Readers' Letters Of The Day

From The Metro (page 14), responding to this fascist nonsense that people "should" have fewer children to "save the planet"...

In response to comments regarding birth control and climate change (Metro, Wed), it's worth rememering China, a country that has had a one-child pollicy per urban family for more than 30 years, has the highest C02 emissions in the world.

Jim, Surrey.

It's all very well Val saying we should remain childless (Metro, Wed) but without a younger generation, who does she think is going to pay any taxes when she has retired?

Andrew, Bedfordshire.

James Moore says a smaller population is the only sure-fire way to reduce CO2 levels. He's right and the way to achieve it is via education. Statistically speaking, the higher the rate of education in a modern society, the lower the birth rate.

Mark de Graaf, via email.

The truth, as ever, lies somewhere in the middle.

It is not really education itself which reduces the birth rate, it is having general prosperity. Good education is both a cause of and a result of general prosperity. We also know that general prosperity is impossible in a society with too many old people and not enough young people. And we know that citizens in prosperous countries tend to emit more C02 (to the extent that is a relevant metric, clearly, environmental standards are much higher in prosperous countries), so the whole thing largely cancels itself out.

So instead of more people emitting less C02 each, we have fewer people emitting more C02 each. But isn't the relevant metric how happy people are in general?