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One Billion Americans: The Case for Thinking Bigger
What would actually make America great: more people.
If the most challenging crisis in living memory has shown us anything, it's that America has lost the will and the means to lead. We can't compete with the huge population clusters of the global marketplace by keeping our population static or letting it diminish, or with our crumbling transit and unaffordable housing. The winner in the future world is going to have more--more ideas, more ambition, more utilization of resources, more people.
Exactly how many Americans do we need to win? According to Matthew Yglesias, one billion.
From one of our foremost policy writers, One Billion Americans is the provocative yet logical argument that if we aren't moving forward, we're losing. Vox founder Yglesias invites us to think bigger, while taking the problems of decline seriously. What really contributes to national prosperity should not be controversial: supporting parents and children, welcoming immigrants and their contributions, and exploring creative policies that support growth--like more housing, better transportation, improved education, revitalized welfare, and climate change mitigation. Drawing on examples and solutions from around the world, Yglesias shows not only that we can do this, but why we must.
Making the case for massive population growth with analytic rigor and imagination, One Billion Americans issues a radical but undeniable challenge: Why not do it all, and stay on top forever?
If the most challenging crisis in living memory has shown us anything, it's that America has lost the will and the means to lead. We can't compete with the huge population clusters of the global marketplace by keeping our population static or letting it diminish, or with our crumbling transit and unaffordable housing. The winner in the future world is going to have more--more ideas, more ambition, more utilization of resources, more people.
Exactly how many Americans do we need to win? According to Matthew Yglesias, one billion.
From one of our foremost policy writers, One Billion Americans is the provocative yet logical argument that if we aren't moving forward, we're losing. Vox founder Yglesias invites us to think bigger, while taking the problems of decline seriously. What really contributes to national prosperity should not be controversial: supporting parents and children, welcoming immigrants and their contributions, and exploring creative policies that support growth--like more housing, better transportation, improved education, revitalized welfare, and climate change mitigation. Drawing on examples and solutions from around the world, Yglesias shows not only that we can do this, but why we must.
Making the case for massive population growth with analytic rigor and imagination, One Billion Americans issues a radical but undeniable challenge: Why not do it all, and stay on top forever?
267 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2020
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2,988 people want to read
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October 10, 2020
Most polemics don’t persuade anyone of anything, they just provide comfort and occasionally a new argument for those who already believe. Matthew Yglesias’s brilliant book could be an exception that genuinely change some minds. I don’t mean persuade anyone that the United States should have more immigration or invest more in children, my guess is most of his readers already thought that. Instead, Yglesias might persuade his readers of the greatness of the American project, the importance of the United States continuing to be the leading country in the world, and the fact that it is currently under threat from a growing China. The book’s strong opening chapters eloquently make the case for America’s role in the world, why it is better than the alternatives, how we won World War II, and why that spirit matters in the future, a sentiment that is sometimes missing from the publication he founded which has been known to publish July 4th pieces regretting the very existence of an independent United States.
If a Council of Foreign Relations type read the book (and I hope they do but fear they won’t), they would get a new argument for high levels of immigration: “What the various diplomats and admirals and trade negotiators and Asia hands who think about the China question don’t want to admit is that all the diplomacy and aircraft carriers and shrewd trade tactics in the world aren’t going to make a whit of difference if China is just a much bigger and more important country than we are. The original Thirteen Colonies, by the same token, could have made for a nice, quiet, prosperous agricultural nation—like a giant New Zealand. But no number of smart generals could have helped a country like that intervene decisively in World War II.”
If a nativist politician read the book (and I know they won’t) they would have to either change their mind, dismiss it without cause (the most likely), or retreat to an argument that they supported a smaller, weaker, poor United States because they did not want to see further changes in its racial/ethnic composition which they value enough to outweigh these other concerns.
Personally, I was a convert on both of the causes above but I got a lot of new arguments, an organizing principle for those arguments, and some nifty data. The nationalistic argument may be more persuasive than the more moral and narrowly economic appeal that Bryan Caplan made in the also excellent Open Borders: The Science and Ethics of Immigration. (Caplan’s case resonates a bit more with me, but I suspect Yglesias nationalistic arguments and rejection of open borders is the wiser approach politically.)
If you had asked me before this book I would have said 1 billion Americans was a lot. But Yglesias marshals a lot of data about how it would still leave us much less dense than most of Europe and resource abundant relative to population as compared to many countries. He never seriously (or even at all) addresses adjustment costs, but given that it is more about an ambitious goal than the likelihood that we will get there anytime soon that is an understandable omission.
