Seven billion people on Earth
Oct 31, 2011, 8:47 AM | Updated: 8:57 am
Listen to Dave Ross Commentary: Seven billion people
As a species we’ve been having a lot of sex. The UN says that early Monday morning, the seven billionth living human being was born. We are at the point now where every fifth of a second a woman gives birth. And apparently this woman can’t be stopped!
On Twitter, somebody named Jane Marie tweeted – “7 billion… that’s a lot!” Yes it is, Jane Marie… in fact if you laid 7 billion people head to toe, they would encircling the earth 266 times. And create the world’s largest Yoga class.
And yet, standing up, all 7 billion of us would fit within the boundaries of Los Angeles.
And indeed, growth rates have actually been slowing down in many countries. Populations in Europe are actually shrinking. Russia now pays women to have a second child.
So what does 7 billion mean, besides increasing the odds that someone actually WILL get hit by a piece of space junk someday?
It means we better not build that alligator filled-moat because it turns out the seven billion are not evenly distributed, and we’re going to need to import a lot of them.
The less developed countries are where the young people are — people who can get through an eight hour day without Advil.
And it’s the more developed countries that will need them.
Sure, it’s unfair to rack up debts for the next generation to pay off, but even worse would be if the next generation was too small to ever pay them off!
The day is coming when a third world woman will show up at the border and we will escort her to the birthing center and beg her to have an anchor baby, five a second if she can pull it off.
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