By Fareed Zakaria
I was pained recently to read the tragic story of China's Feng Jianmei. She was seven months pregnant. But she already had one child. So, local officials forced her to abort. The story could have ended there - another loss, another sad story. But Feng's relatives posted graphic images of her fetus on the internet. The pictures went viral, forcing government officials to apologize.
The story led to a government-affiliated think tank calling for change. Writing in the China Economic Times, it suggested Beijing should switch to a two-child policy.
Even a few years ago, it would have taken a very brave Chinese thinker to pose that question in public. Now, there is public discussion about China's one-child policy. Could it actually change?
When the one-child rule was first introduced in 1979, China's leaders were reacting to an unprecedented population boom - from 540 million to 960 million people in just under 30 years. And this was happening while China was one of the poorest countries in the world, with little prospect of economic growth. With certain exceptions, the policy was meant to restrict married, urban couples to having only one child. Officials sometimes resorted to extreme measures to implement the rules.
But do they make sense any more? Leaving aside the immoral practice of forced abortions, China is facing a demographic disaster.
China is going to get old before it gets rich. Right now, only 8.9% of Chinese are over the age of 65. Compare that to the American ratio of about 13%. But come 2050, China's percentage of elderly people will overtake that of America's, rising to 26%, which is more than Japan's right now.
Consider the median age over time in China. It's gone from 22 in 1980, rising steadily upwards to 35 now - roughly the figure for a rich country like America, not a developing society like China. But continue the projection until 2050 and the numbers get more troubling for Beijing. While the U.S. will have a median age of 40, China's will be closer to 50. So, half of all Chinese will be over the age of 50.
The implications are immense. China's workforce will shrink - it will no longer be the world's factory. All those older people will need to be supported - by their families or by the state. And China will likely need to import workers instead of exporting them - and China is not exactly an immigrant-friendly society. Societies with fewer young people become less dynamic, less risk-taking and less adventurous.
There's one more thing. China's one-child policy has been especially brutal on women. By one account, there are 123 male children for every 100 females under the age of 4. Imagine what happens when they grow up. Too many men, not enough potential spouses. And remember, countries with male youth bulges have historically seen civil wars and revolutions - from Algeria in the 1970s to the Arab Spring now.
Chinese officials claim the one child policy has prevented the births of 400 million children. They point to it as one of the reasons why the state has been able to lift millions out of poverty. That may be so, but the policy is now a burden, not a benefit.
The rules have been relaxed in some ways, but no formal reversal is possible until Beijing's next set of leaders assume power next year. Even then, it will take much courage. This is actually a fascinating real life example of the problems with centralized authoritarian regimes, even when they're as well run as China's. When they make good decisions - on economic policy, for example - they are rapidly implemented and well-executed. But the same is true when they make a bad decision, or a decision that no longer makes much sense. That seems to be the case with the one-child policy.
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It is not fair to tell me how many children I should have!!! This is a simple common sense!
@ Fahad – you are correct – except a VAST majority of this world DOES NOT have common sense...they keep breeding more and more, then suddenly they can't support those children and who does it fall on to support them? Every other tax payer....
Fahad, your right and ofcourse guess who picks up the over flow? USA and Canada.
Many Chinese do support this one-child policy and enjoy the individual benefits it brings. When they look at India – out of myopic point of view – they do believe they're better off. Fareed toke a look at the one-child policy at the macroeconomic level and the impact it has on the demographic development.
'A VAST majority of this world DOES NOT
'A VAST maajority of this world DOES NOT have common sense'? But fortunately the USA has been blessed with common sense? How proud we should be! Why can't the rest of the world be just like us! The least China could do would be to let the USA take control of their internal affairs. We may not manage our own so good but we certainly could manage theirs if they had sense enough to let us take over. Our Secretary of State could be the leader, she could also instruct Chinese women how to deal with unfaithful husbands. Of course this would be to do nothing if it would be of future personal political benefit to do nothing.
Yes, it is. Most people have a logical number of children. 2-3. And this is fine, because those will replace their parents in the workforce as they get older.
Here's the problem. If EVERY person has 2-3, the population exponentially doubles with every generation. The world already has problems with needing jobs, food, clean water, etc.
In a country like china, whose population is enormously large, continues to exponentially grow... well it will lead to ONE outcome. War. It is inevitable, like the tide. History proves this, over and over and over again. Responsible breeding and a major ethics overhaul are the only way to change this, regardless of location.
People should not be allowed to throw around the word "exponentially". Talk about irresponsibility....
If everyone has 2 kids the population stays the same. It takes 2 parents to make 1 child.
"exponentially double" reveals your ignorance. I support the one-child policy and I also support common sense. What may be good for macroeconomics is not necessarily good for our environment. This includes things like housing availability, the availability of jobs and the crush of people that increasingly populate our world. Robbing Peter to pay Paul is a short-sighted strategy to ameliorate future economic problems.
Tony, that is only true if the 2-3 children do not breed while their grandparents are still living.
Actually, I read a while ago it's required to have 3 children to maintain a stable population since it factors in other untimely deaths to the population.
Tony, that's only true if every *couple* only has two children. If every *person* has two children, that's a four child *family*.
Can you give birth to children by yourself?
'Everyone' having 2-3 children equals 'Every Couple' having 4-6 children.
Even in India the average family probably do not have that many children.
check your fact math
It takes two people to have a child, so each child is shared with both its parents. So if *each person* has 2-3, that's really 2-3 per *couple*, which does not double the population. In fact, it pretty much keeps population steady as long as enough people choose not to have children at all. The biggest problem with procreation in the world is when parents have more children than they can afford or take care of, whether that's one or five or twenty. Those children then grow up to be burdens on society. Educate women so they have careers and other things to do other than childbearing, and provide access to affordable birth control, and the population boom problem solves itself.
Even in these times of medical marvels most men aren't able to bear even one child, much less two or three. A birthrate of 2.1 children/female is generally cited as the replacement rate for a stable population. So yes, if the men also have a birthrate of 2.1 children, the population will double every generation!
I doubt this will happen
Tony -
You are completely wrong. Let's say my wife and I have 2 children. When they are 20 years old, they each have two children. When they are 20, they all have two children. I am likely still alive. Does this make sense to you? That's why they call it 'exponential growth'. Take a course in differential equations and see what I mean. The population growth is proportional to the current population.
@really
Let's say my wife and I have 2 children.
This would leave you with essentially one child to replace each of you in the future.
When they are 20 years old, they each have two children.
This would leave them to essentially have one child to replace them and their partners.
When they are 20, they all have two children.
Again one child to replace them and their partners.
I am likely still alive. Does this make sense to you? That's why they call it 'exponential growth'. Take a course in differential equations and see what I mean. The population growth is proportional to the current population.
What you are not factoring in is some of these offspring will not make it to an age where they can have two children, if they have children at all. That is why everyone needs more than 2 children to keep the population stable or to increase. Two children a couple/person will not result in growth, but decline.
Don't you just love Americans trying to do math and failing miserably...it's so quaint.
Caihlyn
Dont you just love when muslims think that no one will see them to post poisonous rants?
get your maths right moron
It isn't fair, but if we keep going down the same road then the world is going to become so overpopulated that it is no longer sustainable (it's already pretty bad now!) In the end though, what's more fair? Having as many kids as you want and having them grow up to find that there is no job for them or appropriate place for them to live or healthy food for them to eat (because farmers won't be able to keep up with the expanding growth), or having a limited amount of children and having them grow up to find a place for them in society? Common sense tells us it isn't fair, but in the long run it is the far lesser of two evils.
The Chinese have already outgrown their trousers already, its typical that they would want an even bigger piece of the pie.
This is an excellent justification for teaching and promoting responsible family planning, and a very poor justification for a rigid one-child policy or for forced abortions.
Birth restrictions are fair when they are warranted just as it's fair to restrict each family member to only a share of each meal rather than one person gobbling it all up. Don't you think? People have not behaved responsibly and the maxim: "Just because you can doesn't mean you should" is widely ignored. Lots of supposedly educated people in the USA have > 2 kids. Why? They want them and they never think of the future. They are selfish parents who want everything for themselves. There already aren't enough jobs and yet people here still have > 2 kids. What on Earth are they thinking for their kids' futures?
Everyone should only be allowed to have one child. At least until we get our population under control. We are overpopulating and until we figure out how to live without killing the planet we should not be breeding as much as we are.
Ari – I'm with you! It's not just China that needs to reduce population. Most of the world should. Look at the problems with fish catches as an example of how we are beyond the carrying capacity of the world.
As the article points out, one-child-per-family creates a problem with the distribution of ages. But we can hopefully get by that via working longer and automation. At least it's likely to solve the unemployment problem. For countries that don't have as much of a problem the reduction can be slower – 1.5 or 1.7 children per family. And some countries are already there – Italy and Russia for example. These are often described as problems, but they should be celebrated.
The average size of a muslim family is 8 children and that is counting only the first wife.
Educated people are not the problem, even the ones with more than two children. The average number of children among highly educated people is much lower than that among the poor and uneducated. The poor and uneducated have nothing better to do other than give birth to children they can neither afford nor properly provide for (including education). Educated and wealthy people should have *more* children, because those children will grow up to be productive members of society that will help create a sustainable world. It is poor and uneducated people whose procreation needs to be curbed in order to solve the overpopulation problem. Allowing them to breed willy-nilly and then forcing educated people to take care of those brats while not being allowed to have their own children is both unfair and unsustainable.
An what does common sense tell you? Was any thought given that even though people are living longer, they actually consume an increased amount of time and resources to care for as they age? When you consider the additional time, medication and resources needed to care for our definition of 'the elderly', 2 kids born today can literally consume twice as many resources in their lifetime than 2 kids born 40 years ago. I'm not saying we kill off the elderly. I am saying that even 'common sense' doesn't cover it. Even i f you can "feed 'em" after you "breed 'em", long after you are dead and gone, your children will be consuming more and more resources to maintain the life you gave them.
This article is incomplete. There is a "penalty" of 40,000 RMB (roughly $6,000USD) if you have a second child. So basically, if you're well-off in China and can afford the penalty (and hence to pay for raising your own 2nd child), then you can have more than one, which makes sense.
It's simple and should be implemented in the states too. Stop the welfare babies and the burden on taxpayers.
and i suppose your next suggestion would be to forcibly terminate pregnancies for women who cannot afford to pay the fine?
Or maybe we should force women to take birth control pills until they are able to receive a "birth permit" which allows them to come off the pill until they have a child, then women can go back on the pill or maybe have a forced sterilization unless they can pre-pay the "fine" for the next child.
