Abstract
A BROADSHBOT Population-a Challenge and a Choice Bol, issued by Political and Economic P a nirjgl Kttefnpts to re-state clearly and simply the agranenxs fr and against a determined effort to after the population trend in Great Britain, discussing thVeconomic prospects in relation to that trend, the internal social effects which would flow from certain trends and the effects on our international position. There is no purely eugenic argument as to the effects of population trend on the average inherited qualities of the population as a whole; but the importance of quantity in relation to the distribution of age-groups and in relation to the best training and use of the raw materials of population is emphasized throughout. Now that our numbers are within our own control and the standard of living for women is a major interest in our national life, it is concluded that the choice of family size which would be made by parents, if they considered only their own personal and social development and reasonable standards of life for themselves, would strike too low a level to maintain our numbers. There are no reliable signs that this tendency will be arrested, and it is urged that to such factors as improved social services connected with parenthood there must be added a willing and confident acceptance of the demands which are made of us as a community if we are to play a worthy part in the world, and a new attitude to parenthood which will modify calculations of purely personal comfort or competition.
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Population Policy in Great Britain. Nature 158, 265 (1946). https://doi.org/10.1038/158265c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/158265c0