Problem of Human Heredity 153 



Probably the most potent remedy for this 

 situation is the development of a sense of 

 obligation on the part of the really able parents 

 to increase the size of their families as a means 

 of contributing to social improvement, rather 

 than voluntarily restricting the size in the 

 interests of ease and luxury, as seems to be 

 now so prevalent a custom. 



Social and economic readjustments, which 

 make possible earlier marriages in the desirable 

 classes, are important factors in any eugenic 

 program, for any social group that marries 

 at twenty will in a few generations outnumber 

 and replace a competing class that marries at 

 thirty. - An economy of a few years in the 

 process of education, a larger wage to the 

 young, skilled worker, or a reduction in the cost 

 of the necessities of life by governmental 

 control of the sources of supply, by inventions 

 that cheapen production, by better methods in 

 agriculture — such apparently unrelated factors 

 are really determining influences in the size of 

 families, and so contribute directly to racial 

 improvement by selective breeding. 