Yglesias focuses on immigration and having children. On immigration he has the heterodox-for-a-progressive view that we should care about what types of immigrants we get, if it is more politically possible to expand for some groups we should, and that a differential tax rate for immigrants to reflect the benefits America creates for them would be tolerable. On having children Yglesias makes a heterodox pro-natalist argument for a relatively conventional but worthy progressive list of child allowances, preschool and the like—with an emphasis on genuine universality and the addition of marriage penalties to the list of public policy problems, something often omitted from progressive lists.
He also focuses on what would need to be done to make it work with an outstanding capsule discussion of trends in American economic geography and advocacy of reducing land use restrictions, a cause he has been a leading advocate of.
Overall, the book is intelligent, insightful, often heterodox, and persuaded me of the case for focusing on and making arguments for issues that are first order important and expanding the Overton window rather than just staying within the current and more limited paradigms.
If a Council of Foreign Relations type read the book (and I hope they do but fear they won’t), they would get a new argument for high levels of immigration: “What the various diplomats and admirals and trade negotiators and Asia hands who think about the China question don’t want to admit is that all the diplomacy and aircraft carriers and shrewd trade tactics in the world aren’t going to make a whit of difference if China is just a much bigger and more important country than we are. The original Thirteen Colonies, by the same token, could have made for a nice, quiet, prosperous agricultural nation—like a giant New Zealand. But no number of smart generals could have helped a country like that intervene decisively in World War II.”
If a nativist politician read the book (and I know they won’t) they would have to either change their mind, dismiss it without cause (the most likely), or retreat to an argument that they supported a smaller, weaker, poor United States because they did not want to see further changes in its racial/ethnic composition which they value enough to outweigh these other concerns.
Personally, I was a convert on both of the causes above but I got a lot of new arguments, an organizing principle for those arguments, and some nifty data. The nationalistic argument may be more persuasive than the more moral and narrowly economic appeal that Bryan Caplan made in the also excellent Open Borders: The Science and Ethics of Immigration. (Caplan’s case resonates a bit more with me, but I suspect Yglesias nationalistic arguments and rejection of open borders is the wiser approach politically.)
If you had asked me before this book I would have said 1 billion Americans was a lot. But Yglesias marshals a lot of data about how it would still leave us much less dense than most of Europe and resource abundant relative to population as compared to many countries. He never seriously (or even at all) addresses adjustment costs, but given that it is more about an ambitious goal than the likelihood that we will get there anytime soon that is an understandable omission.
Yglesias focuses on immigration and having children. On immigration he has the heterodox-for-a-progressive view that we should care about what types of immigrants we get, if it is more politically possible to expand for some groups we should, and that a differential tax rate for immigrants to reflect the benefits America creates for them would be tolerable. On having children Yglesias makes a heterodox pro-natalist argument for a relatively conventional but worthy progressive list of child allowances, preschool and the like—with an emphasis on genuine universality and the addition of marriage penalties to the list of public policy problems, something often omitted from progressive lists.
He also focuses on what would need to be done to make it work with an outstanding capsule discussion of trends in American economic geography and advocacy of reducing land use restrictions, a cause he has been a leading advocate of.
Overall, the book is intelligent, insightful, often heterodox, and persuaded me of the case for focusing on and making arguments for issues that are first order important and expanding the Overton window rather than just staying within the current and more limited paradigms.
September 9, 2020
fantastically and fundamentally misunderstands and misrepresents simple concepts, like socioecological carrying capacity and resource scarcity acceleration. the core premises of this book cannot support the weight of their own painfully obtuse oversights, let alone the nationalistic crap heaped atop.
September 26, 2020
A few pages into this book I declared to my husband, "This is a profoundly unserious book".
So I'm a fan of Vox and a listener of The Weeds, and I'm entrenched in pro-city pro-housing discourse, and of course I'm pro-immigration, so I was inclined to be a sympathetic audience to at least the policies in this book.
The problem is that MY writes in such a glib style, basically a series of superficial takes, that it's hard to take this seriously even when you agree. Each chapter of this book deserves its own deep dive, not an arrogant hit take. There are major gaps. He's never quite convincing when being jingoist against China; the arguments are better when framed in terms of benefits to Americans themselves. Eh, maybe I'm not the target audience after all.
