China has a similar, though more severe worry, than the U.S.: Will there be enough young workers around to keep its economy ginning and provide for its rapidly growing elderly population?
Recently, China responded by further relaxing its child quota, now allowing three per family.
Although some see this as progress, that’s only if you ignore how such quotas are enforced: through government snooping on women and forced abortions when families don’t follow the rules, or when they don’t have the money to bribe officials to look the other way. Other punishments in the past, writes columnist Mona Charen, have included lost jobs, education denials and confiscated property.
Theoretically, increasing the permitted family size should reduce the number of forced abortions and other barbaric measures inflicted on the Chinese people, but it won’t eliminate them. When a government puts the supposed collective good over individual rights, it leads to indecent and inhumane treatment.
— From The Greenwood Commonwealth
