The Declining Population

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"Nearly 10% population growth is slow only in relation to that of Burundi, the African country with the world's lowest per capita gross domestic product. Our population growth rate is comparable to Mexico's, Brazil's and Indonesia's."

Froma Harrop

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This morning, I have been reading with considerable interest Froma Harrop's column about America's "slow–growing population" for Creators Syndicate.

USA Today reports that, in the decade that has passed since Y2K, the U.S. population has risen 9.7%, Harrop writes. "For Americans concerned with a loss of open space and thickening congestion," she writes, "a 10% growth rate should seem darn high."

Now, they've been talking about a population explosion since I was a child. As I have said before, I am not a mathematician, but it seems to me that Harrop touches on something important there. I mean, to understand what the new population figures mean, isn't necessary to have some old figures to put the new ones in perspective?

As it turns out, USA Today did provide some numbers for the purposes of comparison, but those numbers don't suggest that the population is declining. It is still growing, just not as fast.

Here in Texas, for example, the population grew by more than 20% in the last 10 years. That seems like a high figure — and it is. As a result of that population growth, the Lone Star State will gain four House seats in 2012 (consequently, its representation in the Electoral College for the 2012, 2016 and 2020 presidential elections will go up by four as well).

But that growth rate is actually lower than it was in the 1990s, when Texas' population went up by more than 23%.

Clearly, though, the population of Texas is growing faster than most others — the rate of the increase has not been as great as it was, but it's still pretty impressive by most people's standards — and CBS News' Political Hotsheet observes that is bad news for Barack Obama and the Democrats.

Much of the population growth — and the resulting shifts of 12 House seats from one state to another — appears to be in states Obama didn't win two years ago.

"The new map will put a little more emphasis on southern battlegrounds like Florida at the expense of older battlegrounds like Ohio and Pennsylvania," write Anthony Salvanto and Mark Gersh for CBS News.

There may be more emphasis on Texas, too. Years ago, it overtook New York as the second–largest state. But, unless something radical happens in the next 18 months, I wouldn't expect Texas to be too competitive in 2012. Republican nominees have won Texas in every presidential election for the last 30 years.

That's clearly a concern for those for whom the presidential campaign never ends. I used to mean political activists, pollsters and campaign coordinators when I said things like that. Now, unfortunately, I mean just about everyone.

Well, that's not my primary concern in December 2010 — although Harrop does touch on one of my concerns.

"[G]reater political clout is something any state would welcome, and there's lots of room in Texas," she writes.

"But anyone who drives on Dallas' North Central Expressway at 4 p.m. on a workday knows the meaning of 'crowded.' The Lone Star State's big growth has been in the urban corridors, where there's no shortage of company."

So be warned, if you're planning a trip here for the Super Bowl in February.

At the moment, though, my immediate concern is for a friend of mine, who is purchasing a medical company.

This friend has been out of work for awhile. His wife works for a birthing center, and her employer is retiring. They're buying the business.

My friend tells me his wife has a lot of experience in this field. In her career, he says, she has participated in the delivery of more than 1,500 children.

It seems to me that that is the kind of experience an expectant mother would want to have on her side when her child is about to be born.

And, judging from the Census figures, there won't be a baby shortage around here any time soon.

So the prospects for my friend's acquisition seem pretty bright — even if the U.S. population is not growing as rapidly as it was.

The End of Prohibition

It was 75 years ago today that America ended its mostly failed experiment with Prohibition.

Prohibition ended on Dec. 5, 1933, when three states — Ohio, Pennsylvania and Utah — ratified the 21st Amendment — which repealed the 18th Amendment.

And syndicated columnist Froma Harrop says it's time to end the modern-day equivalent, "the so-called War on Drugs."

Those who oppose drug legalization should read the article. Not only does legalization make sense from a revenue standpoint, but, as Harrop points out, regulating the strength and purity of currently illegal drugs makes them less deadly.

Removing the "illegal" stigma from these drugs will make it more likely that those who need help will seek it. "We have treatments for alcoholism," Harrop writes, "but we don't ban alcohol." A valid point.

The "War on Drugs," Harrop observes, hasn't had the effect of inflating drug prices, thereby discouraging people from buying and consuming them. In fact, she says, "[t]he retail price of cocaine is now about half what it was in 1990."

Legalizing drugs also would take the profits out of the terrorists' pockets.

Harrop quotes a Harvard economist who contends that legalizing drugs could save $44 billion in enforcement costs while providing governments with up to $33 billion in revenues "were they to tax drugs as heavily as alcohol and tobacco."

It seems to me there would be all sorts of ripple effects from legalizing drugs — not the least of which would be the elimination of all the innocent victims of drive-by shootings from gang members and others involved in the illegal drug trade.

Economist Milton Friedman estimates that the criminalization of drugs has been responsible for more than 10,000 such fatalities — deaths of children, the elderly and other innocent bystanders — per year. These killings would cease if drugs were legalized, he says.

When was the last time you heard about someone being killed in a drive-by shooting that involved the sale of liquor?

"The war on drugs has led to gang violence, trampling of civil liberties, and military interventions abroad," writes Jacob Grier in The American Spectator. "Federalist principles are routinely ignored in medical marijuana raids, doctors face prosecution for prescribing painkillers, and ordinary adults must show their ID just to purchase effective cold medicine. The United States now has more than 300,000 people imprisoned for drug violations."

Harrop concedes that it won't be easy to end the "War on Drugs."

"Too many police, drug agents, bureaucrats, lawyers, judges, prison guards and sprayers of poppy fields have a stake in it," she says — and that, I presume, includes those companies that make their living testing other people's bodily fluids for trace evidence of recreational drug use. "But Prohibition was repealed once."

Indeed it was. And it took an economic crisis to make it happen.