The part I don't understand is why it's important to hit the "replacement level". Wouldn't it be better for the planet if there were fewer people living on it and competing for resources?
The economy will crumble if we don't get to replacement levels at least, but it will also crumble, along with everything else if we do. Only way out of this is to change the whole model before it crumbles. But that would mean the rich need to get (willingly) less rich, so I'm not holding out hope...
Yes, but our whole economy, and maybe even society itself is built on the requirement and assumption of growth.
We steal tomorrow to pay for today.
If we stop having enough people to grow, we will collapse under the requirements of our system until a new non-growth economy/society is formed from the ashes.
I don't think it will be possible to have a smooth transition to a non-growth or low-growth society since very few people will willingly sacrifice the amenities we pay with in debt, which is paid for by predicted growth.
When that predicted growth goes negative, collectively, we will not be able to afford the things we want, and that will cause mass chaos and potentially even resource wars.
Actually, you're right, and I think that lowered populations are a good thing. World needs quality people, not just quantity. A world filled with a smaller amount of environmentally conscious and responsible people is better than a world filled with a large amount of meat eating, gas guzzler driving jackasses that spend all their time being racist, while overconsuming everything and yelling and shooting at anyone who even suggests that maybe they should cut down on consumption.
That's true but the largest impact is caused by billionaires who fly even-more-gas-guzzling private jets, hunt and/or eat endangered species, buy gold and jewelry made with blood materials from Africa and use their spending power to influence the world negatively in multiple ways for profit.
The Ponzi scheme, that is American “social security” (I mean actual social security, but all the rest of the social services too), would collapse if there arent more poor people pumping money into, than are taking out of it. Instead of doing shit like taxing the fuck out of the rich, or AI/robots.
But, yes, it would solve A LOT of the worlds problems if there were less people.
How do you figure. If the workforce becomes by and large robotic, taxing the businesses, based on that, like you would humans, would work well enough. If not, then there needs to be some concession from businesses to pay the same or more as when humans were doing the jobs.