the alternative that's worked everywhere that's tried it: educating Women. If that happened the pervasive corruption might be questioned. Instead we'll just kill the extra children.

I would hope that we could find a way to decouple reproductive rates from women's education. Otherwise a very strong argument could be made for placing severe restrictions on education for women in most of Europe, North America, Japan, Australia, etc, all of which are experiencing catastrophic declines in their native populations.

Re: Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

#36
post #4

But we can't have the alternative that's worked everywhere that's tried it: educating Women. If that happened the pervasive corruption might be questioned. Instead we'll just kill the extra children.

Who said anything about killing extra children ? They are just proposing 100,000 rupees for limiting to one baby. or some minor economic disincentives for more than 2 babies, on top of which are already there in practice and naturally for even 1 baby.

By your logic, if we needed more babies you would stop educating women ? Education and baby making are orthogonal issues.

Re: Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

#37
post #4

But we can't have the alternative that's worked everywhere that's tried it: educating Women. If that happened the pervasive corruption might be questioned. Instead we'll just kill the extra children.

Notwithstanding that this would be a good thing (education I mean), economic development and lifting people from poverty, alongside widespread access to contraceptives, has had a strong impact on fertility rate in the 1st world and in the long-run influenced attitudes on education as well.

Re: Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

#38

I am wondering how can they enforce it in just one state. I can just cross state lines to have a 3rd child.

A lot of people (hundreds of millions) in rural India will never leave their state of birth to settle elsewhere. Ties to land are too strong and cost of moving is much higher than western countries. The attitude towards free movement is just not like what we are familiar with.

Re: Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

#39
This isn't about population control. This is yet another attempt to oppress Muslims. This state Uttar Pradesh is headed by an Hindu extremist priest who actively uses the arms of the government to persecute minorities.

It is a common trope by the Hindu right wing that Muslims are breeding like rabbits in India and may become larger in number than the Hindus.. and the way to control Muslims is by coming up with measures to restrict the rights of those with more than 2 children.

The Hindu right wing has been actively asking Hindus to have many children.

https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/other-states/Produce-...

The truth is that the fertility rate (TFR) has been reducing drastically for Muslims as well as Hindus.. though the Muslims have a slightly higher fertility rate but there is no way the Muslims are going to overtake the Hindus in population.

https://www.indiatoday.in/diu/story/muslim-women-family-plan...

Re: Indian state proposes two-child policy, stringent measures for violators

#40
post #4

But we can't have the alternative that's worked everywhere that's tried it: educating Women. If that happened the pervasive corruption might be questioned. Instead we'll just kill the extra children.

Who said anything about killing extra children ? They are just proposing 100,000 rupees for limiting to one baby. or some minor economic disincentives for more than 2 babies, on top of which are already there in practice and naturally for even 1 baby. By your logic, if we needed more babies you would stop educating women ? Education and baby making are orthogonal issues.

Educated women who have larger control of their lives tend to choose to have less children. That is how it works.

Stopping to educate women and limiting our ability to make own decisions would probably made women have less children. It would however be unethical, cruel and oppressive.

Post reply on HN