If you like MY, and want to read him explain white papers for 270 pages, you might like this. But I still recommend you read a book on housing advocacy, or City Power, or a book on immigration reform, or a book on family policy, instead of this.
So I'm a fan of Vox and a listener of The Weeds, and I'm entrenched in pro-city pro-housing discourse, and of course I'm pro-immigration, so I was inclined to be a sympathetic audience to at least the policies in this book.
The problem is that MY writes in such a glib style, basically a series of superficial takes, that it's hard to take this seriously even when you agree. Each chapter of this book deserves its own deep dive, not an arrogant hit take. There are major gaps. He's never quite convincing when being jingoist against China; the arguments are better when framed in terms of benefits to Americans themselves. Eh, maybe I'm not the target audience after all.
If you like MY, and want to read him explain white papers for 270 pages, you might like this. But I still recommend you read a book on housing advocacy, or City Power, or a book on immigration reform, or a book on family policy, instead of this.
Want to read
October 19, 2021Would someone please explain how tripling the number of Americans could result in anything other than an environmental catastrophe?
June 27, 2020
Very provocative and thought provoking. I have no doubt that many will take issues with some of the details but I think the big picture argument is fairly persuasive.
August 4, 2020
Here’s a public service announcement — don’t waste your time or money reading the work of a serial plagiarist. Just take a second to google the author. His entire reputation is hearing about an existing fact, and then pretending he’s the first one to ever hear of it.
This book is filled with poorly researched dog-whistles that are ignorant at best and openly racist at worst.
This book is filled with poorly researched dog-whistles that are ignorant at best and openly racist at worst.
June 4, 2021
Initially, I thought this book would be very interesting and promising. It calls for a very radical shift in American policy by aspiring to triple the population from 330m today to 1b eventually. This idea is bound to have many implications on politics and views on race, culture, and religion. Many arguments about the role of America in the world could be made; about how this changes relations between the US and its allies and its continent; about how other countries (i.e., Australia, Canada, etc.) which have explicitly sought to increase its population numbers have succeeded (or failed) in realising this vision.
However, this book was mostly about the policy minutiae that could possibly engineer a larger population, though the author does not prove that any of his policy proposals would even result in the vision he outlined to begin with. There were many standard progressive talking points like free college tuition, heavily subsidised preschool education, and higher investment into infrastructure, as well as some less common ideas like relocating Federal Government departments from Washington, D.C. and ending the summer holiday (and having a Singapore-style school holiday system). The explanation of the policies was detailed, but the part about increasing the population always seemed like an ancillary benefit of those policies rather than the main focus. Ultimately, I am very doubtful as to whether these ideas can achieve "one billion Americans". Even if they all passed, the existing disincentives to have children entail that the increase in the number of children born would still be too marginal to hit skyrocketing population growth. The only way to achieve this would probably be mass-scale immigration, which the author does spend a chapter discussing, but which again needs to be far more radical than the author supposes. It cannot simply be about increasing the number of H1B visas, or allowing universities to accept more foreign students, but really must involve opening the doors wide and accepting virtually anyone applying for citizenship, including those who are low-skilled and uneducated, which is not a group that the book talks about much at all.
Overall, some interesting ideas but not really what the cover says it is about.
However, this book was mostly about the policy minutiae that could possibly engineer a larger population, though the author does not prove that any of his policy proposals would even result in the vision he outlined to begin with. There were many standard progressive talking points like free college tuition, heavily subsidised preschool education, and higher investment into infrastructure, as well as some less common ideas like relocating Federal Government departments from Washington, D.C. and ending the summer holiday (and having a Singapore-style school holiday system). The explanation of the policies was detailed, but the part about increasing the population always seemed like an ancillary benefit of those policies rather than the main focus. Ultimately, I am very doubtful as to whether these ideas can achieve "one billion Americans". Even if they all passed, the existing disincentives to have children entail that the increase in the number of children born would still be too marginal to hit skyrocketing population growth. The only way to achieve this would probably be mass-scale immigration, which the author does spend a chapter discussing, but which again needs to be far more radical than the author supposes. It cannot simply be about increasing the number of H1B visas, or allowing universities to accept more foreign students, but really must involve opening the doors wide and accepting virtually anyone applying for citizenship, including those who are low-skilled and uneducated, which is not a group that the book talks about much at all.
Overall, some interesting ideas but not really what the cover says it is about.
