The book Empty Planet addresses the issue of falling fertility. Most people seem to think that overpopulation is the global problem, but looking just a little further ahead reveals something very different. The birth rate falls with urbanisation, and fertility itself is falling in both men and women. These trends are very difficult, maybe impossible to reverse.
Very interesting piece. One point, childlessness is referenced to Tacitus and Pliny the Younger, but the following observation regarding immigration has no such reference but does, IMO, follow the preceding referenced point and may garner some of its force (from being referenced).
Would it be possible to have a reference for the immigration observation as well?
Sure, Tacitus (in the same passage) records Augustus saying, 'we give our allies a share in the government that our numbers may increase'. But the basic point that the Empire's urban centres were populated by immigrants is covered so widely I didn't bother referencing it. Just as Gauls, Ilyrians, Germans and Sarmatians boosted the dwindling army, immigrants boosted the declining cities.
The book Empty Planet addresses the issue of falling fertility. Most people seem to think that overpopulation is the global problem, but looking just a little further ahead reveals something very different. The birth rate falls with urbanisation, and fertility itself is falling in both men and women. These trends are very difficult, maybe impossible to reverse.
Very interesting piece. One point, childlessness is referenced to Tacitus and Pliny the Younger, but the following observation regarding immigration has no such reference but does, IMO, follow the preceding referenced point and may garner some of its force (from being referenced).
Would it be possible to have a reference for the immigration observation as well?
Sure, Tacitus (in the same passage) records Augustus saying, 'we give our allies a share in the government that our numbers may increase'. But the basic point that the Empire's urban centres were populated by immigrants is covered so widely I didn't bother referencing it. Just as Gauls, Ilyrians, Germans and Sarmatians boosted the dwindling army, immigrants boosted the declining cities.