OUR MISSION
Envisioning a sustainable, healthy and happy human population living in harmony with the natural environment.
Utah and UPEC
Utah’s beautiful, pristine, and expansive natural environment has been greatly degraded in recent years, fueled by high population growth and rapid growth of its resource extraction-based economic sectors. Utah’s leaders are actively planning to accommodate a predicted doubling of the population in the next 20 to 30 years – especially along the urban Wasatch Front.
UPEC was founded in 1997 initially to provide a data-based foundation for considering population and environment concerns and issues. It is managed and directed by board members who meet regularly (please see Who We Are).
We believe it is our responsibility as citizens of the earth to be concerned about the environment, sustainability, and population. We place special value on the unique heritage and landscape of the state of Utah.
Read UPEC’s Updated White Paper
We all face many important choices as we live our lives and form relationships with others, and with society as a whole. Many factors influence population levels, of course, but this white paper will discuss one of the most personal and important choices we face that affects our population — how many children to bring into this world — and the implications of this choice for ourselves, and our state, nation, planet. READ MORE
We at UPEC are somewhat agnostic -- or, that is, our opinions vary -- about "degrowth" (that is, reducing economic growth, not population growth!). On the one hand, we can't grow at 3% forever ... think of the chess board with the amount of rice doubling on each board (at 3%, we double the economy every 24 years). On the other hand, as renowned economist Branko Milanovic points out in this piece, arresting economic growth is, at the moment, wishful thinking at best (and likely very harmful to many). Our White Paper assumes continued economic growth but softens the impact of it by embracing future population declines .... thoughts? www.globalpolicyjournal.com/blog/23/02/2021/degrowth-solving-impasse-magical-thinking
Degrowth: Solving the Impasse by Magical Thinking | Global Policy Journal
www.globalpolicyjournal.com
Branko Milanovic outlines the ideological divides and rhetorical tacti...
The Chinese unfortunately seems to be reading all the birth-dearth articles in the western press! Although we applaud getting rid of birth restrictions, we wish China would not encourage its citizens to have more babies. Fewer children mean a cleaner environment, at least a chance of meeting climate change targets, a healthier population, and more resources for everyone. Luckily, the Chinese people likely agree; we bet the birthrate won't increase much as a result of this policy shift because couples want a higher standard of living.
China Three-Child Policy Aims to Rejuvenate Aging Population
www.google.com
China’s top decision-making body said the government would raise its...
The lead article on the NY Times's webpage today is titled "Long Slide Looms for World Population." You can probably imagine UPEC's thoughts on this -- but we would love to hear yours. At least this article does nod toward some of the benefits of declining fertility: "Smaller populations could lead to higher wages, more equal societies, lower carbon emissions and a higher quality of life for the smaller numbers of children who are born." But these are the afterthoughts in an otherwise pessimistic piece. The article concentrates too much on just a few wealthy nations and fails to mention that the global population is still going to increase tremendously from today, to more than 11 billion in 2100. www.nytimes.com/2021/05/22/world/global-population-shrinking.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&p...
Long Slide Looms for World Population, With Sweeping Ramifications
www.nytimes.com
Fewer babies’ cries. More abandoned homes. Toward the middle of this...
There's good news and bad news coming out of the Census Bureau ... the U.S.'s overall population growth is slowing, but Utah -- no surprise -- continues to explode. Over the last decade, Wasatch County was the 3rd fastest growing county in America! We have a lot more to do ... ![]()
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apnews.com/article/bb73cf7437af6a520b945517f69e63c9
Report: 3 Utah areas top nation in population growth
apnews.com
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — The U.S. Census Bureau has released a report o...
No, you weren't imagining all that traffic on 40 coming from Park City! Unfortunately for Utah, Heber ranked fifth among all American metro areas for the most in-migration during the COVID 19 pandemic!
How the Pandemic Did, and Didn’t, Change Where Americans Move
www.nytimes.com
As disruptive as the pandemic has been, for the most part it hasn’t ...Upcoming Events
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