this post was submitted on 10 Sep 2024

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Unpopular Opinion

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General population decline trends in the last years is actually a good news. (self.unpopularopinion)

submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by 101 to c/unpopularopinion@lemmy.world

41 comments fedilink hide all child comments

If we really thought about it, there will be a raising amount of people who don't have a job and will not be able to get a job ever due to the decline in human labour needs, which lead to fewer jobs being offered globally which means that with fewer humans around there will be a higher chance for people to get a good job.
Humans consume resources, with less humans around there will be more resources for each humans and they will collectively consume less resources in total.

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[–] RBWells@lemmy.world 1 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I do agree. You can't run the world economy like a pyramid scheme. Not sure there are "too many people" or just technology lag, and I don't believe EVERYTHING is zero sum (we have increased efficiency in a lot of ways, and solar energy & nuclear don't seem like they use as many resources as they provide) but easier on the earth if we don't have as many.

I am not sure it's even an unpopular opinion, though.

[–] _bcron@lemmy.world 40 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

The problem isn't scarcity in resources or lack of available work, the problem is that everything is zero sum and resources wind up locked out because there are a couple hundred assholes that look at numbers on a screen like it's the only thing that validates their existence.

People are starving and can't buy houses because people like Bezos or whoever have 20,000 million dollars they'll never use sitting in some bank account they forgot about, but they need more, so they disenfranchise the class that brings them wealth.

Less jobs = better margins, but that all rests on the assumption that people absolutely must work full time and for the lowest bid

We all may as well grab shovels and bury the wealth of the Earth in a big hole in the ground because that's what happens when we inflate the worth of the wealthy. Resources just vanish into the ether

[–] MaXimus421@lemmy.world 0 points 6 days ago

Fascinating.

[–] Boomkop3@reddthat.com 22 points 1 week ago

Yo that's great! Less people.means more resources for everyone! More nature, less pollution, less density (which makes crime and such more noticeable)

...but it won't make billionaire as many billions. Unacceptable!

[–] Dead_or_Alive@lemmy.world 17 points 1 week ago

Humans don’t have a modern economic or social model for what is about to happen to most of the developed Western world as well as Russia and China.

Having a smaller cohort of young people means less consumption, fewer children being born. Before you get your dander up screaming about how great that is for the environment. Just remember that fewer young people means the pace of technological change is likely to slow down, there will be fewer young people to support a larger elderly population which will likely mean higher taxes and yet fewer children.

Japan has been going through this process for years. However they were a single developed country in a sea of developed countries that had rising working aged populations. They offshored production to countries with labor pools and were able to position themselves very well because of that. That is not the scenario the rest of the developed world will face.

The world will likely be a very different place in 20 years. Nations historically held together with ethnic majorities that have passed the point of no return to repopulate may no longer exist in that span of time.

[–] Solumbran@lemmy.world 15 points 1 week ago

Humans don't need a job to survive.

[–] booly@sh.itjust.works 14 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Humans consume resources, with less humans around there will be more resources for each humans and they will collectively consume less resources in total.

This is where you get it wrong, because you haven't actually thought about how much more one human can consume compared to another, and the actual lived reality that households with children tend to consume less than childless households.

We're not living subsistence lifestyles. There are many of us who travel for leisure by airplane, waste more food than is necessary to keep a person fed, throw away or consume more physical goods or energy than we need, create way more pollution, etc.

Rich societies tend to have fewer kids and consume way more resources and emit more pollution. The billions of people in Asia contribute less to our pollution than the comparably smaller population of Western Europe and North America. The relationship between population and environmental impact is broken because one rich Westerner can consume more than literally ten thousand poor Asians.

[–] shyguyblue@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Households with kids tend to consume less!?

Say anything you want, i stopped listening after that nugget of stupid.

[–] SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works 13 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's funny, I noticed the implied "per person" in that statement because it is kind of obvious.

[+] shyguyblue@lemmy.world -7 points 1 week ago (1 children)

When the child develops a personality, I'll buy that it counts as a person. You might as well include dogs as people, they are about as useful.

If two adults consume 20 amount of product, and the child consumed 5, then yes, per person the amount is less per individual. But when your talking about a thing that just sits there and consumes resources, yeah that's disingenuous math. The child will eventually grow into an adult, but if we're talking resources vs ability to provide, households with children will always consume more than without. Look at how fast those things go through diapers, and tell me the single couple is throwing that much trash away every week.

[–] booly@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Look at how fast those things go through diapers, and tell me the single couple is throwing that much trash away every week.

Are you counting the trash generated by the fact that the DINK couple can afford to go out to eat dinner at restaurants 5 times a week, and travel by plane 4-5 times per year?

