WORLD POPULATIONS

Waikato Independent, Volume XXIV, Issue 2390, 30 October 1924, Page 7

WORLD POPULATIONS

HOW THEY ARE CHANGING. Remarkable changes have occurred in the last 50 years in. the. relative positions of Britain, America., Germany, and France, writes Sir Leo Griozza Money in ''Overseas." In 1870, when Hohenzollcrn William was proclaimed German Emperor at Versailles, France was the biggest of the four countries. She had roundly 38 million people, whereas Britain had only :'.() millions, Germany .'57 millions, and the United States 3(5 millions. After a lapse, of 5-1 years, France, which in 1870 had about 3<S millions, had, at the beginning of 1924, about 39 millions. Germany, which had 37 millions, has grown to (54 millions. The United States, which had 3(5 millions, has grown to 110 millions. The United Kingdom, which had only .'SO millions, lias grown to 481- millions. Thus in half a century what was the greatest white nation in the world lias added only about one million to its population, and that despite the fact that the French population figures include the people of the restored territories of Alsace-Lorraine. Frenchmen are yearly becoming a declining proportion of the world's people. Germany has almost doubled her population in the same time. The increase in the- population of the German Republic is now 000,000 to 700.000 a year, so that it will not be long before there are twice as many Germans as French| Even more remarkable is the case of the United States, which has nowgrown to about 110 millions. Her.natural growth is enormous, and although she has seriously curbed immigration by statute, she is constantly receiving a stream of new and vigorous citizens of all races. The growth of America has been the most wonderful thing that has happened in the last century. In twenty years (1900-1920) the United States increased in population by 29,700,000. In some years before the war America gained a million immigrants, including members of almost every race in the world. There arc actually more Irishmen in the United Slates than in Ireland.

The British figures given relate to Great Britain and Ireland only. Outside the British Isles there are in the British Empire some 17£ million white people of British and other origin. In 1924 the British Empire, as a whole, had about. (5(3 million whites, in addition to some 380 millions of coloured people.

Many Frenchmen themselves realise how serious the case has become. The French Government desires to maintain on annual contingent of 250,000 army recruits, but, as things :ire going, the yield of recruits will have fallen to about 1.13,000 by 193(5. In 50 years' time the French nation may number only 25 million people. Many proposals have been made to check the decline, and local authorities have been- encouraged by national subsidies 1o grant: bounties to families on the birth of every child after the second, with increased bounties as the family enlarges. All families, whatever their station in

life, are entitled to the bounties, in order to show clearly that the sum paid is not. charitable relief, but a reward for fruit fulness. It does not appear, however, that the bounties have had any substantial effect in opposing the limitation of families in a, country where birth control has become :iu established custom.