| Abstrakt: |
The Feb. 8 editorial "Wanted: More immigrants and babies" spun the weary trope that population growth is an "engine of prosperity" and ignored the long-term irreversible impacts on human well-being and the natural world of unrelenting population growth, a documented threat multiplier that contributes to catastrophic climate change, the water pollution crisis, mass extinctions and environmental degradation. Pronatalism and baby-bust alarmism ignore the gains in women's empowerment and reproductive autonomy that lead to lower fertility rates. Pronatalism commodifies women, babies and immigrants as economic inputs that benefit only the corporations that rely on a never-ending supply of workers and consumers for their products. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER] |