You're thinking about human resource consumption as if it's a bell curve, where most are within an order of magnitude as everyone else.

But that's not the case. The wealthy consume literally thousands of times more than the poor, and income/wealth is negatively correlated with fertility, so it can be the case that a single childless millionaire consumes more resources than a dozen 4-person households.

So when comparing the countries where the birth rates have actually fallen below replacement, and where their populations are on the cusp of shrinking, you'll see that as they have fewer children their consumption still goes up exponentially even when their population doesn't.

Taking away scarcity by making fewer people compete for those resources doesn't actually change the aggregate amount of resources consumed. People are perfectly capable of increasing their demand several orders of magnitude if there's less competition snatching up those resources first.

[–] shyguyblue@lemmy.world 0 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Dear God, who are you friends with?!

eat at restaurants 5 times a week

?!?!? Who the fuck can afford that?

Travel by plane 5 times a year

I'm not sure who these magically able to take vacations people are, but people with kids travel by plane too...

[–] booly@sh.itjust.works 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Who the fuck can afford that?

The fact that you struggle to imagine that these people exist in large quantities tells me that you haven't actually fully understood the power distribution of who is consuming how much.

On CO2 emissions, the top 10% emit about 48% of the CO2. The top 10% of Americans (where the cutoff is about $135k) produce about 55 tonnes of CO2 per capita per year, and they have low birth rates.

people with kids travel by plane too

Yes, but paradoxically having more children makes households consume fewer passenger miles at any given budget, because traveling with children is slow and less enjoyable, and their tickets are just as expensive. So the DINK couple with the $200k budget can fly for vacations and even weekend getaways once every few months (4-8 times per year), but after having kids might only fly on one trip per year. Even with two kids, doubling the number of people in their household, they might be looking at half the passenger miles by taking 1/4 as many trips.

And if eating all the meat in the world and throwing food in the trash and using disposable diapers doesn't compare at all to the consumption involved in traveling out of town by plane, then adding up all the day-to-day stuff the family is doing with kids won't compare to the jet setting couple with the same budget.

Throw in the fact that the people who have the $200k+ budgets are less likely to have kids, and you have the correlation where consumption is negatively correlated with fertility/household size.

[–] shyguyblue@lemmy.world 0 points 6 days ago (1 children)

You seem to be having two completely different arguments.

People with kids = poor, consume less

People without kids = rich, party all the time

You keep going back to the plane thing. Every childless couple doesn't automatically make them a jet setter?

[–] booly@sh.itjust.works 2 points 6 days ago

You're talking about the bottom 90% of the world and I'm saying that they don't consume as much as the top 10%, so I'm focusing mainly on the top 10%. If we're going to discuss resource consumption, the people we talk about should be weighted by the resources they consume. And by that metric, the global rich consume much more, and have fewer children, than the global poor. Therefore, it's easy to point out that reducing birth rates won't actually do much to reduce consumption, because the people who have kids aren't doing much of the consuming.

The jet fuel is just an example of that general correlation, and one of several mechanisms why the childless tend to consume much more. You can argue "oh but all else being equal more mouths equals more resources" but I'm saying that all else isn't even close to equal, so you should engage with the patterns as they actually exist in the world rather than a hypothetical where everyone is equal.

[–] dwemthy@lemdro.id 2 points 1 week ago

Doesn't read past headlines

[–] GBU_28@lemm.ee 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Yes but the countries expecting or experiencing population decline are high consumption countries, largely.

[–] booly@sh.itjust.works 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's my point. The correlation already runs the other way. As those countries start to see shrinking populations, they'll also continue to consume greater amounts per capita, offsetting the population decrease.

China and South Korea are starting to shrink. Do we really believe that their pollution and resource consumption are going to go down in the next 10 years?

And it doesn't really matter whether we're talking causation in one direction or another, or a spurious correlation with some other confounding factors. The fact is, the highest consumption populations tend to have the lowest birth rates, and vice versa, so why would we expect dwindling births to reduce consumption?

[–] GBU_28@lemm.ee 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Well if the goal is the fewest number of humans, all living good lives, with ecological impact low enough to not worsen the planet over time, we should be happy that the humans who are forecasted to not exist are of the variety that are high consumers/polluters.

This is not a eugenics comment. I'm not suggesting anyone is invalid or should be removed, but we are instead discussing births that simply don't happen.

[–] Hacksaw@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Yes, but what I think he's saying is that so far the deceased birth rate coincides with drastically increased consumption per capita. Therefore the decrease in birthrate may have no to negative short and medium term effect on total consumption/pollution.