November 5, 2020
This was a good book to read on a day like yesterday, where I was too distracted by election news to do any real work while simultaneously looking for an alternative from being glued to Twitter all day. It's a quite easy read, essentially an extended Vox article written in Yglesias's characteristic conversational/simplistic style.
Yglesias is ostensibly arguing that the US must increase its population to 1 billion in order to compete with China and India, following the straightforward logic than having more people translates directly to more resources to work with in a scenario where competition with a rising China and India is important. However, my suspicion is that Yglesias doesn't care all that much about this wider goal (he only dedicates a few pages to it) and is more a rationale for expounding on his pet issues of immigration, family policy, and urbanism. That's not meant as a dig-- he makes quite compelling and reasonable arguments on all of these topics-- but just worth noting that the book is more about residential zoning and the economics of productivity than it is about aircraft carriers and defense policy.
Like I said, I found Yglesias's proposals to be reasonable and even inspiring. I think it would be great if we could have a more generous welfare state that specifically encourages growth of families, if we built denser housing in urban areas, and if the US as a whole put more thought into solving the problem of public transportation, which is fundamentally a technical one that doesn't need grandiose thinking by any means. I also buy his argument that more immigration ends up being good for everyone. Thus, Yglesias paints a picture of a cosmopolitan, well-functioning American society in which individuals are free from much of the economic constraints that currently hobble higher economy productivity.
Yglesias falls short, though, in two key areas. The first is climate change. He does address the fact that more people naturally leads to greater overall carbon emissions, though he makes a solid point in that it's more about the technology we use than about people themselves. However, it all amounts to a kind of hand-waviness about the issue; he basically just says that by enacting this agenda, we'll have more innovation towards carbon-neutral alternatives, and that will solve the problem. That seems somewhat fanciful to me.
The second issue is that of cultural backlash to immigration. While I personally have no doubts that bringing in skilled workers from around the globe would be a net positive for a variety of reasons, I believe a backlash to such immigration is inevitable, and takes place not on economic grounds but on cultural grounds. Yglesias acknowledges this as well, but he just calls it racist and moves on. While that may be a fair enough assessment of what it is, I think he underestimates the degree to which that would be a powerful political obstacle here. Perhaps it's not his job to think about backlash, but anyone who seeks to carry out these policies will have to think hard about how backlash is to be managed and dealt with. After all, our current president came to power on the back of such a backlash.
Yglesias is ostensibly arguing that the US must increase its population to 1 billion in order to compete with China and India, following the straightforward logic than having more people translates directly to more resources to work with in a scenario where competition with a rising China and India is important. However, my suspicion is that Yglesias doesn't care all that much about this wider goal (he only dedicates a few pages to it) and is more a rationale for expounding on his pet issues of immigration, family policy, and urbanism. That's not meant as a dig-- he makes quite compelling and reasonable arguments on all of these topics-- but just worth noting that the book is more about residential zoning and the economics of productivity than it is about aircraft carriers and defense policy.
Like I said, I found Yglesias's proposals to be reasonable and even inspiring. I think it would be great if we could have a more generous welfare state that specifically encourages growth of families, if we built denser housing in urban areas, and if the US as a whole put more thought into solving the problem of public transportation, which is fundamentally a technical one that doesn't need grandiose thinking by any means. I also buy his argument that more immigration ends up being good for everyone. Thus, Yglesias paints a picture of a cosmopolitan, well-functioning American society in which individuals are free from much of the economic constraints that currently hobble higher economy productivity.
Yglesias falls short, though, in two key areas. The first is climate change. He does address the fact that more people naturally leads to greater overall carbon emissions, though he makes a solid point in that it's more about the technology we use than about people themselves. However, it all amounts to a kind of hand-waviness about the issue; he basically just says that by enacting this agenda, we'll have more innovation towards carbon-neutral alternatives, and that will solve the problem. That seems somewhat fanciful to me.
The second issue is that of cultural backlash to immigration. While I personally have no doubts that bringing in skilled workers from around the globe would be a net positive for a variety of reasons, I believe a backlash to such immigration is inevitable, and takes place not on economic grounds but on cultural grounds. Yglesias acknowledges this as well, but he just calls it racist and moves on. While that may be a fair enough assessment of what it is, I think he underestimates the degree to which that would be a powerful political obstacle here. Perhaps it's not his job to think about backlash, but anyone who seeks to carry out these policies will have to think hard about how backlash is to be managed and dealt with. After all, our current president came to power on the back of such a backlash.
