this post was submitted on 17 Dec 2024
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Economic sustainability has almost nothing to do with population size. The vast amount of unsustainability comes from wasteful consumerism. Furniture that lasts years instead of centuries, clothes that last months instead of decades, holidays 10,000 km away instead of 1 km away, single-use plastics for every single thing, etc.
People that live within an ecosystem have net negative emissions if they care to put in the effort. Every person that exists can live and work to make things better, so how can it be a disadvantage to have more of them?
There is a point when every bit of nature has a steward tending to its development/survival/recovery closely enough that another person won't be a net ecological benefit, but with a global population density of one person per two hectares we're not there yet.
This may be true but it also assumes idealism that everyone will be open to being a good steward of the planet. The way I think about it, lower population is sort of a buffer against an inevitable portion of the population who, no matter how direct and obvious the impact of climate change is, can't be convinced to help society. And unfortunately, at the time of having kids you can do everything you can to teach them to be interested in helping the planet but they still might not, and that would come with a huge amount of guilt in my case.