Not if we pick up the overflow, and you bank on that.
The penalty for an unauthorized birth varies by province, but I am told in Guangdong it is 8 times your annual income.
This is one reason the policy will be difficult to change- it is a major source of revenue for local governments.
BTW, there are many loopholes to the policy. Most Chinese can have a second child if they choose without paying a fine. In the urban east, most choose not to.
Billybart – for egregious offenders maybe abortion is the answer. But up to a point it would probably work to just severely fine, or else adopt the kid out to somebody who can't have their own.
Don't you see the blatant hypocrisy? I can abort a life if it suits me. We can abort lives in mass if it serves the masses in the end. The resulting dilemma comes from the 'ethics of me' and what I can get. Some of us may live to see the end result of a world centered on policies based on statistical returns on investment, not based on the value of people, but based on how comfortable I will be in retirement.
Agreed. I think another more important factor is that the one-child policy prevents a majority of people from having siblings. While family is extremely important in traditional Chinese culture, it is ironic that the CCP is starting to get in the way of those traditions.
However when you said studies show countries with a higher percentage of men have civil wars and revolutions, I think that's a false generalization. Countries go through Civil War and revolution not because of testosterone levels, but because the country is in need of change and there is possibly disunity between the common people of the nation. China went through a civil war and a revolution both before WWII.
There is a huge necessity for revolution in China today (clearly), but its the government people should bash on, not the common population of mainland China. Without support from HK or Taiwan it will be difficult for China to change its policies as everyone wishes.
Peace
Frankly I wish they did this in the US.
We are taxing the planet's ability to sustain us.
If people can not be responsible and think of those that come after them, then their virus like reproductive behavior needs to be curtailed.
Not looking forward to drought, famine, and disease in the planet's future – and the WARS they start – because a bunch of dullards never learned what birth control was.
Without immigration, US is a Disneyland with aging population. American youth do not produce but kill unborn babies.
Amato – as the article shows, an "aging population" is a consequence of a trend toward reduced population. Humanity has gone for thousands of years on a population growth trend that cannot continue to be sustained. So a change is going to seem "wrong", but still necessary.
If we got the population down to level the earth could comfortably sustain on a long term basis, then there can be a change to one-child-per-person or two-children-per-couple. Of course none of use will see that time – it's several generations away. At that time kids can commonly have siblings again.
Exactly, "a bunch of dullards." That's what we get when people who "know better" don't breed. Then the ONLY people making babies are the ones that can't afford them, and have nothing to contribute to society, and so those babies grow up and are burdens rather than blessings. People who can afford children and would make good parents should be allowed – even encouraged – to have as many children as they want. The average number they want is probably around two, and a bunch don't want kids at all. If you start by discouraging educated people from having children, then nobody's going to be left to educate the unwashed masses.
@Fahaq: Does 1.2 Billion with limited resources ring a bell for you? Can you imagine what will happen if the lid is taken off? Yes, it is sad when you are forced to abort and it is nice to have choice but as a society, as is the case with China, they have reached the outskirt of their limits. More people means more resource. Where are they going to get it? They can't invade and take over peaceful easy countries like Tibet, Mongolia, and East Turkestan anymore. Shortage of food and resources will inevitably lead to war within itself and its neighbors. Right now, they already have a major problem with China reallocating major rivers from Tibet to China, when it naturally use to flow down to the other asian countries like India, Bangladesh, Pakistan etc. They have built unprecedented mega dams on these arteries which they deny but is found out to be true with satellite pictures.
China actually needs to reduce its population if it means to maximize its resources and happiness. 1.2 Billion is way too much for one country. That goes for India too by the way.
Not just china. China is just the first to actually start taking responsible action. India and Pakistan are both far more guilty of rampant over population. the over population they are contributng to is unforgivable, and other nations should simply close their doors on them. stop the over flow from india from pouring out onto other countries and make them deal with it themselves.
I agree China should continue with the one child policy and so should the rest of the world. All these articles always mention the older population and their drain when they get to retirement age but never stop to think once that older generation dies off you'll be left with a well balanced population of young and old and more resources and more jobs for the young.
What is happening in china cannot happen in India. India is a democracy and cannot impose sanctions on its people. moreover, compare the per capita consumption of resources and emitter of green house gases, India stands the least in the developed and developing nations. An average american and European must stop consuming lot of energy and get off from their government's support and go to work. there is a whole lot of different world on the other side of the ocean, you need to be there to know about it. Just watching the news about a country's people you cannot talk about the entire nation. For a country that was( is )built on immigration, us always had a choice of restricting the people. Whereas India and china cannot do this as they are one of the oldest civilization and enjoyed prosperity until the westeners conquered it.
The world is over populated and the impact of anyone having more than one child will be felt by everyone. You're actions will have effects upon other people. That includes the action of having excessive numbers of children. When we all live in a finite world with finite resources that must be shared, then other people have every right to tell you how many children you may have.
You're actions afect other people and they have a right to tell you what actions they are willing to accept from you.
But the overflow of people from India are the best brains. What are you complaining about? While our kids are growing up as party crowd, kids from these countries are taking the lead. Name it. Spelling bees, science fairs etc. In India people have lot of freedom to choose and do what they like. Naturally majority of the couples have come down to having two children in the current times. People might as well eat less and be free men rather than have all materialistic comforts and not be free to make choices.
The very concept of violently forcing your will on another person is appalling, and population control is the apex of that train of thought. As technology gets better and as education gets better throughout the world, then the natural trend will be to reduce population.
Sean, it's a nice thought but there's no way population reduction will happen naturally or gradually. We haven't time for that. The drought's already here, Climate Change is already working its way on our environment and we're already going to have to deal with the outcome of the changes, whatever they may be: famine, disease and death.
'The 21st Century is when everything changes. You have to be ready.' Captain Jack Harkness, TORCHWOOD.
IF YOU CAN'T CARE FOR THEM ?? IS RIGHT. CHINA IS OVER POPULATED, THEY DO NOT NEED MORE PEOPLE.. I SUPPORT CHINA ONE KID PER FAMILY....SOMALIA--POOR AFRICANS SHOULD ALSO BE FORCE TO ONLY ONE KID..THEY CAN'T TAKE CARE OF THEIR KIDS.
Its common sense that the world can only hold so many people. I pretty much think you are a moron. Sometimes common sense is making the choice that doesn't make everyone happy, but keeps the world from having a billion starving children.
Learn how to be a responsible citizen!!
Actually, 'one-child policy' applies only to couples if one or both of them has sibliings. If both husband and wife are the only child in their respective families, they are allowed to have two children. The problem is that not every couple is able to give birth. And living cost, especially cost of good education for children and housing cost, has exceeded the payroll of many yound couples.
Fahad, don't pretend that you know everything
I agree with you I dont want my governement telling me what to do. The problem isnt about money or taxes but how is the earth itself going to support people in the future. By 2050 we will need additional farmland the size of brazil just to be able to feed everybody. Unless there is war, famine, disease, or new technological innovation we are all screwed.
Not fair? Why should you be allowed to have 12 children to use up resources? If population trends continue in the manner they are, eventually we won't have enough food to go around. So why can't you have as many kids as you want? Because the rest of the population still exists. Call it social responsibility. The rest of society does not benefit from you having double digit kids.
"Eventually"? There are large areas of the world today where people don't have sufficient food. Nor access to safe drinking water. The ability of the earth to sustain the current population is already exceeded. Only partly because of the population, it is true. The other part is the egregious overconsumption of the well-to-do.
I do believe, though, that this is a self-correcting problem. Widespread environmental degradation has already reduced human fertility, and thus the birthrate, to go along with the lower birthrate selected by those with other things to do than raise large numbers of children. Unfortunately, the overpopulation that is reducing the birthrate is also increasing the misery index.
@Frank Maunder: But not enough. Radical measures will be necessary with this 7 billion population. There are more humans than rats on the planet now. We're more numerous than vermin. Think about that.
Do you want more Chinese in this planet? I think we have more than enough. Stop whining, this is not your problem, use your common sense.
When you live in a country controlled by Communism, where the government owns everything and cannot feed the people currently living there, they then have to also control the population.
It has nothing to do with common sense. it has everything to do with their governments control over their citizens.
and this country (China), who supports Child endangerment by slave labor, and has a horrendous record of human rights is Americas largest trade partner.
Can anyone say Hypocrite? Yea, our values in this country suck.
Control over citizens!
Hey, you just described Islam.
Good for you!
Unfortunately when this earth runs out of food supplies (and that's coming sooner than you think), you'll be glad someone had a sense of reality.
If the world runs out of supplies, it's because of GMO's that are controlled by big companies looking for $$$. if you take a look at the globe and how much water and land there is that is not used, you will see that there is plenty of it. lets not forget that water used is not water"gone" agricultural water gets "recycled and goes back into the ecosystem.
r u kidding me on overpopulation? do you know how much inhabited land there is in this world. just b/c majority of people live in big cities does not mean the world in overpopulating. if the population was more spread out through the earth, we woudn't be having this discussion
It would be worse. Then we would populate every corner of the planet, leaving no room for other life. You know, trees, etc..those pesky things that pretty much produce oxygen for us?
The planet is already telling all of us there are too many people straining its resources. With drought across US in records numbers, food resources will be strained.
You think family size is a civil right? Watch what happens in the next 20 years over water and food. Somalia's a good example. Do you think they have turned to pirating as a country because it's fun? Years of drought and crop failure came first.
Why do you believe that it's 'fair' to overpopulate the planet?
A common sense of being selfish,greedy and barbaric mentality' An idea being a communist mongoloid satanic policy"
Common sense?? Apparently, you don't know what common sense truly is. It is not common sense to allow the whole worlds population to boom like it has, thus causing the dirtying of the planet. It is NOT common sense, and IS immoral to allow something like childbearing to be allowed indiscriminately, causing suffering for children at the hands of people who CAN'T support them, and have no business even having them at all. Everything else is licensed and regulated, but something as important as raising the next generation of humanity shouldn't be?
How is forcing this woman to have an abortion wrong, JUST because she didn't want to abort? Especially if the population can't sustain more kids? It is for the betterment of the society. The U.S will soon basically be forcing, or at least, STRONGLY persuading it's citizens to purchase health care for the betterment of society. There are many incidents where folks are FORCED by authorities concerning property and even their own bodies to do things they don't want to do. Jail, drugs, taxes, you name it.
