Thanks for writing this. I disagree that EAs should prioritise this cause area and I disagree with the analysis of the cause-specific arguments.
Firstly, I think it is good for happy people to come into existence, but this is ignored here.
On climate change, I generally think Drawdown is not a reliable source. The only place where births per woman are not close to 2 is sub-saharan Africa. Thus, the only place where family planning could reduce emissions is sub-saharan Africa, which is currently a tiny fraction of emissions. Working on low carbon technology by contrast can affect global emissions, and policy change in the US or EU can affect a much larger fraction of emissions.
I’m also strongly sceptical of the cost to prevent a pregnancy provided. $10 seems far too low. This seems similar to the kind of mainstream charity cost to save a life estimate that EAs have criticised for a while
The only place where births per woman are not close to 2 is sub-saharan Africa. Thus, the only place where family planning could reduce emissions is sub-saharan Africa, which is currently a tiny fraction of emissions.
This is not literally true: family planning can reduce emissions in the developed world if the desired births per woman is even lower than the actual births per woman. But I don’t dispute the substance of the argument: it seems relatively difficult to claim that there’s a big unmet need for contraceptives elsewhere, and that should determine what estimates we use for emissions.
As a result, the gap between the number of children that women say they want to have (2.7) and the number of children they will probably actually have (1.8) has risen to the highest level in 40 years.
Another point—more humans means more people to find solutions. So we have more people polluting the planet, but also more people working on clean energy solutions that will get us off fossil fuels.
Do you think that this has a net-positive balance, i.e. do you think that more people generally contribute, on average, more to solutions or more to pollution, CO2 emissions, animal suffering, etc.?
I’m honestly not certain—I don’t believe we’ll solve any of these problems by a degrowth approach, so the only way to get a real solution is via innovation and/or adoption of solutions. More people would help with that, but also would contribute more to the problem in the meantime. I think whether the sign was positive or negative might depend on the specifics (eg, I think if environmentalists have fewer kids because of a fear of overpopulation, that will generally be bad for the environment).
As you might have seen, Project Drawdown is not my primary source. I came to my conclusions from various sources, which mostly agree on the general idea: Reducing population size and/or growth is a very effective means for positive change in several other cause areas. This does not rely on one single source.
Regarding the cost for providing contraceptives, the costs of less than 10 USD p.a. per user are well established. See, for example, this publication by the UN Population Fund (UNFPA):
Average direct costs to provide one year of method use are highest for hormonal methods—implants ($7.75), injectables ($8.61) and pills ($7.26)—with the commodities themselves accounting for most of the cost (Table 3, page 12). Permanent male and female sterilization and the IUD have the lowest annual costs when total method costs are divided by the average number of years users are covered by these methods. Annual average direct costs for male condoms fall between these method groups, at $4.17 per year.
As BenMillwood already mentioned, emissions reduction can be achieved almost anywhere, because in most countries actual fertility is higher than desired fertility. This gap varies from country to country but exists almost anywhere. At a current global birth rate of more than 130 million births annually, out of which more than 40% are unintended, I see big potential.
Which analysis of the beneficial effects on other cause areas do you disagree with, and why? I’d be happy to provide more sources and/or explanations, but for that I’d need to know which ones exactly you found to be weak.
I’d also like to point out that per-capita CO2 emissions in many countries will be rising in the next few decades and that, according to at least one peer-reviewed paper I cited, most of our efficiency gains that would reduce emissions were undone by population growth.
Thanks for writing this. I disagree that EAs should prioritise this cause area and I disagree with the analysis of the cause-specific arguments.
Firstly, I think it is good for happy people to come into existence, but this is ignored here.
On climate change, I generally think Drawdown is not a reliable source. The only place where births per woman are not close to 2 is sub-saharan Africa. Thus, the only place where family planning could reduce emissions is sub-saharan Africa, which is currently a tiny fraction of emissions. Working on low carbon technology by contrast can affect global emissions, and policy change in the US or EU can affect a much larger fraction of emissions.
I’m also strongly sceptical of the cost to prevent a pregnancy provided. $10 seems far too low. This seems similar to the kind of mainstream charity cost to save a life estimate that EAs have criticised for a while
This is not literally true: family planning can reduce emissions in the developed world if the desired births per woman is even lower than the actual births per woman. But I don’t dispute the substance of the argument: it seems relatively difficult to claim that there’s a big unmet need for contraceptives elsewhere, and that should determine what estimates we use for emissions.
At least in the US women have been having fewer children than they want for many decades:
Another point—more humans means more people to find solutions. So we have more people polluting the planet, but also more people working on clean energy solutions that will get us off fossil fuels.
Do you think that this has a net-positive balance, i.e. do you think that more people generally contribute, on average, more to solutions or more to pollution, CO2 emissions, animal suffering, etc.?
I’m honestly not certain—I don’t believe we’ll solve any of these problems by a degrowth approach, so the only way to get a real solution is via innovation and/or adoption of solutions. More people would help with that, but also would contribute more to the problem in the meantime. I think whether the sign was positive or negative might depend on the specifics (eg, I think if environmentalists have fewer kids because of a fear of overpopulation, that will generally be bad for the environment).
As you might have seen, Project Drawdown is not my primary source. I came to my conclusions from various sources, which mostly agree on the general idea: Reducing population size and/or growth is a very effective means for positive change in several other cause areas. This does not rely on one single source.
Regarding the cost for providing contraceptives, the costs of less than 10 USD p.a. per user are well established. See, for example, this publication by the UN Population Fund (UNFPA):
As BenMillwood already mentioned, emissions reduction can be achieved almost anywhere, because in most countries actual fertility is higher than desired fertility. This gap varies from country to country but exists almost anywhere. At a current global birth rate of more than 130 million births annually, out of which more than 40% are unintended, I see big potential.
Which analysis of the beneficial effects on other cause areas do you disagree with, and why? I’d be happy to provide more sources and/or explanations, but for that I’d need to know which ones exactly you found to be weak.
I’d also like to point out that per-capita CO2 emissions in many countries will be rising in the next few decades and that, according to at least one peer-reviewed paper I cited, most of our efficiency gains that would reduce emissions were undone by population growth.