[–] GBU_28@lemm.ee 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Right but our goal should be some hypothetical 100000 people who all live incredible, careless, needless, yet fulfilled lives (number is a joke, pick any you like). But to get there, it's gonna take a while. Generations.

I'd rather focus on raising up the lowest into a tier of stability, health, basics, etc. And rely on the upper group of consumers diminishing.

Wondering about short term gains on something like this is silly.

[–] booly@sh.itjust.works 2 points 6 days ago (1 children)

I'd rather focus on raising up the lowest into a tier of stability

What you're describing, then, has nothing to do with birth rates. That's what I'm saying in this thread: reduced birth rates won't fix the problem of runaway consumption and emerging scarcity.

[–] GBU_28@lemm.ee 1 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Reduce birthrates A LOT (via non eugenic methods, I'm not playing with that), and prefer to remove (again, via absence) the most consumptive.

Give it a few hundred years and baby, you got a stew goin.

[–] booly@sh.itjust.works 1 points 6 days ago (1 children)

I'm saying that you can reduce birthrates a lot and it won't make much of a difference, because you can't go below zero and the rich/high consumption countries are already low.

If your goal is to reduce net consumption, then reduce consumption (or replenish consumed resources through increased production or restoration/replenishment of what is consumed). Preventing births itself won't meaningfully move the needle.

[–] GBU_28@lemm.ee 1 points 6 days ago

Over a few generations reducing birthday near zero would absolutely love the needle.

I think we generally agree, I'm just focused on a wider time span

[–] cyborganism@lemmy.ca 11 points 1 week ago

The world population was approximately 4 billion people in 1974. Today it has roughly doubled since then.

Source: https://ourworldindata.org/population-growth-over-time

I agree with you, OP. We need a decrease in population.

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Also look at Detroit as an example. One of the reasons they’ve found it tough to rebound is so much Infrastucture for a much bigger population, they can no longer afford to maintain. Nor is it affordable to “downsize” the city. And of course the worst hazards are on the downsize list

[–] Xenny@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

If the infinite labor babies stop flowing the infinite capital generation stops too. Can't have that for some reason

[–] minibyte@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I just realized we need to protect farmersonly.com. If anyone should have kids and pass on their knowledge it’s farmers.

[–] booly@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

What if I told you that knowledge can be passed on to people who aren't your biological descendants?

[–] minibyte@sh.itjust.works 0 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

To pass the knowledge of that exact plot of land and the impact climate change has had on it leading to a shift in growing method, and the thoughts behind the corrections – that would take Dr. Watson or a Vlog maybe.

[–] NafiTheBear@pawb.social 4 points 1 week ago

I recently watched downsizing, whose main topic was overpopulation and I remember a time where there were some papers on that the earth will soon be overcrowded and I'm very happy that this simply won't be an issue for us in the future anymore.

[–] 31337@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 week ago

Not sure I agree that there will be less human labor "need." Ideally, we should strive for progress, and not just survive. I think there is infinite use for human labor.

I agree with your second point.

[–] Nytefyre@kbin.melroy.org 1 points 1 week ago

All I'm thinking about higher population is that - man, graveyards are going to be so packed up to the brim even more so than they are now. Oh and the landfills.

...Get used to this planet while you can people.

[–] HubertManne@moist.catsweat.com 0 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Massive downvote from me on this one.

[–] SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

So you don't think it's worth talking about, or you don't like how it's stated? Or are you using votes simply to mark agreement? If it's the last method, that cheapens lemmy.

[–] HubertManne@moist.catsweat.com 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

um you get how unpopular opinion works yea? you are supposed to vote if its unpopular or not. Its a bit tongue in cheeck when I announce my vote but this particular place to post expects people to vote. My downvote im saying I agree which means its less likely to appear as an unpopular opinion.

[–] SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works 1 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Thanks for clarifying, I didn't know that subrule, thought all votes were just for relevance or quality.

[–] HubertManne@moist.catsweat.com 1 points 6 days ago

im actually a bit wrong as I look at this sidebar. im not sure if its changed or if there are several of these aping the reddit one. This one says to vote your opinion on what you think the general opinion people have on the issue which I actually do not like as I like the straw poll element if people vote their personal view oppositely. I should not have voted as I was doing the opposite of my personal view so imma takin it out.

[–] higgsboson@dubvee.org 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

...Because you think it is NOT an unpopular opinion? It sure seems unpopular, judging by the comments.

[–] HubertManne@moist.catsweat.com 1 points 1 week ago

nope. people are supposed to vote based on what they believe and the votes decide if its popular or unpopular. im downvoting to agree and if enough others do then it won't come up high in the unpopular opinion ranking.