How many people do you want to share NZ with

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Forums › Politics › How many people do you want to share NZ with

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#2680408 25-Mar-2021 14:31

MikeB4:

The UK has a population circa 65 million and has a similar amount of roads, main trunk rail, back bone power reticulation etc to Aotearoa.

Those statements must be way wide of the mark. UK has nearly 250,000 miles or 400,000 kms of roads. NZ has factors less than that. Same for rail and power.

If NZ increased it's population to that sort of level it would be unrecognizable. It would no longer be NZ as we know it. South Island would need to expand it's population maybe 20 fold and have a large industrial base. You can't support those numbers with farming.

If you are comfortable with that fine but I think you might be an outlier with that opinion.

Having spent the first few decades of my life in various parts of the UK you do not want it believe me.

neb

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#2680451 25-Mar-2021 14:35

Geektastic: We’d also have to increase the tax base. A tiny percentage pay the majority of the income tax and 50% pay none after transfers. That’s not sustainable if you need to get more money.

Actually the list of things that would need to change, once you scratch the surface a bit, is long enough that it's getting close to "reformat and reinstall NZ". Which includes towing us to somewhere where the amount of exports and imports we'd need would be feasible.

Thus my comment that the people suggesting this are in la-la-land.

Dingbatt

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#2680470 25-Mar-2021 15:07

MikeB4:

@Dingbatt climate change and rising sea levels will impact our Island neighbours and territories. In many cases the Islands will need to be abandoned due to inundation and inability to produce food both land based and marine sources. We will need to open our entry to them to move here.

But you stated we would be forced to take them (NZ citizens aside).

Not unless you mean via the mechanism @neb suggested. But that is generally called an invasion or an occupation.

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#2680549 25-Mar-2021 15:44

@Dingbatt I meant we have a responsibility as a good world citizen to assist our neighbours. Our Pacific neighbours would/should be a high priority and that would/should diminish as the distance away diminishes. That said we should over as much regional assistance we can. Climate change is a planetary emergency and should be treated as such.

Here is a crazy notion, lets give peace a chance.

Geektastic

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#2680568 25-Mar-2021 16:35

MikeB4:
Geektastic:

How will that force us? We can control who comes in - as we’ve just proven.

1. Some are citizens of Aotearoa.

2. Caring for our neighbours.

Their homes will become uninhabitable and not of their doing. We have an obligation to assist.

If you say so.

Geektastic

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#2680569 25-Mar-2021 16:37

neb:
Geektastic: We’d also have to increase the tax base. A tiny percentage pay the majority of the income tax and 50% pay none after transfers. That’s not sustainable if you need to get more money.

Actually the list of things that would need to change, once you scratch the surface a bit, is long enough that it's getting close to "reformat and reinstall NZ". Which includes towing us to somewhere where the amount of exports and imports we'd need would be feasible.

Thus my comment that the people suggesting this are in la-la-land.

As long as the sea is available it’s feasible. Yes you’d need bigger ports and more efficient handling but since that is already done elsewhere, it can be replicated here with sufficient political will. No need to move NZ at all. Just to make more effort.

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Geektastic

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#2680573 25-Mar-2021 16:49

SJB:
MikeB4:

The UK has a population circa 65 million and has a similar amount of roads, main trunk rail, back bone power reticulation etc to Aotearoa.

Those statements must be way wide of the mark. UK has nearly 250,000 miles or 400,000 kms of roads. NZ has factors less than that. Same for rail and power.

If NZ increased it's population to that sort of level it would be unrecognizable. It would no longer be NZ as we know it. South Island would need to expand it's population maybe 20 fold and have a large industrial base. You can't support those numbers with farming.

If you are comfortable with that fine but I think you might be an outlier with that opinion.

Having spent the first few decades of my life in various parts of the UK you do not want it believe me.

Not that I’m supporting a 65 million population here (definitely not), but just to point out that the UK is unrecognisable if you’re old enough.

Roman Britain had about 3 million. By 1801 that was still just 10 million. In the 100 years between 1900 and 2000 it increased by about 25 million or 33%.

Unlike in this scenario, of course, it was not discussed in advance!

