34 HENRY FAIRFIELD OSBORN 



quite a number of the men associated with the eugenic movement have aired much the 

 same views as East and their almost uniform suggestion has been to spread birth control 

 knowledge throughout the world and, in this way, avert the calamity of over-population 

 and worldwide misery, which was otherwise inevitable. 



Apart from a few countries such as China and India, possibly Japan, there is no evidence 

 of over-population, certainly not of serious over-population at the present time, because 

 never before in the history of the world has there been so much food available and so much 

 of other necessities of life. The reason that many people now are ill-fed and otherwise 

 destitute is not that there are too many people, but that our systems of distribution and 

 of consumption have broken down. Or to put it another way, it would not help the 

 present economic or social situation one bit if by some hocus pocus the population could 

 be uniformly reduced 50 per cent. I make this point because it is implied in the whole 

 theory of over-population. Those who have such views forget that people are producers 

 as well as consumers. The crux of the problem is not the absolute number of people but 

 rather the relation of the numbers of the people to the necessities available to them through 

 our existing channels of commerce. 



China and India are, as I have said, over-populated. My test is the low standard of life 

 in those two countries. The people are immeasurably worse off than are the people of 

 Europe or of America. Yet, it is of great interest to find that unemployment is not a 

 problem in those two countries. The masses are employed but their industry is so un- 

 organized, their channels of transport and distribution are so primitive, that there is a 

 very meager existence possible for the people. 



It is in a country like ours or in industrial Europe that we suffer from unemployment. 

 But here again, I am not at all sure that such unemployment is closely related to over- 

 population. We in the United States are certainly not over-populated by any test that I 

 know. England and Germany would be over-populated if they depended on themselves 

 for their food supply. But those two countries have launched on another program. 

 They are highly industrialized and exchange their surplus products for food. Ordinarily, 

 they have got along very well. The present crisis in which they and we and the rest of the 

 world are plunged is not the result of over-population. It is rather the result of dis- 

 organization and of a number of causes, some of which you have very clearly specified in 

 your category of "overs." 



I do not agree with Dublin as to the population in the United States, for 

 I think the present unemployment figures represent a condition likely to be 

 in part permanent. 



A recent unemployment estimate, revised by Dr. Dublin on July 30, is 

 as follows: 



Germany 5,500,000 



France 1,000,000 



United States 10,000,000 



England 4,000,000 



Total 20,500,000 



While some highly competent people are unemployed, the mass of un- 

 employment is among the less competent, because in every activity it is the 