There is never a good time to kill a baby, but if it NEEDS to be done, then the best time to do it is when the child is in an extremely immature state, like early pregnancy.
Um, seven months is not early pregnancy you dope.
Yes, that is exactly right. This was a baby with hands, feet, and felt pain. Could have been sucking his thumb. This is so sick I could cry and ANYBODY who thinks this was ok will reach the gates of hell someday. . I have two cousins that survived birth at this age. All birth control methods can fail no matter how well you stick to them. She didn't even get the option to adopt the child out. This is a tragedy that I believe will not go unpunished in the end.
I think it is common sense that government has to tell people you can only have so many kids. I think the U.S. needs policies due to low educated kids. If your income can not support 5 kids why did you have them or if you were into drugs why should you have a kid. To me if the rich,smart people, middle class on average have 2 kids. The drug addicts, poor ppl, and not so smart ppl have average of 5 kids. Then in 20 years we as a nation will be over run with retards.. nevermind already happened
I'd love to see this policy all over the world. How dumb is it too have so many people you can't feed them – yes that is coming down the road. We don't need more people we need smarter people.
"How dumb is it too have so many people you can't feed them – yes that is coming down the road. We don't need more people we need smarter people."
Coming down the road? Its been happening for a long time.
Brilliant, a world with nothing but old people who can't feed or take care of themselves. You should run for office with bad ideas like that. Hey while your at it why not put everyone into camps to control them.
There will only be a large amount of old people until...they die, then there will be a large amount of young, then it will balance out.
This goal is already accomplished in the entire first world except America which has a huge and growing immigrant population. Most of Europe and the Pacific rim has birthrates way below replacement levels.
PAT , THANK YOU, MY POINT TO......LOOK AT SOMALIA-SOUTH AFRICA BLACKS......AMERICA SHOULD BE SENDING THEM CONDOMS AND BIRTH CONTROL PILLS.. A GOOD REASON WHY AMERICA NEEDS TO CLOSE OUR IMMIGRATION DOORS FOR GOOD.. EVERY POOR PERSON IN THE WORLD WANTS TO COME TO AMERICA TO RUIN OUR COUNTRY LIKE THEY DID THEIRS..
THERE ARE MANY POOR PEOPLE IN AMERICA SHOULD HAVE ONLY ONE KID...LOOK AT THE WELFARE FAMILIES. I REST MY CASE.
You can send third world countries condoms and birth control, but you can't make third world countries use them.
We were, Jose, and then Bush cancelled the program. How stupid was that? It had something to do with that abstinence crapola. As if that could help stop them passing the HIV virus back and forth.
I AGREE WITH YOU. ONE KID PER PERSON IF YOU ARE POOR AND CAN'T CARE FOR THEM. THOSE WHO CAN TAKE CARE OF MORE THAN ONE KID WITH OUT WELFARE ? SHOULD HAVE MORE.
Jose,
It appears that your CAPS LOCK key is stuck on.
JustMe
Just what you would expect from an Apple IIE keyboard?
I'd love to see this policy all over the world. How dumb is it too have so many people you can't feed them – yes, that is coming down the road. We don't need more people we need smarter people.
don't know why my post came up twice??
Because it was so stupid it needed repeating. Your arguements are the same bad arguements and not matter how often they get disproven someone like you will continue to repeat it.
May be CNN needs a one post policy.
I KNOW WHY . COMMENT PENDING APPROVAL.
I think a more interesting development is that China is mostly ethnic Han. The children from this decision are now in their late 20s and 30s. Since this cohort is heavily male it seems that they will go to neighboring countries (PI, Vietnam, Korea) to look for foreign wives. This will mean that in another 20-30 yrs there will be a huge cohort of mixed race and mixed cultural in China. This mixed cohort, I believe, will have an even larger impact on China.
Population problem? We have enough room on this Earth. Spread out!
room is not the problem r3terd....resources are.
We have enough room for now (sure... if you destroy parks and protected areas, thereby destroying the other species on this planet), but the real problem is sustainability.
FIne. Go live in a desert. Stay there. Don't come back.
Brenda, you must be one of those right to lifers. The truth is that abortion saves Americans from a policy like China's.
Maybe Brenda and her countrymen can spread out to the moon or pluto since there are room there too. 1.2 billion is way too much for a nation. In my opinion, CHina needs to keep at this until the population reaches 500 million and then slowly ease up. even 500 million is huge. India too. And all those middle east countries bend on making their religion the most followed.
BRENDA, YOU WANT TO SUPPORT THOSE FAMILIES ON WELFARE THAT CAN'T TAKE CARE OF THEIR KIDS ???? I DO NOT.
THat is the stupidest post I've seen in a long time. Spread out? I hope you are joking.
Awesome! Don't eat, drink, eliminate or breathe. BTW, that include not using oil or other resources. What about schools and hospitals? What happens when you die? (That should happen quickly, considering you aren't using air or eating or drinking water, remember?)
Where does this ridiculous idea come from? Oh, yeah, the oil industry and the Koch brothers. The maroons drink the Kool Aid and believe, because they aren't the ones who paid attention in science class or who went to college.
Critical thinking is required for the rest of us. The earth is full. Go home.
When you see complete losers like Ocotomom having over a dozen children and the State of California having to have to pay for the care of children until they are 18, our liberal laws for having children have to change. If you are poor, without a job, single why should you be allowed to have multiple children in the first place?
What do you mean that no thinkers dared to question several years ago?
Actually anyone can question as long as they are not selling multi party system.
Chinese made huge mistake by producing so many people, now they are correcting the mistake.
YOU HAVE TO PAY PRICE TO CORRECT THE MISTAKE YOU MADE.
Now, are american people willing to pay the price for their mistakes?
The later you are, the worse the problem will be, the more people will pay.
Stop being a big mouth jerk like you know how to solve the problems.
AMERICA IS ALREADY OVER POPULATED AND WE DO NOT HAVE THE GUTS TO DO WHAT CHINA IS DOING.. WE WILL BECOME DOOMED.
I suspect that you do not know this, but using ALL CAPS is considered rude on the Internet. Please type the way people type normally and do not use ALL CAPS. Thank you.
Dear author. Yours is such an ignorant view. Not enough people coming up to support an aging population?? Have you not heard of robotics? China is so low on productivity, it will vastly improve on that overtime, which will in turn compensate falling populations. Stop crying wolf already. China you must stay the course with one child policy for the good of all.
by author I meant Fareed.
I would have to have my spouse get a vasectomy after the first child. They would have to kill me before they killed a child I had carried for 7 months. I can't imagine the horror. If they have to have a 1-child rule, which I see no way around it really because there is only so many resources, everyone that has one child needs to take permanent birth control precautions so that more innocent children aren't killed.
I love how your husband will have to get a vasectomy rather than you having your tubes tied.
What is wrong with that? Vasectomies take about 20 minutes, are an outpatient procedure done under a local anesthetic, and generally have very few complications. They are also reversible.
On the other hand, a tubal ligation is very invasive, requires general anesthesia (hence, more expensive), longer healing time, and the likelihood of complications is much higher considering its invasive nature. The risk for post-operative pain is very high, and it carries a higher risk of surgical error, such as nicking bowel or bladder and turning the entire incident into a nightmare for the patient.
It sounds to me like you are trying to make this an issue of gender (woman vs man). That doesn't hold water for the above reasons, but if you still need more to convince you of why a vasectomy is a more humane option, consider this: a woman who has had to carry a child for 9 months (thus devoting herself to living for her unborn child, essentially), endure the trauma of birth, and then deal with postpartum complications and body changes has earned her right to pass on having any more scarring, invasive actions taken. It takes two to make a baby, and I for one am ready for less blame being placed on females for pregnancies and their potential problems and more responsibility put on the men who have no problem sowing their oats as they please.
Dawn, if it was a choice between your life or the fetus and you chose death then you'd be fulfilling Darwin's Law. Do you not understand that you already have a living child who needs a mother? If you do not, then your parenting instincts are poor at best.
A wise mother would survive to protect and raise the child she already has living and outside the womb. Otherwise you seem to be one of those nitwits who things a fetus is the most valuable thing in the world. If you have children, I feel sorry for them. Too bad you don't have their best interests at heart. I'm Pro Choice, BTW and I have a child, a grown son. I'd fight for your children. I fight for the best interests of all children.
Good parenting means weighing pros and cons and making choices. Sometimes it means making a choice you'd rather not take. The best choice would have been for that woman not to fall pregnant again. Second best choice, she should have had an EARLY termination. She KNEW she wasn't allowed to have that baby. She thought she could get away with breaking the rules. That never happens in China.
Correction above: you'D already have a child...etc, etc, etc.
Growth of human population on Earth is not sustainable. The size of the population is hardly sustainable. Liberalism is not sustainalble. Whatever China decides now it will hardly make any difference at the end: because no other country uses the same responsible approach. Humankind never learns: even the hard way. Not so sapience after all!
What do you mean that Liberalism is not sustainable?? It is the Conservatives that are opposed to abortions, that is not sustainable!!!
What he means is that it is liberalism that allows people the "freedom" to be dumb and have more children than they can afford to feed and raise and expect the government and taxpayers to cover the shortfall. We need survival of the fittest and personal responsibility. Have you not noticed that those who are on the lower rung of income and education levels are the ones having the most offspring. How ridiculously liberal.
Since muslim will rule the world, we should allow to have 12 chikd eac.
We shouldn't allow them any children.
The phenomenon of children “opting out” of Islam is virtually unheard of in most Muslim countries, for obvious reasons relating to the societal and cultural norms of those countries. However, for Muslim parents in the West, the threat of children choosing not to follow their religion is real. As one father struggling with this dilemma put it, “In Canada we are free to practice our faith. It’s a wonderful place to grow up as a Muslim. However, my 13- year-old son has had problems living in this great country. My son has decided Islam is not for him, that he has discovered too many flaws in the faith.” This is just one brave example of the very real challenges Muslim parents are facing in the West in regard to their children growing up with a sense of religious freedom.
It's not true that in Islam you loose your children. Certain people believe this but really it's not that straight forward. It works very similarly to here: if the mother is unfit then obviously the father gets custody but if the father is unfit (which he is by Muslim standards as he is an adulterer) then there is no reason why the kids should be sent with the sinning father who just says he is Muslim. Does he pray? Does he fast? Does he go to Friday Jumah prayers? Does he pray zakat? How is he Muslim? These are serious questions to ask. I find it ridiculous that at this point one would mention the kids staying with the fathers as this is the punishment in Islam for adultery:
As for the punishment specified in the Shari`ah for the married adulterer or adulteress, it is stoning to death.