October 22, 2020
I regularly listen to Matthew Yglesias on the Weeds and am inclined to agree with him on many topics, but I wasn't impressed by this book. The majority of the book purports to cover at a very high level, policy changes that would encourage and support American population growth, but it failed to convince me that premise was a worthwhile goal. Policy ideas are discussed in a very high level informal way with little empirical evidence. And it's almost as if Yglesias forgot why he brings up various topics in the first place. The last paragraph of each section tries to remind us by saying, "oh yah, this would help a larger population too".
September 20, 2020
Yglesias makes the argument that Americans have for decades been thinking way, way too small. And that the greatest way to ensure American prosperity and maximum freedom for the world is to massively increase the American population through pro-family policies and immigration. Indeed, he takes seriously the rhetorical proclamations of the Left and the Right, but proposes policies that would make those a reality. Americans often declare their support for the American family and for immigration of high-skilled individuals, but in practice our policies are hellish for both. Child-birth and rearing are made extremely difficult by high cost healthcare and childcare, paired with debt-financed college which is the surest way to obtain a family-supporting job. The powers-that-be insist on the importance of families, and yet they stymie every effort to build more affordable housing or admit more healthcare workers from abroad.
On the immigration front, Yglesias restatates a point that used to be American gospel. The U.S. could easily find and admit hundreds of millions of the most ambitious, diligent, and well-qualified immigrants. He shreds the xenophobic policy arguments of conservatives, who design "merit-based" policies that only manage to throttle all immigration. American healthcare is extremely expensive, so what possible reason could there be for blocking immigration of doctors and nurses, or even healthcare aides who would help bring down the cost of elder care among America's aging population.
The book is more of a survey of the issues, rather than an airtight policy argument. But the one-billion Americans agenda is ambitious and inspiring. It was the first truly uplifting political message that I'd heard in the 12 years since President Obama's first campaign. I recommend this book to all Americans simply because it encourages us to think so much bigger than the small-mindedness of heckling over marginal corporate tax rates, the kind of small thinking that has commanded our attention for too long.
On the immigration front, Yglesias restatates a point that used to be American gospel. The U.S. could easily find and admit hundreds of millions of the most ambitious, diligent, and well-qualified immigrants. He shreds the xenophobic policy arguments of conservatives, who design "merit-based" policies that only manage to throttle all immigration. American healthcare is extremely expensive, so what possible reason could there be for blocking immigration of doctors and nurses, or even healthcare aides who would help bring down the cost of elder care among America's aging population.
The book is more of a survey of the issues, rather than an airtight policy argument. But the one-billion Americans agenda is ambitious and inspiring. It was the first truly uplifting political message that I'd heard in the 12 years since President Obama's first campaign. I recommend this book to all Americans simply because it encourages us to think so much bigger than the small-mindedness of heckling over marginal corporate tax rates, the kind of small thinking that has commanded our attention for too long.
February 6, 2021
It's not uncommon for readers of science fiction to bemoan the state of the genre. It's too dysptopian! I don't think I realized until now how much of the Golden Age consisted of big visions for the future carrying within them wonky overviews of various strands of science. By 2001, everyone will have household nuclear reactors. And by year 2100, if Matthew Yglesias has his way, the USA will have One Billion Americans.
The big frame is that there is no way the USA's 350 million patriots will continue to economically outcompete 1.5-2 billion Chinese. Should they give in to decline or should they try to win? Well, if you want to win, here you go: if the USA grows to 1 billion people, there is no way Uncle Sam could lose! It seems ridiculous, and yet reading One Billion Americans, it struck me as completely doable. In the epilogue, Yglesias explains that this is because the policies aren't so difficult. When it comes to immigration, more people want to come to American than leave. When it comes to family size, people in the aggregate are not having as many children as they say they would like. Building would be easier if there were fewer veto points and zoning/ building regulations. And America is full of empty space relative to many other countries.
In Why We Are Polarized, Ezra Klein explained that Democrats are from Mars and Republicans are from Venus. What will come of the polarization? Klein calls for an end to the filibuster, a move that Yglesias supports, but this book is about a unifying vision. The 1 billion agenda's values (e.g. American power, family first policy) superficially read as conservative (though I'm not sure Republicans still care about family values, to be honest). Many of the policies are associated with Democrats (wonky technocratic planning). Why not come together behind this audacious vision to build a golden future?
