One-child policy began in 1979. In 1980, My mother hid in her relatives' houses and finally delivered her second child - me. I was very lucky because if my mother was caught, I can't sit here to type these sentences.<p>I do understand the one-child policy because there are too many people in China, especially in cities. The population should be under control. (However, as far as I know, one-child policy never really works in the very poor area. It's common to have 3+ children there.)<p>In recent decades, China becomes much richer and people have better education. Many families (in cities) get used to having only one child and don't want to have the second child because the cost of raising a child becomes very high. Two-child policy should come earlier.
From the article "All couples will now be allowed to have two children".<p>So it seems China isn't so much ending its one-child policy, as augmenting it by one to a two-child policy. This means the brutal and cruel enforcement will continue, only it will kick in at the third child instead of at the second.
Before commenting on this, there are two things you need to read.<p>"China - total fertility rate (graph)"[1]<p>"List of famines in China."[2]<p>"China - Population 1950 - 2015" [3]<p>In 1970, the fertility rate (babies born per woman) was 6. That's huge but not untypical for an undeveloped country, where a lot of people die young. Once some basic modern medicine was deployed, the number of people surviving went way up, and the population doubled in 50 years, even with the one-child policy. It would have been much, much worse without it. Something had to be done. China has a history of famines, and the last big one was in 1962, and 20 million to 40 million people starved to death. Keeping that from happening again is a major goal of policy in China.<p>The one-child policy worked. The population is leveling off. The fertility rate is now around 1.55, which is about typical for a developed country. Once a country develops, the fertility rate drops off without coercion. China has reached that point, and no longer needs a mandatory one-child policy.<p>India's population grew by a factor of 3.4 during that period, but India has more arable land. China is a big country, but most of it is desert, tundra, or mountains. The US has six times the arable land per capita as China. China has nothing like the Midwestern US.<p>Actually, the one-child policy was relaxed years ago. Only some provinces require it.<p>[1] <a href="http://www.china-profile.com/data/fig_WPP2010_TFR_1.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.china-profile.com/data/fig_WPP2010_TFR_1.htm</a>
[2] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_famines_in_China" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_famines_in_China</a>
[3] <a href="http://www.china-profile.com/data/fig_Pop_WPP2006.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.china-profile.com/data/fig_Pop_WPP2006.htm</a>
Overpopulation is an interesting problem, it exponentially affects every other problem we have -- some balance will have to be found between ultimately telling people they can't kids or maintaining that those people have autonomy over their own lives and can make such a decision. I don't know what the solution is - perhaps making the developing world developed as fast as possible.
Once-child policy was brutally enforced and cruel. It was also highly effective way to reduce poverty.<p>China vs. India: GDP per capita versus fertility rate<p><a href="http://www.google.se/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&ctype=b&strail=false&bcs=d&nselm=h&met_y=sp_dyn_tfrt_in&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&met_s=sp_pop_totl&scale_s=lin&ind_s=false&dimp_c=country:region&met_x=ny_gdp_pcap_kd&scale_x=lin&ind_x=false&idim=country:IND:CHN&ifdim=country&tunit=Y&pit=1382997600000&hl=en_US&dl=en_US&ind=false&icfg&iconSize=0.5" rel="nofollow">http://www.google.se/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&ct...</a>
Are there any psychology/sociology studies how one-child policy impacted China's society? It has been documented how having one child vs siblings impact one's psyche. I wonder what kind of impact it has on a culture/society as a whole if most are from single-child families.
This has been expected for a while.<p>Hopefully it can help address the increasing gender imbalance. It has reached 6:5 male to female births, resulting in huge numbers of Chinese men who cannot find marriage partners.
I've been on vacation in China this summer and a tourist guide told me that they can have as many children as they want, but 1) they have to pay some sort of one time fee for the second and successive children (maybe 10,000 Yuan? can't remember) and 2) school, healthcare, etc are to be paid in full for those children. Basically if you're not reasonably wealthy you can afford only one child.