First off, when I mentioned the losing of the kids, I was speaking of what happened to an American Muslim friend of mine. She lives in the USA. Her ex-husband, cheated on her, than later married the other woman. They had a child, and went through the courts here. He went to another country, coming back for court dates, and things. Well after 2 years of fighting, she lost her child. Most of the time her child is with her grandmother on her fathers side. This happened with two muslim people. I wanted to warn the lady, that this can happen.
As for the other lady, I am sorry, but what you are saying about your dh drinking, and so forth is against Islam. When you answer please answer with Islamic knowledge, not with what you are personally doing. In Islam all children are Muslim when they are born, it is the parents that corrupt them, by them becoming Chirstian, Jew, or anything else for that matter. This is why alot of converts to Islam use the term revert, because we are going back to our Muslim state.
Also, the original lady, knew in the beginning that she was going to be raising her children Muslim. It was not a surprise to her, and she agreed to it.
Muslim Women Have the Right to Go Outside of Her Home
Muslim women are not forbidden from going out in the community, working, or visiting relatives and female friends, if there is no objection from their guardian/husband and they are covered and behave and speak according to Islamic guidelines and, if necessary, escorted by their Mahram (a close male relative). However, a woman’s home should be the main base that she works from. Allah (SWT) instructed the wife’s of the Prophet (SAW):
"O wives of the Prophet! You are not like any other women. If you keep your duty (to Allah), then be not soft in speech, lest he is whose heart is a disease (of hypocrisy or evil desire for adultery, etc.) should be moved with desire, but speak in an honorable manner. And stay in your houses, and do not display yourselves like that of the times of ignorance, and offer prayers perfectly (Iqamat-as-Salat), and give Zakat and obey Allah and His Messenger. Allah wishes only to remove Ar-Rijs (evil deeds and sins, etc.) from you, O members of the family [of the Prophet (SAW)], and to purify you with a thorough purification." (Al-Ahzab 33:32-33)
While they're supposed to have those freedoms, the male relatives will sometimes behave as jailers, bodyguards and controllers. The women's lives become unbearable and they live as abused women, for that is what they are.
'...if there is no objection from their guardian/husband and they are covered and behave and speak according to Islamic guidelines and, if necessary, escorted by their Mahram (a close male relative).'
If there is she is no more than a prisoner and a 2nd class citizen, with no freedom and no pleasure. She's then a slave and a chattel with no rights and no way to escape her home or her marriage. If she's unfortunate enough to have an abusive husband she is really unfortunate because the abuse must be witnessed by other men and testified to in a court before she can be released from her marriage. Since men rarely allow other men to see this in their home, women are usually trapped when they're unhappy. Dowries must be returned in divorce so when a man wants a divorce he accuses his wife of adultery and has her killed. That way he gets to be a widow and keeps the money and the children and he gets the sympathy of the community.
The wife gets stoned to death, whether it's true or not. Often it's untrue.
To me the one child policy is an obviously liability leading to a demographic time bomb of too few working age Chinese as Mr. Zakaria points out.
I wonder however if the policy serves a more insidious purpose of reinforcing the authority and power of the state over the individual. Totalitarian societies have a difficult time granting freedoms. Once people get a taste of freedom they want more and more inviting revolt.
What the heck does it have to do with freedom?
What kind of freedom are you talking about? Forcing other people to feed your kids?
Is it fair? No. But as someone who lived in China for two years it is definetly necessary China is one of the worst countries for finding jobs(unles you have connections) many people even in beijing live in one room(see:10×10) apartmets with their familys. Rural China is like stepping into a different country. Also combine it wih the fact that 99% of chinese do not use birth control and condoms are rarely used(from what I hear) this has World Aid and famine written all over it.
It would be awfully nice if more people in the States considered limiting the size of their families. Overpopulation is the understated source of environmental and economic ills, and seeing people with three, four, SEVEN kids (santorum) makes me feel like even having one would contribute to the problem.
Besides that, with giant child tax credit, parents end up chipping in LESS than childless couples, even as we're the ones paying for all the government resources that they benefit from.
Santorum is an oddity. (in more ways than one) Statistically the wealthy are only have 1-2 children, while the poor and uneducated masses of the ghetto are having half a dozen or more.
wow!! if they do stop the abortions, all the lbiturds who support abortions are going to be devastated!!
if only u wre smrt....
I understand about overpopulation and depleted resources...sure I do...but I cannot help but feel to the depths of my heart for this mother who was forcibily made to terminate her child...a child that could have conceivably lived outside her womb had it been allowed to be born at 7 months. The Chinese government could have handled that entirely differently...such as allowing her to have the child but perhaps put it up for adoption for a childless couple. I understand there are consequences for breaking the law but to kill an innocent baby like that? No way man...no way...
No have children.
No abortion.
No birth control.
allah provide.
I agree with you from the scientific point of view. 6 months is too late to enforce their law. I would consider this a mistake on China's part as well. That is certainly a living being at 6 months. Adoption would have been the best solution here. In addition, China will do well to continue to improve education on prevention/contraception and early diagnosis of pregnancies. 7 billion people and growing on a planet with limited space. Facts become more apparent to those blinded by this once their own space reserves begin to get used up. Be wary, people of Earth!
@ OhMy
I agree the Chinese government COULD have handled it better. But the mother SHOULD have. She and her husband put themselves in this position. One could also say... that is god wanted this child born no human force could have stopped it. Someone should ask him about that next time they see him.
I have sympathy for her.
Don't knock China. They are dealing with a problem of proportions we can only sit back and discuss in the comforts of the huge swaths of open land here in America. You might not like it, but you offer nothing as a solution.
Here's what is gonna happen:
- Pressure from the men who cannot find wives will mount.
- China will start wars of conquest to take land, kill the men and carry the women off as war spoils
- To counter China's threat and dwindling Oil, USA and Canada form the Food Cartel. A barrel of oil for a bushel of Wheat.
- Mid-Eastern countries, no longer rich from Oil, are forced to sell the Oil or starve.
- China is hit with double-whammy of no Oil and no Food.
- Starvation cuts world population to 2 billion from the current 7 billion.
- All countries enact stable-population measures to ensure it doesn't happen again.
Either that, or you're looking at Gay Chinese!
@.@ What are you on?
If that's your prediction for China, seeing your reaction to 12/21/2012 should be very amusing.
WTH do you think is going to happen, genius? The Zombie Apocalypse?
Here's my prediction: the sun will rise, some people will be born, some will die. There may be an earthquake or a tsunami. There may even be a terrorist attack of some sort. The planet will continue spinning.
Look, the whole China will get old before they get rich is just another one of the western media's mantras. And you sir are a tool. There are people retiring at the age of 45! So that there's room for new employees in the company! Even with the one child policy, there are still too many workers.
Aborting at the 7 month period shouldn't be allowed, but like in every other country you can't always expect people who have power to misuse it. From a moral stand point it is wrong!
As for America's age being younger in the coming decades than China. Doesn't quality count too? The next generations of Americans are going to be the "me, me, me" and graduate with arts degrees whereas China will have many more engineers and scientists.
Last point, unlike North America elders who are wheel chair bound and on medication, few Chinese or Asian grandparents are like that, even in later years they are more productive and active, so is it really a loss?
Please bring this policy to the U.S.
The Chinese policy has led to couples and people that can not have kids to encourage the kidnap and forceful adoption of kids all over China. Perhaps, if the policy is reversed this act would seize.
This policy doesn’t remove the ability to have children. It imposes a fine (and abuse in some cases). However infertile people have been kidnapping children since the dawn of time. Maybe you should talk to jebus about why he is encouraging people to kidnap and force adoptions. What that you say… he isn’t encouraging that… people are acting of their own free will you say. Maybe…you should rethink your logic.
Tom,Tom – EVERY topic no matter what – you turn your bigotted eyes on Blaming Jesus /God for man's abuse of his own free will!
What a boring, predictable little twerp you are. Change the record there's a good lad!
@HonestyCounts
Hit a nerve huh?
If you are going to post please contribute to the topic at hand.
Btw, the Christian concept of free will is a lie. Your god made you with instincts and a flawed body and fallible mind then sets the rules against you and vanishes leaving no evidence of his existents. He clams be omnipotent and omnipresent. He knew what you would ‘decide’ before he CREATED you. That isn’t free will...you sheep, that’s baking a cake.
p.s. Your pivot and denial shows a lack of an intelligent response to your god’s actions.
Honestcounts – you are the better person.
Tom – you are a pathetic human being who needs to be locked away for a very long time.
In your religion, ISLAM, if you do not do as you are told, they kill you.
That is soooooooooooooo much better.
It would be a good policy if applied to teapublicans in America!
The reds are already out breeding the blues. We don't have to discriminate against the tea party to get the effect.
"One Child policy"? Well, it's upto that...Country, who knows how to govern and how much it could afford for its Nations.
**Here in America and Canada, where we have much fraction population-compared with China, we do have huge problems that the Governments and politicians can not afford to manage. As we all know, unemployments, gun crimes, secret ethnic clansing in Schools, workplaces, residents,...
Even the distinguished journalist Dr. Fareed Zakaria, afraid to investigate some of the secret crimes that still happening in U.S. and Canada.
As Citizens of America and Canada, our voices are kept hostaged by those who secretelly committed Cultural genocides against Christian-Ethiopian-Canadians/Americans. Since the crimes are affected most Ethiopians populations, most Jewish has been caught when they used Biological, Chemical and Radiological substances against Ethiopians in Canada and U.S.
Ironically, hundreds of Jewish organizations around North-America and beyond, did participated by committed CONSPIRACIES against Ethiopians.
Remember, the Jewish who do represent only their own people, they will never admitted whatever evils they did against others. But, when little crime about to happen against them, they send Red-Alert across the World. They ask also assistances from US.
The Jewish are the main ring-leaders of North-America and beyond.
What is an infidel? Someone who doesn't believe like you? Like me? The way I see it, we all have to look at our holy books and cross out the passages that promote hatred towards the other. To me, religion is Be Helpful to your Neighbours, if it's not Be Helpful, it's not religion, it's cult.
Since Islam was so similar to Judaism, Mohammed assumed the Jews would immediately accept this new religion. When the Jews did not live up to his expectations, he turned violently against them and many Jews died by the sword. (We are still suffering from this today; may there be peace soon.)
I wish, I better wrote good things. But, personally witnessing the reality, forced me to...............