The big frame is that there is no way the USA's 350 million patriots will continue to economically outcompete 1.5-2 billion Chinese. Should they give in to decline or should they try to win? Well, if you want to win, here you go: if the USA grows to 1 billion people, there is no way Uncle Sam could lose! It seems ridiculous, and yet reading One Billion Americans, it struck me as completely doable. In the epilogue, Yglesias explains that this is because the policies aren't so difficult. When it comes to immigration, more people want to come to American than leave. When it comes to family size, people in the aggregate are not having as many children as they say they would like. Building would be easier if there were fewer veto points and zoning/ building regulations. And America is full of empty space relative to many other countries.
In Why We Are Polarized, Ezra Klein explained that Democrats are from Mars and Republicans are from Venus. What will come of the polarization? Klein calls for an end to the filibuster, a move that Yglesias supports, but this book is about a unifying vision. The 1 billion agenda's values (e.g. American power, family first policy) superficially read as conservative (though I'm not sure Republicans still care about family values, to be honest). Many of the policies are associated with Democrats (wonky technocratic planning). Why not come together behind this audacious vision to build a golden future?
Read
November 14, 2020"Yglesias’ book is very interesting and useful because it shows how something many Americans, including him, assume to be so obvious as to be beyond dispute, actually leads to an utterly absurd conclusion when you work out the implications of it."
Nathan Robinson on why "nationalism is a brain disease":
https://www.currentaffairs.org/2020/1...
September 17, 2020
Yglesias's "One Billion Americans" is on some ways a welcome return to the mid 20th Century form of using policy to diagnose and influence real-world problems rather than taking a pessimistic, lassez faire approach. The central thesis of the book is a response to the observation that America's world supremacy in an economic and political sense has been declining over the past two decades. Yglasias notes that China and India have populations four times later than the US and posits that the solution might be to drastically upsize the population rather than hope Asia falters in its development.
The first chapters outline the problem; historically the US had an advantage in global conflicts such as WWII because it vastly outnumbered the Axis Powers. Yglasias provides evidence that innovation is directly linked to density, allowing thought economies to specialise and giving experts the ability to associate with each other in proximity. Trying to do more with numerically fewer people is simply an economic and political disadvantage. Plus, says Yglasias, the United States is extremely sparsely populated compared to peer nations like France, the UK and Germany. A United States with one billion inhabitants would be like France, not a Blade Runner dystopia. Younger people are also economically less stable than previous generations, as evidenced by the fact that they consistently have fewer children than they say they'd like to.
The second part of the book describes the solutions. These include:
- providing robust support for families in the form of parental leave, childcare and education,
- allowing many more immigrants into the country, particularly high-skilled immigrants, and
- strategically providing incentives for the public and private sector to relocate to depopulating, smaller urban centres.
The book draws on various lines of evidence for these sections, including economic data for various generations of parents, childcare costs, present immigration statistics and presents common-sense economic arguments for the various cycles that lead to population loss or accretion.
Part three of the book discusses many of the issues that would be faced as a result of implementing the One Billion Americans policy and some potential solutions. The section on housing scarcity that examines the multitude problems with NIMBYs and their unrepresentative, disproportionate impact on the supply side of the housing problem is particularly good. The examples of the SBahn, food supply and American military overspend are also well-researched and draw on good data.
I do have issues with Yglasias's thesis, though. While his economic arguments are compelling, the case for why America should maintain its supremacy is never explicitly made; instead, we are repeatedly told this supremacy is something America "can and should" maintain. This is not that hard an argument to make in terms of the worrying authoritarian policies of China and India, but it becomes considerably more dicey when considering the consequences of the US's history in Latin America and the Middle East.
Second, the elephant in the room with this book is climate. The One Billion Americans audiobook is only about six hours long but there is so little discussion of climate change that I am genuinely suprised. It should be a whole chapter. Yglasias's argument that One Billion Americans is of no concern in a climate change context is just incorrect. If the population of the US triples and consumption doesn't change, emissions will roughly triple as well. This is not just an "accounting trick" as Yglasias calls it. The emissions from the increased construction alone would be astronomical! I believe the conclusion that the direst climate change outcomes are overblown in an attempt to inspire climate action is misguided - the possibility for the decimation of our species is of a much higher probability than for commensurate disasters that far more planning is dedicated to mitigate. I would not support a One Billion Americans policy without a much more comprehensive argument for how the carbon mitigation would proceed.