This link has a bit more information: <a href="http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2013-11/15/c_132891920.htm" rel="nofollow">http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2013-11/15/c_1328919...</a><p>(Yes, it's from a couple of years ago, but it describes China's thinking).
<i>The Giver</i>’s portrayal of systematic euthanasia of the elderly comes to mind. I <i>really</i> hope we never have to make that kind of decision. After all, what choice could possibly be compatible with our principles of liberty, equality, respect, and fairness? This may be the hardest ethical problem we can’t afford not to solve.
Talk about bad things about China -> Get upvotes.<p>Talk about good things about China -> Get downvotes and people rebutting you with clearly one-sided sources.<p>Am I surprised? No.<p>Am I pissed? No.<p>I believe time will tell.
The once-child policy has been gradually weakened for some time. It will be interesting to see the future population trend in China. I can see it going one of two ways:<p>1. Multiple children has previously been reserved to those with political connections or money. Now that everyone can have two they will jump at the opportunity.<p>or<p>2. Almost every young person in China has grown up in a single child family and sees it as the normal family. Social norms are also based around parents dedicating a lot of resources to one child. So they continue to have only one child. In about a decade China may have to start encouraging people to have more children, like Japan.
China's 1 child policy (now 2 child, I guess) is a difficult to fully form an opinion on.<p>On one hand, "population crisis" is something a lot of people are concerned about^ and the policy was a direct and practical way of tackling it. On the other, it is unmistakably totalitarian.<p>Going to 2 is a strange choice. It's just as totalitarian, but probably has a fairly negligible effect on average fertility rate. I guess they don't see<p>^On a tangent, I don't totally buy population crisis and judging from how rarely I hear it mentioned these days I think I'm not alone. There is obviously some natural limit on human population, but I don't think we're near it.<p>The fact that we hear less concern about it is says something interesting about the zeitgeist. I think people believe in technological progress more in 2015 than they have since the space age and nuclear age of 50 years ago, maybe more than ever. At our current rate (ignoring the projected gradual reduction) we'll double every 65 years. I can certainly see us absorbing doubling population density in that time considering all the empty oceans, deserts, the potential for landless food productions, megacities and all that jazz. I mean, If the US & Australia went to the population densities of Germany and France (moderately dense with quite a lot of open spaces), we would be good for another 100 years.<p>Basically, I think we have the space.
So many people here with really outdated ideas about what causes over population and how to control it. Wish they would read this article by Melinda Gates on some myths around this subject: <a href="http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Who-We-Are/Resources-and-Media/Annual-Letters-List/Annual-Letter-2014#MYTHTHREE" rel="nofollow">http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Who-We-Are/Resources-and-Medi...</a>
The sad part is the policy was likely unnecessary given what we now know about the effects of urban migration and modern healthcare on reducing population growth.<p>It's often too expensive to have multiple children in a large city, and when infant and child mortality is reduced there's less incentive to have lots of kids (so people use birth control).
A pension crisis in China would be tremendously disastrous; something one can barely picture.<p>With growth and technology, fertility rates goes down and emerging markets,specially BRIC nations, will be severely affected by this.
China doesn't qualify as per <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_ecological_footprint" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_ecologica...</a>
Thats a good thing. Pressures like these have pushed technological progress forward. Either that, or a natural cycle of starvation and death, unlikely but possible. Let's see what happens.
"A Christian Manifesto" by Francis A. Schaeffer gives a reason why.<p>Our creator inspires freedom and love. When we follow him we seek to spread freedom to not only ourselves but to others as well. A population willingly adopting the new testament Biblical principles will spread freedom willingly.<p>The humanist world view on the other hand has no moral absolutes and must enforce the popular or elected rules onto the majority by force.<p>America has been slowly transitioning from a Bible believing nation to a humanist world view. The result is
predictable, the loss of individual freedom and the increase in the use of force to preserve the lack of these freedoms.
Middle-class in China is going to be fascinating to watch as it consumes all resources.<p>(four times the entire population of the USA for perspective)<p>I guess the logic is it will help their economy?