Innovative Solution to Population Growth

Warning - the following has something for everyone, and is sure to satisfy no one...

Seed Exchange...

Kenneth Boulding proposed the idea that when a child (boy or girl) is first borne, they are issued 'rights' to 1.1 children.  Every whole right entitled a couple to 1 future child (average of 2.2 kids per couple).  Each 1/10 right unit would trade as a certificate on an exchange, effectively like the current stock markets.

Those who are particularly wealthy, or particularly virile, could purchase additional rights on the open market.  Those who were perhaps more career-oriented, or perhaps future clergymen, would choose to instead sell their rights on the open market, to the previously mentioned groups.

For the conservatives...

This proposal is a market based solution, and will help maintain the current prosperity of this country.  There is not much need for government mandates, other than instituting and enforcing the initial ratio of 1.1 rights per child, or 2.2 rights per couple.  Prices would be set by market demand - higher when people feel frisky, and lower when people became more abstinent.  Brilliant!

For the liberals...

This would act as a de facto form of income equalizer.  The rich would have many children, and hence become more and more poor.  The poor would still be allowed to have children, but could give up some of those 'rights' in order to escape from the poverty trap.

Alternative...

Kenneth Boulding's original proposal actually differs from the above version, in that he believed only baby girls should be given rights, with 2.2 going to each.  The benefit of this is that it directly empowers women to make economical and rational decisions regarding child-birth.  Particularly in those societies, or pockets of society, where women have less access to economic independence, this 'seed market' would potentially open up options for women to become free from masculine oppression.  Brilliant!

The sheer unfamiliarity of a scheme of this kind makes it seem absurd at the moment.  The fact that it seems absurd, however, is merely a reflection of the total unwillingness of mankind to face up to what is perhaps its most serious long-run problem. (Kenneth Boulding)