Throughout history, religious wars have been fought in the name of different gods. The premise of the Oslo Accords was that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was not an irreconcilable religious war, but one over borders. However, the Palestinian religious leaders, all appointees of the PA political leadership, are publicly preaching that the Israel-Palestinian conflict is part of Islam's eternal religious war against the Jews. Jews are portrayed as the eternal enemies of Allah, and the killing of Jews as Allah's will. On the national level, Allah prohibits acceptance of Israel's existence and will destroy it.
No Child policy until the next 10 Centuries, must applied to jew. If they got found having a Children, punish them financially and convert their Children into Christianity.
Voluntary birth control (heck, reimburse people for a vasectomy or IUD or whatever other long term birth control) coupled with reducing the incentive to have so many children (no tax breaks, perhaps even adding an additional tax for people who choose to have more children) would go far enough to control population.
Gender selective abortions could be evened out through increasing incentives to have female children until the culture begins to value women and men equally.
Some degree of population control is essential- you just have to avoid it becoming oppressive. All countries SHOULD have a comprehensive population control program, but it needs to be voluntary, sure you can have a carrot and stick, but you can't force people to abort or be sterilized.
Nicole – All the better if voluntary methods and incentives are enough. But if not, then stronger methods are called for.
Gender selection that leads to more men than women is actually a good thing for population, so why discourage it?
As China shows, you *can* force people to abort or be sterilized. We can't in the US because there are too many voters who can't understand exponential growth.
Zakaria says a "demographic disaster" awaits due to proportionately too many elderly people and too many boys vs girls.
It is also a demographic disaster to have over a billion people and to be well on the way to 2 billion people (I'd say "and even more", but at that point starvation, lack of water and resources would step in to reduce the population level). Which was and would be the state of China without their 1 child policy.
So I guess it's a matter of which demographic disaster do you want?
Changing it to any more than 1 kid would be a far greater crime to humanity than forcing women to abort babies. This planet already has too many people, now we want that many more? It's a shame that people could care less about what is best for society because they are too busy thinking of themselves.
More countries need this law because the planet is getting over crowded and our resources are limited.
The one child policy applies only to the poor. The rich come to the U.S. to give birth to their 2nd and 3rd child. Since China doesn't have dual citizenship, the extra children born in the U.S. do not count.
Fareed's FUD is based on ONE set of projections for the year 2050.
There are an infinite number of permutations possible, particularly ones that involve historically common things like war, famine, and natural disaster, all of which radically alter any sunny-day forecasts.
Am I the only one who thinks Fareed Zakaria is a moron who thinly masks a deep hatred for America and all things western? It's noticable in the majority of his writing.
Yes and no. China's methods are draconian, but there was no real alternative. It's well known that the poorest tend to reproduce the most. When it happens in a third world country that can't social welfare, it leads to disaster. The civil wars, the famines of african nations speak of what china could be today had they not adopted drastic measures. Even just looking at India and you can see what an uncheck birth rate produces, a population the size of china with living off 1/3 of the GDP and 2/3 of the geographic area. If any country need to take action right now, it's India.
Meanwhile the Chinese government obviously can't keep up the 1 child for 2 parents forever. But if their economic record reveals anything about their planning skills, I would give them the benefit of dooubt. They probably have a plan and a time table in place already.
I hope I die before I see the world become the overpopulated and starvation-stricken slum it is destined to. China may have prevented that end, but with all the "hurr durr muh semen, muh liberty!" people I'd say they've only delayed the inevitable.
Implement a 2 kid rule: One boy. AND One girl.
That should be the Max any family should be permitted to have in ANY country without facing a very steep fine.
Mexican mothers are traditionally Catholic. When they give birth in a U.S. hospital, their children are counted both as U.S. citizens and as Christians. Factored into the nation's regeneration statistics, these children contribute an additional 0.6 to the 1.6 of other U.S. families, giving America an overall rating of 2.2 children per family. Population experts define 2.2 as a break-even point, because 2.2 is the minimal number of children per family a nation needs to sustain itself. When family size falls below that, the culture begins to die.
What does this mean? It means the only reason the United States is currently sustaining itself is because of illegal immigration from Mexico.
That is one way to look at the impact of immigration on a country
Oh, let them have as many children as they want. If/when famine and poverty becomes an issue, the poor children can be raised, and fed, to the rich – thereby solving the problem of them being a burden to the poor and becoming beneficial to the public. Jonathan Swift ("Gulliver's Travels") up with this brilliant idea "A Modest Proposal" back in 1729. And why not? The Chinese will eat anything.
All right Alex Chinese people eat all kinds of grass .and leaves of a trees they invented those leaves as teas and teas
And herbs as medicine WOW ?
Scott, it's probably just you that thinks that, Fareed may be critical of the U.S. and the West but that doesn't make him someone that hates it, rather its more like contructive criticism that he is doing. Something that most Americans have the right to and should do.
I'd much rather have someone to be able to criticize the current status quo, for there is always room for improvement, the moment that we stop doing that and start singing Nationalistic songs and ideas in the guise of "Patriotism" is when we as a nation and civilization need to take a good hard look at ourselves in the mirror and see if we have become the very enemies that we so fear.
Wow, so many Hitlers on this website
one child policy is good for China, 2 or more China can not handle.
The world needed a depopulation plan in the natural ways.
China is definitely overpopulated. From their perspective they "did what they had to do." Otherwise they would have 2 billion people right now. But the one-child policy is over 30 years old. So they essentially made a smaller generation. Which means they will be able to level off at under a billion. India in contrast already has a billion people and women have five or six kids per. So India will have two billion people in another 30 years. Hard to imagine where they are all going to fit or how they are going to get housed and fed and they can't all come here.
Also you can bet that old folks in China will continue to make themselves useful. One way or another. Not like in Greece where people expect to kick back on the dole starting at 50. Also... Fareed is trying to jump on the obvious as a revelation. Since quite soon with a couple of years only a relatively small number of childbearing women will predate the policy.
You are right many Hitlers, favor for chinas one child policy? but after 20 years no more people in china ?
Yea right, many hitlers on these website?
One child policy in china is good but not forever policy ?
To China, India, and all the people all over the planet who breed uncontrollably and selfishly, I have two words for you: Soylent Green.
There's no problem with China's one child policy. The only problem I see is how ugly and how primitive china government react when there is a violation. They kill. So unkind.
Damned if you do, and damned if you don't...at least as perceived by the Western point of view.
Even with China's carbon footprint per person being 1/5 of an American citizen, the dominate media spin is that China is the big polluter. That notion is analogous with comparing America's carbon emissions with Iceland, most people would find that patently absurd, but somehow that is an absolutely reasonable way to measure China.
Imagine another 300 million people added to China's population...seeing the massive scorn already heaped on China today even as they have made strides transitioning from a poverty stricken country to a more developed nation, imagine the condescension of Americans if China had a 1.7 billion population along with all the resultant insurmountable problems they would pose
I would say at this point, China is slowly learning that they should frankly not give a damn what America thinks.
yeah, because one thing china (and the world) needs more of is more people.
China should adapt the CO2 trading mechanism. Couples are allocated the right to having 1.5 children. Which means 0.75 child per person – so that if you divorced after already having a child, each divorcee is left with right of having another 0.25 child.
So it takes a village. A group of people could get together to share that right. May be in an extended family, a brother and his wife/husband just wants to have one child. So he and his wife/husband could share that 0.5 child with another sibling. And that way they get to carry on the family's legacy.
People could come together, good friends or blood brothers/sisters to form a fabricated family just to share birthing privileges. Especially for gay couples.
Or the privileges could be traded. I bet you a lot of couples would be willing to be paid a year's wages to forego having that 0.5 child.
And of course, you could beat those dang protesters into submission by confiscating their reproductive rights. And use the confiscated pool to reward those who help you track down and report dissidents.
Not only so, you could use your pool of reproductive rights to reward winners of X-Factor and Chinese Idols. Or Chinese Jeopardy. Isn't that great?!
You could also use the pool as awards to foreign dignitaries. Instead of being knighted by a queen, these people are given the NON-TRANSFERABLE right to reproduce say 10 children in China. Ten children, that is a very high esteemed honour. But of course, you could apply a loading factor on those awards since how many foreign dignitaries would actually want to reproduce in China?
One of the recent talks is about an overhaul in China's economy. This should happen after the transition of the country's leadership soon.
China I think has had enough of American political idiosyncracies all these years.
They have seen the messy wars started by US in foreign countries, eg. Vietnam. They saw for themselves how US airforce and military slaughtered 4 million innocent Vietnamese civilians, while 58,000 US servicemen died in that nothing achieved war. Not only was it a purposeless war, in the end North and South Vietnam are happily united, and there is no communist domino effect on the whole of Asia – like American politicians wrongly calculated.
Recent years of US non interference policy, militarily, has ensured changes are taking place withou having to carpet bomb civilians and soldiers alike.
So, I think China while not really involved in many of America's wasteful military episodes in Iraq and Afghanistan, know any US started wars will end up just like the Vietnam war – a massive waste of of American tax payers'money – and human lives.
So, I think China will continue to stand firm on its own political agendas . They will never concede to US request for censoring any country like Syria or Iran. Even if they know they should.
Because I think, China may have very little faith that anything worthwhile coming out of any American initiatives – and this is based on historical facts and past military conflicts involving America.
Finally, I suspect China will not bother too much with America in the future. China have acquired enough modern technology from the West and will innovate and improve – and do things their own way. Without the pressure from US and EU on matters like currency valuation. Enough is enough?
Now come the most unthinkable move by China – It may have to increase its population to 2 billion from 2020 to 2050.
Which means the one child policy will cease. This 2 billion will become the consumers of all products made in China.
Meanwhile China have been signing trade agreements, and friendhship treaties, with emerging countries, Africa and Asia. They are concentrating on commodities investment especially.
I think China will still play a part internationally – they will invest in other countries, even in America, earn foreign currencies to strengthen their national reserves. Just in case, USA itches for a war with them..
So, hey Hollywood, dont stop producing movies depicting Chinese as the evil gangsters, coniving drug dealers ....but before long, you wont have any audience for your movies in China.
Fareed Zakaria, before talking about China's one child policy, let's talk about India population. In the next 25 years, India will be most populated country on the earth. Let's ask Fareed, how to feed them????
How do you know that? Many things can happen to change that.