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#2680581 25-Mar-2021 17:07

So to answer the question originally posed.

If the catastrophists are to be believed then the world population needs to be reduced below 1 billion. That would mean NZ would need to drop its population to about 700000 to ‘do its part’ on a pro-rate basis to be a good global citizen.

I don’t have a problem with this....................as long as I get to choose who ;-D

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#2680610 25-Mar-2021 18:20

MikeB4:

GV27:

The question no one wants to ask is "Are people having fewer kids because they legitimately want to, or are they having fewer kids because we've made things like housing and other living costs so prohibitive that they don't feel they can afford to have more?"

That is a very complex topic. There are many factors affecting the desire to have or not have children. It would take more time than I have today (seeing a surgeon) and any full response would be a giant wall of text. I will ask my son (psychologist) if he can give me Readers Digest answer or an elevator version.

Not really. Internationally in every case increasing wealth and reduction in child mortality results in a decrease in birth rates. You don't need as many people to have a viable economic unit and you don't need excess kids as it limits your ability to capitalise on the available wealth in society.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_and_fertility

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#2680611 25-Mar-2021 18:21

1101:

Adding more people wont help NZ economy.
It will mean more people churning the same limited NZ money pool. So kiwi's will get poorer on av , long term .

That's not how an economy works.

Handle9

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#2680613 25-Mar-2021 18:25

kobiak:

I'd like Auckland and Wellington to become Melbourne type city with population 4-5 mills with their transport options only plz.

And as soon as you're out of town - there's dead land in AU and NZ. You can walk for days in our National Parks and see no other human on public easy trails. If you go harder - every other person you see (very unlikely) you treat them like a brother. and it's only 20 mins out of civilization.

I just hate to see how government and local bodies does not understand, that building major housing areas (read out west of AKL, eg. westgate, kumeu, etc) without planning public transport (oh yeah additional bus route every hour) - is no no no no no Noooooo No. I live myself at one of these townhouse villages and it takes me 12 mins to drive to the city without traffic and 30-50 mins during peak hour. But it takes me 40-50 mins on the bus without traffic and 1-1,5hrs during peak hours. do I take bus? :)

Therefore, government is not prepared for the growing population at all... like lot's of "planning" on paper, but little gets done. I'm living in AKL for almost 20 years now, and they are still discussing cycling/walking options on the harbour bridge or building another one next to it.

Governments and local authorities have a reasonable understanding of these topics. Voters don't, in particular rate payers.

The fixation by voters on "waste" in local authorities and capping rate rises and productive debt produces the outcome we have now. Infrastructure costs money. Someone has to pay. No one wants to.

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#2680677 25-Mar-2021 21:01

SJB:

Having spent the first few decades of my life in various parts of the UK you do not want it believe me.

Couldn't agree more with this. Main reason I'm in NZ having spent roughly half my life in UK is low population density here makes it a much nicer place to live. I really hope we can value this in NZ and control our population growth (preferably to 0%).

Emigration is easy enough for those who find NZ too boring and sparsely populated. I'll even offer a free ride to the airport

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#2680747 25-Mar-2021 22:07

Umm ... the only people sharing NZ are the Maori.

If you are not Maori feel free to keep quiet

MikeB4

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#2680796 25-Mar-2021 22:14

Batman:

Umm ... the only people sharing Aotearoa are the Maori.

If you are not Maori feel free to keep quiet

Fixed that for you

Here is a crazy notion, lets give peace a chance.

GV27

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#2680868 26-Mar-2021 08:02

Handle9:

Not really. Internationally in every case increasing wealth and reduction in child mortality results in a decrease in birth rates. You don't need as many people to have a viable economic unit and you don't need excess kids as it limits your ability to capitalise on the available wealth in society.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_and_fertility

We have been about where we are at in terms of social development in NZ for some time now. At some point, escalating living costs and housing pressures will contributing to ongoing declines in the size of families more than anything else.

I know it's easy to fall back on conventional wisdom but conventional wisdom says house prices should never have gotten to where they are, and pretending that hasn't had massive flow on effects would be ignoring an elephant in the room when it comes to future demographics. Otherwise we risk papering over symptoms instead of fixing the actual underlying problems.

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