Thirdly, while Yglasias spends a good portion of the book discussing methods to overcome the various issues with the policy, the American political sclerosis doesn't seem to factor in. American sentiment to immigration is, largely, sour as it is so the prospect of a radical uptick is likely to be wildly unpopular. This is to say nothing of the government dysfunction that prevents the US from taking care of its existing infrastructure-the level of mobilisation described in the book would be nothing short of miraculous. This exclusion might have been aimed at keeping the scope of the book tight, but it was a notable absence.
All in all, a fascinating and worthwhile read! Keep up your great podcasting work, Matt!
The first chapters outline the problem; historically the US had an advantage in global conflicts such as WWII because it vastly outnumbered the Axis Powers. Yglasias provides evidence that innovation is directly linked to density, allowing thought economies to specialise and giving experts the ability to associate with each other in proximity. Trying to do more with numerically fewer people is simply an economic and political disadvantage. Plus, says Yglasias, the United States is extremely sparsely populated compared to peer nations like France, the UK and Germany. A United States with one billion inhabitants would be like France, not a Blade Runner dystopia. Younger people are also economically less stable than previous generations, as evidenced by the fact that they consistently have fewer children than they say they'd like to.
The second part of the book describes the solutions. These include:
- providing robust support for families in the form of parental leave, childcare and education,
- allowing many more immigrants into the country, particularly high-skilled immigrants, and
- strategically providing incentives for the public and private sector to relocate to depopulating, smaller urban centres.
The book draws on various lines of evidence for these sections, including economic data for various generations of parents, childcare costs, present immigration statistics and presents common-sense economic arguments for the various cycles that lead to population loss or accretion.
Part three of the book discusses many of the issues that would be faced as a result of implementing the One Billion Americans policy and some potential solutions. The section on housing scarcity that examines the multitude problems with NIMBYs and their unrepresentative, disproportionate impact on the supply side of the housing problem is particularly good. The examples of the SBahn, food supply and American military overspend are also well-researched and draw on good data.
I do have issues with Yglasias's thesis, though. While his economic arguments are compelling, the case for why America should maintain its supremacy is never explicitly made; instead, we are repeatedly told this supremacy is something America "can and should" maintain. This is not that hard an argument to make in terms of the worrying authoritarian policies of China and India, but it becomes considerably more dicey when considering the consequences of the US's history in Latin America and the Middle East.
Second, the elephant in the room with this book is climate. The One Billion Americans audiobook is only about six hours long but there is so little discussion of climate change that I am genuinely suprised. It should be a whole chapter. Yglasias's argument that One Billion Americans is of no concern in a climate change context is just incorrect. If the population of the US triples and consumption doesn't change, emissions will roughly triple as well. This is not just an "accounting trick" as Yglasias calls it. The emissions from the increased construction alone would be astronomical! I believe the conclusion that the direst climate change outcomes are overblown in an attempt to inspire climate action is misguided - the possibility for the decimation of our species is of a much higher probability than for commensurate disasters that far more planning is dedicated to mitigate. I would not support a One Billion Americans policy without a much more comprehensive argument for how the carbon mitigation would proceed.
Thirdly, while Yglasias spends a good portion of the book discussing methods to overcome the various issues with the policy, the American political sclerosis doesn't seem to factor in. American sentiment to immigration is, largely, sour as it is so the prospect of a radical uptick is likely to be wildly unpopular. This is to say nothing of the government dysfunction that prevents the US from taking care of its existing infrastructure-the level of mobilisation described in the book would be nothing short of miraculous. This exclusion might have been aimed at keeping the scope of the book tight, but it was a notable absence.
All in all, a fascinating and worthwhile read! Keep up your great podcasting work, Matt!
September 16, 2020
The book has all the best of Matt Yglesias (big idea thinking with a technocratic approach) but also some of the worst of Matt Yglesias (big idea thinking with a technocratic approach, also smarmyness).
I am enthusiastic about the idea of a large, inspirational goal for the US to work towards and also many of the individual policy proposals he advocates. The author is pretty explicit that his main argument is for a united vision for US policy, so I think you can have reasonable criticisms of some of the policy proposals without rejecting the book entirely.
