Population Growth

The U.S. immigration rate averaged about 1 million people per year throughout the 1990s. The population of the United States is around 279 million. If current demographics--fertility, mortality and immigration rates--remain fairly constant, America’s population will be over 400 million by 2050.

Imagine what California would be like with a population of more than 60 million! (It is now around 33 million.)

What is the carrying capacity of the land itself? Will there be enough clean, pure water for everyone? What about food? Housing? Employment? How will the billions of additional tons of solid waste and sewage impact our environment?

And then there’s the little matter of air quality. What will that be like when there are twice as many automobiles on the road? (This assumes, of course, that our highways can keep pace, fuel supplies remain plentiful and the majority of us still own cars.)

The United States will not be able to maintain even a semblance of its current standard of living with a population pushing half a billion. Our natural resources are not sufficient to sustain so many people. At current levels of consumption, they are not even sufficient for the existing population.

Immigration, along with fertility rates, must be reduced if our population is ever to be stabilized and eventually cut back to a manageable size. There is no reason why America has to go down the same road as India, China or Latin America. But to turn things around, we must act now!

I suggest that we start by lowering the number of legal immigrants to about 200,000 per year. Next, I would like to see a government-sponsored national ad campaign encouraging couples to have no more than two children.

Overpopulation is America’s No. 1 environmental problem. Continuing to ignore it will not make it go away; it will only make matters worse--much worse. And the cost of doing nothing will be very high indeed.

MICHAEL D. RAY

Thousand Oaks