If China hadn't had the one-child policy, you'd be looking at a nation with 2 billion people instead of 1.2 billion. Those 800 million would have meant food shortages instead of food surpluses and a flood of desperate people looking for jobs in cities.China's better off with a one-child policy. Note that the forced abortion was extremely unusual. Normally families simply pay a penalty for the extra kid.
I think China plans to invest in massive farms in some Asean countries like laos and cambodia. This is inevitable. They are not going to plan for 2 billion population without taking food and water supply into consideration.
There is also their intentionI think to establish several huge agriculture farms in Australia for supplying vegetables (and meat) to China.
China will also need more reliable water supply in future. Singapore is very involved in constructing massive water plants all over China. Some are starting operation soon.
I think this is another evolution of China's policy. One which see China no longer selling vegetable and milk powder to the world like before. China is aiming for high end high tech products. Thats why their recent outer spare projects.
I am sure we will hear more about these initiatives next year.
shush! Not so loud... NYC is looking for something else to ban!
What China should do is if the first born child is a girl, the family is allowed to have another child. Their adherence to girls are worthless, or worth less than boys has led to an inequality of male/female children. Then this killing of baby girls will be slowed down.
You are very concerned about the killing of baby girls.
What about the killing of baby boys ? Oh I see, that's a woman's right to choose.
Hypocrite.
Um, since boy babies AREN'T being killed in favor of girls, you're barking up the wrong tree.
I am in disbelief that this conversation has actually went down the path of discussing the value of the lives of children vs. adults vs. elderly, etc. Talk about micromanaging human development. Our lives are so miserable, we must now think of them as a cost-benefit analysis? Wow. maybe we should stop having babies, since they will all probably grow up to be as miserable as us anyways. Spare them the agony!
There are already over a billion chinese. Stop selling food to China and save the planet.
What if a Chinese version of Sarah Palin has a Chinese version of little trigtwit, the tard baby? Does she get to have another one?
The demographic culprit is not the One Child Policy, but the various societal demands for a MALE heir. The new generation of Chinese women will either get to take their pick of mates, or be confined in harems.
We know that the replacement birth rate is 2.1 children per woman. The Question is, how man people can the Earth support and withstand? If that number is less than 5 billion (at any level of consumption), we will HAVE to figure out how to do One Child Policies correctly.
If we are already making TOO MUCH STUFF, having fewer workers to make it is a Good Thing.
Have your pet spade or nuetered. Close all welfare accounts.
Yes, apparently you are.
Fareed – as a journalist, you need to get your facts straight before post the article. The one-child policy HAS been changed and now the couple could have two kids if both of them are the only children from their family.
that was not a point of this article. the point was to remove all restriction. your example still implements restrictions to who, and how many children one couple can have...
If they are goint to have a law of having only one child they should pay for the girls to get their tubes tied. It's just unmoral of them to abort a child at 7 months.
in communist china there were many examples when the woman gave birth to her first child, then while she was unconscious, they cut her tubes. the baby died later. now she was unable to have any children. tragic. they should start experimenting castrating all of those communist members who implement the law.
All these women hating countries have already fixed the problem. Their population is so imbalanced with too many men and not enough women that they will die out within the next 100 years.....
Unlike uneducated Americans [ who despite that fact, always have a lot to say without a shred of evidence!] the Chinese, like the Russians understand the Demographic Winter.
The D.W. is well underway. You can look it up but the asic facts are:
# The Western nations are not replacing their populations
# Due to abortion; contraception; gay lifestyle and career women not having children – the world populations will be reduced by 50% in 25-30 years.
# Elderly populations are around 60% higher than children
# 62% of American homes do NOT have children
The Chinese and Russians know that:
[1] Spending decreases after the age of 48
[2] Less young people means lower workforce = less production = less exports = less income = economic ruin
[3] The Russian offered women $900 lump sum; $450 a month and 13rd of their salary for EACH baby they were willing to have – virtually no takers!
There's more. Look up Demographic winter. And don't rubbish it if you're not a professional Demographer!
well, china is a communist dictatorship country. its like assking hitler stop killing jews. china will not bend.
Hitler didn't kill Jews. Jews who got higher ranks from Hitler did kill Jews. Everything you read and hear bad about Hitler are FALSE. The Jews made-up FALSE information to get compensations.
The ancient Egyptians murdered and slaved more than 95% of Jewish populations for many years. Why the current Jews are not asking Egyptians compensation? Because, Muslim Brotherhood will kick Jews ass. The German are foolish when they are keep funding Billions of Dollars for Jews criminals.
they should start castrating all of those communist members who implement the law.
I think the Journalist should have guts to expose real truth about China. This article does not hit the nail on the head. Problem with China is Communism. And all this mumble jumble about what china is going to be like in 50 years and is a complete waste of CNN webspace. I would write an article on how the Chinese should rebel against their communist regime, so everyone is free.
Lol, did you ever talk to chinese?
Each year, hundreds of thousands of chinese travel to west, did you ever smell anything that reminds you communism?
What a pea brain!!!
Open your eyes.
99% of the world populations are happy with Chinese people, to work, study, live together. But, 99% of the world populations are hated Jews. They even hate to see Jews.
Ask CNN Gallup, for further information.
I do not think there is problem with population. I think there is problem with people's morals. We are sitting in nice comofortable chairs, writing these words. We suggest who to cut the tubes, stop buying products, problem with india, china and so on. Like a peasnat in china or india real cares about worlds population. they do not travel more than 100 miles outside their village in the entire life time. Why should we care? Oh I forgot, you are afraid that all of this comfort will be over for you... Think who is immoral
I do not think there is problem with population. I think there is problem with people's morals
Whether you think there is a population problem or not... there is one.(that point isn't evening being debated) Morals are subjective from person to person. From the beginning of time people like you have tried to force THIER morals on others all the while spouting their ignorance. Please...don’t breed.
I really hope you are not breeding.
I pity anything you may spawn. However, in the spirit of Karma, you get what you deserve.
Yes, let's breed ourselves out of existence. I am certain the animals are all for it!
Disagree completely with the video commentator. Just because the population will eventually be an older one doesn't mean they wouldn't have new ideas and the workforce would dwindle. Actually i think having one child would leave the people to be able to concentrate on bigger and better ideas. Young people today spend alot of time taking care of children wereas if they didn't have to that would free them up for better things. Also, having less females would make them revered and respected more instead of just used as a commodity. This practice of one child has taken them out of poverty. Shouldn't everyone on this planet want and wish this for the next generation? I think every country especially those that cannot feed themselves should practice this instead of relying on everyone else to save them when they find themselves starving and living in shanty towns. WAKE UP!
I disagree that an aging population is NOT a problem. In the US., the Social Security system depends on young people to feed it, so older people have something to get out of it. There is no innovation that will resolve that. If a 30 year old needs to provide Social Security with enough funds to support 2 seniors, disabled, or children of, there will not be enough money to distribute among the 3. With an average income of $41k, and already a need to pay ~30% to the federal government, and another ~10% locally, for police, teachers, etc. That leaves ~$24.6k for food, mortgage, utilities, car, gas, insurance, plus payment into Social Security & Medicare. And that $41k, includes the millionaires, so there is nowhere else to go for $$$. The only solution is to increase the retirement age to maintain the ratio of working/retired.
Maybe in America where people actually retire and try to live off social security. The commentator was trying to say they were "doomed" if the majority of the population was 50.(watch it again) All the 50 year olds i know are working and grown chidren are living with them. Who is taking care of who? Seriously? i know plenty of older people who are not even planning on retiring(i am one of them) You don't always get sick and sit at home or go to a nursing home nowadays. Also(unrelated)i don't believe in "buying" health insurance. Pay as you go! Buying insurance "just in case" is a waste of money. I am totally against it.
The USA needs that 1-child policy or, even better, a 0-child policy with big tax break rewards with 0-kid families.
AMEN to that!
that's just retarded.
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The rich love population control because they fear the slaves (thats you and me) outnumbering them.
They fear a mass of conscious people realizing bankers and cororations (NOT the will of the people) control every government of the world
When you hear world leaders speak of Population control beware
Hitler was a big fan of population control
Hitler was a big fan of population control
*******
and Goebbel had 6 children.
The problem with talking about population control is that it's always one group talking about how another group needs to be thinned out.
The best way to control population growth is to RAISE taxes when you have more children. The logic is to make the parents pay for the services (education, child care, etc..) the children will need. The public will not be forced to subsidize children that they didn't create. The gov't could provide birth control with greater ease, offer to pay for vasectomies and for women having their tubes tied. It's cheaper to prevent children than it is to pay for them.
This doesn't work on the poor.
How do you tax a person whose income is barely enough to ffeed his family (or worse, himself)?
There is a huge difference between Eugenics and birth control.
The two are not comparable.
For all of you people more interested in propagating a myth (overpopulation) than the human species....exactly how many people do you think is the RIGHT number to have? IF 7 billion is too many, by how many people is it too many? How many people do you want to die before we come out and say "sure, you can start having kids again"?
Anything LESS than a "two child policy" is madness...madness that pits a society against logic and mathmatical laws. It requires one child (worker) to support his parents, and his grandparents, and maybe even his great grandparents. One person cannot support so many.
And, here, in America, where we could give every household an acre and a half of land in Texas and leave the rest of the country devoid of all human life, we need MORE people, not fewer.
And, here, in America, where we could give every household an acre and a half of land in Texas and leave the rest of the country devoid of all human life, we need MORE people, not fewer.
******************************************
are you a communist?
You obviously haven't spent much time sitting in traffic jams in Los Angeles. We have enough people! Close the door! Turn off the vacancy sign, the US is full! Sure, there might be empty areas in the middle of no where without jobs and resources but people flock to cities that can't keep up with the population.
One billion seems like a good ending point.
More people is a stupid idea.
The Jewish community is a terrorist community.
if they expand their population, they could demand a Lebensraum-styled policy and attempt to annex neighboring countries. their military is expanding for that very reason.
Lebensraum
Is this not the way Islam is?
nope, the nazi's idea.
Governments wouldn't have to limit the amount of children people had, if people had the brains god gave a goose.
One, maybe two at most children is the maximum any couple should have. The population of Earth is double what it should be.
All the doom and gloom about the gender imbalance in China is nonsense. What liberals don't like is the aspect of social darwinism at play. The bottom 20% of boys will grow up not to have a wife, at least not a Chinese wife. In a society that prices family heritage, there will be tremendous pressure on boys succeed so they can attract a wife.
