THE TWO CHILD FAMILY

• Lindsey Grant
• May 1, 1994
• Forum Papers
• Forum Paper
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THE TWO CHILD FAMILY
An NPG Forum Paper
by Lindsey Grant
May 1994

Seen from a reasonably detached viewpoint — from Mars, let us say — the arguments for arresting U.S. population growth would seem so compelling as to raise the question “why isn’t it being done.” It would help the nation deal with the problems that confront us, yet very few of our politicians and pundits even consider the idea. On the assumption that they are held back by unwarranted fears, let me show by what relatively gentle adjustments we could turn U.S. population growth around.
The author is an erstwhile Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Environment and Population Affairs.

In the NPG FORUM series, we have detailed the benefits that a reversal of U.S. population growth would have on the pursuit of environmental, energy, and resource policies, in the rescue of our collapsing cities, and in addressing the horrendous problems of a society moving toward a two-tiered stratification of a few “ins” and more “outs”. In recent issues, we have argued that two present national projects — health reform and welfare reform — cannot be achieved without addressing population growth. We have made the point, repeatedly, that — unlike the proposals before the nation — a demographic policy would begin immediately to reap budgetary savings.

If the proposal finds few takers, it is perhaps because it conjures up fears of families limited to one child, of fertility controlled by forced sterilization and mandatory abortions, and of a “Fortress America” with all migration barred. The reality is much simpler and gentler. Let us show what could be achieved with the “two-child family” and with immigration returned to the levels that prevailed for much of this century.

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