Chinas One Child Policy Essay, Research Paper

The success of China’s economy over the last two decades would have been much less impressive, if not impossible, had they decided on any other population policy? China’s family planing efforts have dropped the population growth from 3.3 percent in the seventies. To the current rate of 1.6 percent, moreover, during this period the fertility rate of Chinas women have dropped from 6 to 1.8 percent. The population of 65 years old was only 66 million in 1990, and now is expected to grow 90 million by 2000, and 167 million by 2020. China being over 1/6 of our population is wise to adopt this policy for themselves and to set an example for other developing countries. What is the one child policy? Chinas one chilled policy is a way for it to control the population while maintaining friendly relations with its people. The policy is like this; a mother may only have only one child, if the child is born with a serious disability (and would be unable to support the family in their old age) or if the child dies, then they are allowed to have another child. By 1998, the population of China stood at 1.248 billion and if not for the family planing program, they would be at 1.5 billion or more today. Two decades ago, the average amount of children per family was eight now it is at about 1. China is a major contributor to the world population and with such little agricultural land, is somewhat in a state of poverty and is now with the population growing at such a rapid pace they would have been in an extreme state of poverty by the year 2050. China is a communist country; which means every one has equal rights, services and an equal amount of work. This is why the one child policy is so effective for them. Every industry has its own family-planing agent who monitors and records the women who want to have a child. If they are following the law, and they maintain a one hundred percent one child rate of birth then the whole group receives extra benefits. This places pressure in the hands of the people. If one person does not comply than everyone loses his or her benefits. I am strongly in favor of Chinas one child policy. I also think that the Indians should adopt this policy. Right now 83 percent of the Chines population can read and write, while only 53 percent of the Indians can read and write, this percent will only get lower with the rise of the population. Education leads to smaller healthier families and there will be more education with a lower population. There is also a strong relationship between a mother’s education and the infant mortality rate, if the mother has a better education the child is more likely to survive infantry. In addition, the more educated the women may have fewer children later in life. This is why it is crucial to cut population now if we want it to stay lower later. Some would say that the one child policy is immoral, and you cannot deny natural rights such as the amount of children one has. Well how much less immoral is it to let your people live in poverty, with not enough food, clothing or education to survive.

Bibliography

http://www.needham.k12.ma.us/High_School/cur/kane98/kanep2/chinas1kid/dcva2.html