“Good advice is a bit like a bowl of [Brussels] sprouts at a dinner party. You don’t
always fancy taking some for yourself, but you’re happy to pass it on
to others.” —Mark Rice-Oxley
from Melissa Pejrano, Piacenza, Italy:
For a soft decline in population, advance the rights of women. Eliminate forced marriage, have an age of marriage of 18, provide for the education of girls, make sure the workplace is accessible, safe, and comfortable for women, and that they get equal pay for equal work, make available reproductive health services, including birth control, support women who choose not to marry and/or choose not to have children, set up retirement systems so that their children aren’t people’s retirement systems. Women who are self-respecting, socially and financially independent, and able to choose how many children they have, tend to have smaller families than those who aren’t in this fortunate position.*