China's one child policy works because families have to concentrate all their efforts one child. One baby that gets all the resources of two parents and two sets of grandparents. That concentration will continue as those chosen children grow up and the boys have to compete for a wife. By having more men than women, China can use a bit of social darwinism to snuff out the genes of the dregs of society. They certainly have a better policy than the US- that encourages the LCD of our society to breed like rabbits.
The US doesn't need a one child policy- what the US needs to do is stop subsidizing irresponsible breeding. Why should hard working tax payers subsidize high school dropouts having a bunch of kids they can't afford to feed? Most large cities have 75% of the kids in their schools on free or reduced price lunches. That means 75% of the parents in these large Democrat voting cities can't afford to feed their kids. It's 2012. Birth control isn't all that complicated. If you can't afford to feed a kid- don't procreate. Society doesn't need your Walmart working genes.
it is one in the same
irresponsible people are the burden, responsible people tend to have fewer children – so incentivizing and enabling fewer children would provide a societal benefit. Why should a child be further punished because their parents are irresponsible, consequently irresponsible parents tend to produce irresponsible children.
China will be forced to either encourage more immigrants to come into the country or allow more than 1 child per family.
Their workforce is starting to age like America's baby boomers, not to mention talented citizens will sometimes leave China to find jobs in other countries.
the pro abortion people are sad that there could be a change in abortions there. they are very depressed.
We have 7 billion people in the world. It is too many and there are not enough resources to support it.
Reducing the amount of people is a good idea.
The treatment of women, is a completely separate issue, it manifests itself here, but if they value women as much as men, this problem goes away, that is deeper rooted.
In the US, looking at incentives, tax incentives to incentivize people not to have children, have 1 child, and then break even at 2 children is a good idea, then begin removing incentives and further taxing those that have over three children. We are already short on jobs and technology will continue to replace people in the workforce, resulting in fewer available jobs. More educated people have less children as a rule, so it tends to be those least equipped to support more children that have them – a reduction in this problem would be beneficial to society.
My neighbor has 6 kids. They have 1/2 a job between the two of them. On public assistance. and they know they cannot afford all the children. Yet they continue having them.
Why?
They are devoted Catholics.
A perfect example of how common sense plays absolutely no role here.
These are good people. They are nice and love their children.
About time for our values in this country to evolve outside of a 2000 year old doctrine that was neither written nor spoken of By God nor Jesus.
My neighbour has 3 wives and 22 children. He is Muslim. He goes back to Abu Dhabi regularly to collect his paycheque for being a good muzzie. This man has never worked, he calls himself a business man. His three wives know of each other but hate each other. When the women are together, they fight and their children fight each other also. The children know they will never have to work because as Emirates they will collect cheques until the civilized world does not need oil anymore. The whole lot of them have no education and agree that they are more British than Emirati. A real mess. The only thing that keeps them together is brainwashing 5 times a day and hate.
In some Haryana villages in India, the young girls are routinely threatened, abused and killed all under Khap (tribe/clan) verdicts. It is acceptable for the families to feed pesticide pills to the teenage girls and then dispose off their bodies by burning them without any police records.
You live in China for over 2 years and tell me the policy isn't a good thing... too many people + political brainwashing + miniscule moral standards = a population that doesn't know what is good for them
It is interesting that most of the people against the policy to hold Chinese families to only one child focus on the enforcement portion of the policy.
If people respected the policy, then an abortion would not be necessary, would it?
If people took time to understand the issues bigger than themselves, they would choose restraint over indulgence and irresponsibility.
If people took the time to understand global problems, national problems, state/provincial issues, and local challenges, instead of just their own personal problems, perhaps people would make better decisions.
If people paid attention to the long-term effects of decisions making, and not just short-term results, maybe people would behave different.
All these if statements...all just if.
Many times nations implement policies for these very reasons: People are not forward-thinking;they do not pay attention to others' needs; they only look at problems from a personal point of view.
If people, in general, were intelligent, disciplined, and responsible enough to make good decisions, what would we need governments for? We would govern ourselves locally.
Instead of focusing on the enforcement of the policy, perhaps you should ask yourself why is the policy being enforced? Perhaps someone broke the law? Perhaps someone did not take into account the entire country. Perhaps they were only thinking of themselves.
Has China ever considered forced vasectomy? Seriously. It is a simple medical procedure and the male still produces sperm which can be surgurectly extracted to impregnate a female. ( it's a hell of lot less barbaric than abortions)
Many people still think that having kids is naturall and that there shouldn't be any interference in this. They are so irresponsible and don't see any risks in this. If we look at poor and forgotten places on the planet a certain birth-controll policy isn't wrong, but if it is forced by law, like in China and parents have to have an abortion with a seven months old fetus – I think, this is absolutely criminal. Birth-controll is a step towards more medical controll of a society in preventing desease and suffering, that occure because of too less attention towards the individual creature. Many people think, you can leave your kid outside – it will grow up and make its experiences themselves – this isn't valid anymore. Children need people who take care and look after them, so that they can go to school, get some social competence, language skills etc. This is something that is necessary to guarantee its future, an income and the possibility to get out of poverty!
China's policy is rigid and treating people like human material. They could better start to allow their citizien to have only one car!
simply by encouraging birth control is not enough for china. china has 1.3 billion population. only mandating the one child policy will truely help the country. that 7 months old women should have known china's one child policy since the age she went to elementary school. but she still chose to risk it. i was wondering if her 2nd baby was not a boy, would she still be so keen to have that 2nd baby. I was also wondering she might have gone to some illegal clinics in china to know the gender of her fetus baby. the fact that she could not even afford to pay USD5000 fine for the 2nd baby, how can anyone be sure she could provide that 2nd baby good care by sending him to good school. a truely loving parent would sacrifice everything even their life for their children. money would never be an issue. the only motive for them to have additional baby is the motive to have the boy. as long as their wish is not satisfied, they will keep on breeding and chinese society including my family has to pay the price for these extra new babies. forced abortion is a bad, invasive, but most effective way to ensure the implementation of one child policy. to a country, their population is like production material. US constantly reject undesired foreign made population (immigrants) to ensure the immigrant they admit is good for the country. china does not have this luxury to reject foreign material. china does it by controlling its own population. when chinese population is reduced, chinese will environmently be available to afford more vehicles per person. nothing wrong with that.
I don't understand where you get this one child policy. I have friends who lives in China who have brothers and sisters. They say this was a fact but a long time ago which since no longer in practice. You guys need to get your facts straight. So ignorant specially for a news group.
Absolutely Agnar.
I have seen China visitors with 3 kids and they have never been bothered by their China Authorities.
Chinese 1 child policy was established during a past era in which China was very poor, a third world country, and underdeveloped and miles behing the west in every aspects. China shut its doors for 4 decades. It could not afford to feed its huge population after decades of misrule by Mao.
China's emergence as a super power, and powerful economy we see today – is just the beginning. There is more to come. No other nations in the world has risen from poverty within such a short time to become, soon, the most powerful economy in the world. I think this says alot of Chinese capability in economics and their prudence with their ballooning national reserves and savings.
My advise to America is to work with China if Americans want to ride on China's growing economy. US cannot afford to offend or ignore China.
It is better to humble oneself in hard times than forever dreaming about your own invisible greatness.
Pretend to be bowing your head and then stab them in the back.Typical muslim crap.
Australia will benefit greatly by co operating with China in so many ways. Australia is now said to be the mines of China. Soon, Aussies will become the big food supplier to China to feed 2 billlion people. Thats alot of business and job creations for Australia
I wonder, where would America's position be as Australia and China walk into the sunrise, holding hands and patting each others back ?
HINDU KALI _ GODDESS OF POPULATION CONTROL
A recent report by United Press trust of India (UPI) stated that during the past three years more than 2,500 young boys and girls were sacrificed to goddess Kali in India. Another of AFP's recent reports say: hundreds of young boys and virgin girls are sacrificed every month for the deity Kali. In one case Rama Sewak hacked his eight year old son to death in broad daylight in Delhi because goddess Kali had told him he would come back to life and bring him good fortune. Bloodthirsty Kali is worshipped openly the length and breadth of India. Kali's statue stands naked astride the inanimate body of the Hindu deity Shiva, tongue stuck out with blood dripping from fang-like teeth. She holds a noose, a skull-topped staff, a blood-encrusted sword and a severed head. She is also known as Durga, Devi, Shaktima, Uma and Parvathi in other manifestations. The priest of Delhi, Kali Bari, says that a child sacrificed to Kali ensures a man the birth of a son. Human sacrifices are also made to these gods or goddesses, either to appease them or to ask favours of them.
Ugg this is the problem with Fareed, reporting and commenting without understanding all the facts and acting like he knows everything. "One child policy" isn't EVERYONE can only have one child. Urban couples are allowed to have one child, rural couples can have two children if the first one is a girl. This was done because of the preference of boys in rural areas. Couples can have two children if both parents are single children themselves. This is so that there are more children to take care of their aging parents and grandparents. Which means all the people who are single children because of the one child policy will be allowed to have two children. Ethnic minorities are allowed to have more than one child. Also if you are able to support more than one child, starting with paying a fine and paying for that child on your own (the child will not receive much state benefits) then you can. The policy may seem tough but it's to address the issue of too many people and not enough resources and opportunities, which we KNOW leads to civil unrest and war.
The problem with the force abortion is officials going beyond what is allowed in the rules. What should be discussed is how to ensure that there are checks and balances on what government officials can do/can't do. The abuse of power to meet "numbers" is a bigger issue facing China as that is rampant.
Any country with a growth rate such as China SHOULD have a 1 child policy. It is just about the only thing I like about China.
Let's hope they don't change it, we don't need anymore Pizz_poor drivers than we already have. Sorry but they_sukk at driving.
There are a LOT of humans on the earth. If a disease came along that killed 999 out of every 1000 people, there would still be 6 or 7 million folks left alive
We always hear about how we need to reduce government spending. This is the other end of the spectrum that most people don't think about. If a country can put a cap on the birth rate, depending on the death rate, it may give the country an edge on getting it's debt paid for. If Republicans get tired of fighting government spending it wouldn't surprise me if they flip flop on their traditional pro-life stance if the economy gets worse.
China's One Child policy is the only effective solution to a problem that the rest of the world has failed to address. It should be copied around the globe.
Is he crazy..the world is already so overpopulated and do not people get it...we are on the bring of an environment and resource disaster...with global warming we will have a drought from the southwest up to northeast on the global warming map...we are going to have food shortages and the oceans are being over fished. and polluted ..we should have a one child policy in the US and all over the world, do not advocate for more. The author is nuts to suggest otherwise since we are going to add on 3 billion more people by 2030..that is irresponsible of the author to suggest to add more...
