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The Birth Dearth Dilemma
Professor Dowbiggin's talk illustrated once again the snowball effect of abortion as manifest in the birth dearth. Essentially, the birth dearth refers to the dramatic drop in global birth rates and the resulting negative effects on all aspects of society including welfare, education, and the health industry. The roles filled by young people in a society are left vacant; with the most obvious problem being the inability of a society to care for its elderly. This disturbing trend has been commented on in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Germany's Der Spiegel. Economists and social scientists alike acknowledge the problem but they seem unsure of how to deal with this politically incorrect truth. Never before has economic prosperity been accompanied by declining birth rates. In this sense the modern birth dearth is unprecedented in history, although it bears suspicious resemblance to trends surrounding the decline and fall of the Roman Empire. In Canada, as well as in most European and Asian countries, the birth rate is significantly below the necessary replacement rate of 2.1. In Canada the average birth rate has fallen from 4 in 1950 to 2.3 in 1970 to our current birth rate of 1.5. If trends continue as they are today, by the year 2017 there will be more people in Canada over 65 than under 15. Many countries are already witnessing the devastating effects of depopulation and are taking steps to remedy the replacement rates. Dr. Dowbiggin raised the interesting fact that when polled on ideal family size, Canadians consistently averaged over replacement rate. In North America (including Mexico, the USA, and Canada) the same poll resulted in an average of between 2.4 and 2.6. The poll suggests people are having fewer children than they would in fact like to have. So what is causing the modern birth dearth and what steps, if any, can be taken to remedy it? According to Dr. Dowbiggin, the largest contributors to the modern birth dearth are: abortion, rising divorce rates, late marriage, infertility from STD's and artificial contraception. In looking for a solution, Professor Dowbiggin does not suggest passing laws in order to force people to have more children. Rather he proposes enacting government policy to help people who would have more children if they could. Making child rearing more affordable could include incentives for parents and single income families, tax credits, and funding cuts or no funding to population reduction groups. Bernadette Mathie Read more details in the following report and view trailers and clips from the movie "Demographic Winter" here ( http://www.demographicwinter.com/index.html ) |
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On March 1st I had the pleasure of attending for the first time, the St. Catharines Right to Life annual dinner meeting. The evening was certainly a success. A success that was due in part to the speaker, Dr. Ian Dowbiggin, Chair of the Department of History at the University of Prince Edward Island and author of A Merciful End: The Euthanasia Movement in Modern America, (Oxford University Press).