It is disgusting that a government has the right to not only tell someone how many children they are allowed to have, but to force an abortion of a 7 month term child. My heart goes out to this woman and her family. I wish them the best of luck.
While I will probably get blasted for this statement, it needs to be said. In the US, we have more children born to single mother's than should be allowed. When our 'socialized' support system is straining under the weight of people out of work and a bad economy, these single females just keep on having children, without benefit of a support system in place. While I don't condone abortion as an answer, I am seriously getting tired of female's right to give birth to mutiple children taking precedence over my right as a worker having to support them.
Study ECONOMICS THEORY... If you were able to build SUPER ROCKETS to the moon and transport people it won't be problem.
Do you see people building passenger rockets to the moon? No.... So why not keep one child policy in Modern CHINA?
Future China you can have many children you want as long as there moonbase or juniper base or any planets.
GO AWAY illuminati...
It is possible to believe INIDA POPULATION will be bigger than CHINA. India does not have ONE CHILD POLICY.
Indian population will be larger than China.
I'm not sure I buy the "aging population" argument. Just because you're over 60 doesn't mean you can't work. People in their 70's can hold down a job just fine. And I know 2 guys in their 80's who go to work every day. It's just a matter of staying healthy and maintaining your skill set. It sounds like China's policy has helped a lot of people. I think they should stick with it.
abortionists and libturds sure hope not. the love the massive amounts of abortions in China. They dream for it to happen here.
Many families have more than one child, my wife had 4 brothers and one sister. Depends on your location, party affiliation, and ability to take care of the child.
Most families want only one so they can give them the best education possible.
Work ethics are respected over there, Welfare and stealing is looked down on.
nothing wrong with being responsible, The Church over here has done a real disservice to many and even their new lowering the standard will do no good in the end.
Fareed, don't make me lose my respect for you. China's one child policy is just fine. This world is tremendously over populated as it is. I think your native country India & her neighbors Pakistan & Bangladesh should also adopt the same policy. If not one child policy they should at-least adopt a maximum of 2 kids policy. This way in the long run population will stay constant or it may even decrease a little.
Chinese are free to come to the United States to give birth to their 2nd and 3rd child. Some already do.
I suspect most Americans in the street are not well versed with economics, and are totally oblivious to the precarious financial situation of USA. If the US Congress do little to resolve the national debt crisis, it will be game over for America.
More money printing isnt going to help going forward, because by then the world may lose confidence in US$ – abandon itfor other currencies like the rising liberalised Yuan or Yen
At the current rate of compounding interests and increase, the national debt, now at US$16 trillion, will become an impossible US$25 trillion by 2020.
This is reality and problem.
America needs to solved this forseeable catastrophic financial immediately, and not kick the can down the road.
A socialist based system may even be the way to go to overcome this financial cancer. American democracy will NOT work for this matter.
So, dont worry too much about China's one child or no child policy. Many of you know very little about whats going on in China – unless you go there and see the new modern China.
Please do yourself a favor and worry about your own messy financial mismangement. Otherwise a real economic gridlock may happen in USA. I am saying this because I admire America for its innovative and inventive spirit. But not US form of democracy which I think only works to protect the 1% super rich.
And the best part is that there is 700 million but only 600 million women.
Amazing how everyone here is a "GOD" and knows exactly how the planet works and what it's capabilities are – WOW! I'm impressed, everyone knows that there will be hunger if the population grows... it's a simple calculation, we grow food (uses our very limited resouces of fresh water – anyone look at a satelite image of canada and many other parts of the world recently?), this water goes into our food, we eat it, the water exits our system into the sewer system, water evaporates, it rains and the water is usable again... where exaxtly are we running out of food?
Hunger will come quicker from companies producing GMO seed – caring only about $$$ instead of sustainability. there is still plenty of place on earth, Yes people who cannot afford to raise children should refrain from having them, if they are not capable of running a farm to feed their family, but there always was this concept of a "family" – looking at the comments here, perhaps we should take the words "brother" and "Sister" out of our dictionary...
There is a time lag before water that is removed from the system is available again as fresh water. We are already over-using fresh water and don't have enough as it is.
So the answer is to go on breeding like crazy, and then convert the whole earth into a factory farm? Is that the kind of earth we want to live on? No wild spaces, no animals other than us and our domestic livestock and pets? Why? What is the point? If we kept our population within reasonable bounds, we could live like kings on a beautiful, natural planet.
Well done china... Over population is much more dangerous than terrorism etc. Etc. Actually OP is cradle of all problems for human beings.
Only one question:
Can China feed twice as many people?
I understand your reasoning, but the human race is overpopulating this planet at a brutal pace. Most of this world's problems can be traced directly or indirectly to overpopulation: too many people. Most of the world's poorest countries are grossly overpopulated. We need to stabilize the earth's population, and eventually lower it. We must allow our older people to remain active and involved for as long as they possibly can, so they don't have to have 20 or 30 years of care from younger people. China should encourage its people to stay with 1 child.
Every problem on this planet can be directly connected to the fact there are more than 7 billion people on it. We are destroying this world at an ever increasing rate. It is not will America and the rest of the world will have a 1 child role it is when. What is America going to be like when there are 700 million of us? Run away unemployment, water shortages, food shortages, and housing shortages. Nothing good can happen. Wake up America.
Yes, the world has way too many people. Yes, people having better health and longer lives means longer working lives and longer retirements. Yes, fewer children per woman means the median age goes up. Yes, I would prefer to see populations decline naturally (Italy, for example) rather than by law and force (China, for example).
Yes, the number of people on this planet must stop growing rapidly, then stop growing slowly, then stop growing, then start declining slowly until it reaches a reasonable number. How long will it take? Optimistically, I think it will take about 20-40 generations, or about 500-1000 years.
China decided in 1979 to speed up this process. If they continue with their 1 child per woman policy for two more generations, then switch to a stabilization policy (2.1 children per woman) they will settle out at a population of well under a billion (probably half or less compared to today's population). Will that be a reasonable population for China?
In the meantime, we have hard centuries ahead.
If China were to lift the 1 child ban, families would be pumping out babies as soon as the vajeen recovers. It will be an epic boom that will cripple China, possibly destroy it.
It's really a shame because by the time the population settles, the damage done to the earth will be immense. And the end result will be the same – we will have to adapt to a way of life that entails an economy that isn't based on perpetual growth, and will have a somewhat older population base. Since the end result will be the same, it's too bad we don't have the sense to avoid the pain of the coming centuries and deal with the problem now. I think it would take a world-wide education campaign to encourage people to have no more than 2 children per couple. Iran was very successful in reducing their birth rate with a campaign like that, along with universal access to contraception. Even if we could convince people to have one fewer child per family, the time it would take to reach a stable population could be reduced by hundreds of years.
As a species we have evoled so well, we are killing our environment which will end of taking us all out. I don't think the one child rule is bad. It's probably just to late. We have too many people and we are using up all our natural resources at a greater pace. It's not going to effect me but it will effect our children's, children. It's a sad state we leave our children.
They need more wage slave laborers.
OMG, China's running out of slaves! How will I get my new iPhone 5 and who will make the uniforms for the USA olympic team?
Everywhere in the world should have a 1 child policy. There is absolutely no reason for an octomom or someone to be having more than 5 kids. The Earth would thank us if we started to have less children. We need an apocolypse.
who's care about china, why dont's we talk about the problem in US? Now millions south america imigrants who have come here and have a child after another, and receive support for the children until they reach 18 years old. What a burden for society!
Agree with you all – Americans shouldnt expell so much hot air about China.
You see, during its economic expansion years China's exports contributed 45 + % to China's economy. That is dropping as China consumers continue to prosper and their spending has become a major GDP contributor.
China's exports to the world now only account for 28% of China's GDP – and still dropping. Exports to USA contribute even lesser – like 5% at most.
Asia , the emerging countries, and Africa will become the major customers for Chinese products in the next decade.
And I think one of the secondary reasons why China is revolving their economics, is in case Romney becomes the unthinkable president. If you can recall – Romney in one of his speeches, echoed sly Donald Trump in labelling China as dishonest – exact word he used was "cheaters".
It's all the fault of Mao Zedong. Nao's believed that in order to win a war, China must rapidly populate Songhai can have enough soldiers to fight the war. Not so in modern warfare. So there goes the over population of China. In order to curtail the rapid growth in population. China implemented a one child policy in the early '90s and should stay on course for another 5-8 yrs in in order to sustain the economy vs population.
china already has 1.3 billion population. the size of the population already overburden china's natural resources, agriculture and economy. there is simply not enough job to supply this population. that is why china has to take in polluting industries, allow employers to manipulate their labors in order for the job to stay in china. the other option would be no jobs. when a company suffers loss, employer can put its employee out of work to keep the company afloat. today china simply has too many people, there is no other alternatives for china except mandating the one child policy. forced abortion is a bad, invasive, but most effective way to deter people from violating that policy. the other option is to let the baby out. that will render one child policy useless. keeping the extra child from coming to this world is trying to save the other millions of children under one child policy and helping them having a better life. in fact the parents in china today pour all their resources in that only child. most children in china is the king in family. one child was enjoying the love of 6 by their parents (2) and grand parents (4). the 7 months pregnant woman who went through forced abortion knew the policy, and chose to risk it. she should also be blamed. i am wondering if she knew her 2nd baby is still a girl (not a boy), would she still choose to have the baby? today's china simply does not welcome extra new baby. people want to have more children in china simply lives in the worst time in china's demographic history. sometimes it takes a bad policy to reach a good result. future chinese generations will see the benefits of today's one child policy. the good or bad of this policy should only be judged by chinese historians a few hundred years later, not by international media or some foreign governments. think about it, it doesn't hurt for the CCP to repeal this policy, or even earn them some good name. But communist party today is willing to take the bad name to implement this policy because they know it will be good for china in the long run. that is policy as a chinese myself truly supported.
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You could certainly see your enthusiasm in the work you write. The world hopes for even more passionate writers like you who are not afraid to mention how they believe. At all times follow your heart.
The earth as an endless supply of resources. People are only being selfish by squandering and destroying it.
And what about reincarnation? There are a lot of things out there that srongly suggest the exsistence of it. Look at at the things being dicovered by doctors who have hynotised people and the articles that have been written about it. I agree with you. Spread out. What did God say to Abraham? Populate and I will increase and multyply iyour offspring in numbers. I know it sound funny.But, I was paraphrasing not directly quoting.