As a China person, although I agree with almost all of the individual statements he makes regarding the PRC, I am still very uneasy with encouraging the "China is the enemy narrative." Yglesias may be relatively reasonable in his attitudes toward the PRC government, but that doesn't mean his audience will be. This is a tricky time for writing about China, when it is almost impossible to balance between too harsh and too soft. I do appreciate his repeated emphasis on the immorality of the US trying to constrain the PRC's economic growth.
Part of the reason this book is polarizing is due to Yglesias's own public persona, which involves smarmy twitter fights with the internet left and trades heavily on wonkishness as a personality type. Even if you are turned off by Yglesias's personality, I still think that this book can be interesting, especially to those of us left of center.
I am enthusiastic about the idea of a large, inspirational goal for the US to work towards and also many of the individual policy proposals he advocates. The author is pretty explicit that his main argument is for a united vision for US policy, so I think you can have reasonable criticisms of some of the policy proposals without rejecting the book entirely.
As a China person, although I agree with almost all of the individual statements he makes regarding the PRC, I am still very uneasy with encouraging the "China is the enemy narrative." Yglesias may be relatively reasonable in his attitudes toward the PRC government, but that doesn't mean his audience will be. This is a tricky time for writing about China, when it is almost impossible to balance between too harsh and too soft. I do appreciate his repeated emphasis on the immorality of the US trying to constrain the PRC's economic growth.
Part of the reason this book is polarizing is due to Yglesias's own public persona, which involves smarmy twitter fights with the internet left and trades heavily on wonkishness as a personality type. Even if you are turned off by Yglesias's personality, I still think that this book can be interesting, especially to those of us left of center.
May 27, 2021
Skimmed through this book in kinokuniya. Faintly remember how kiddy this book is. A trojan horse for progressive policies but without convincing reasons to let the trojan horse in in the first place.
September 24, 2020
Now, I have only read the sample which seems to copy paste half of the text of the plot description.
One thing that is a recurrent theme in the book is that it is quite obvious the author has never actually been to China. I went mainly to Shanghai and Nanjing around 2 years ago and the country is very, very different from most of the US. I have never been to NYC, but Philly has around 2/3 of the population density of NYC and still felt reasonably empty in the pedestrian friendly downtown area. Curiously Santiago de Chile has 3 times Philly's population density but I didn't feel it to be so crammed outside of riding the subway at rush hour. Hip neighborhoods like Baquedano do fill up on Fridays but it isn't like... that full all day. If you walk in that area at 9 am on a weekday, chances are there will only be another 5 people you will see.
Guadalajara Mexico has twice the density of NYC and even their downtown doesn't cram up with people fighting for 1 centimeter of living space. Mexico City is apparently similarly congested as GDL, and chances are the stats is skewed because they might be counting the semi rural villages of Tlalpan and the expansive unpopulated marshes of Texcoco which will skew the results. If you remove those areas and focus on the 6 million people living in the densely packed suburbs of Ecatepec, Chimalhuacan, Nezahualcoyotl, Naucalpan, Tlalnepantla, and Atizapan, Mexico City's density will likely be closer to 35,000 people per square mile instead of around 28,000 vs NYCs approx 27,000. And yes, Mexico City is packed, go ride the subway or try to hitch a spot in the Metrobus on a weekday at 7:30 am and people are literally everywhere!
Shanghai's downtown area is 17 million and yes, downtown areas with malls are so infested with people everywhere it is literally dizzying. You can barely even enjoy yourself being flooded with so many people. But even then, pick a nice afternoon stroll near the Bund and you might only spot 2 or 3 people walking around. The city can get epicly crowded, but it isn't like it is jam packed like a rock concert 24/7 either.
And after this brief detour, I return to my statement the author writes wonders about tripling the US population without showing much proof he has actually lived in one of the world's top 50 most densely inhabited megacities. I seriously doubt he would believe overpopulation has made cities like Lagos or Kinshasa the top of everyone's bucket list.
So, how does cities like Mexico City, Tokyo and Shanghai pack so many people? Most people lived crammed up in teeny tiny condos arguably just 1/5 of the size of the condo Rachel inhabits in the Friends show. Japanese people make every centimeter count and the living room is also the kitchen and bedroom. Families of 4 might live crammed up like this and feel it is perfectly normal. I bet most urban Chinese tourists feel shocked when they visit their first mega McMansion in suburban Texas with 6 bedrooms 8 bathrooms and 4 garages and still a family of 4 Americans may complain they feel crammed.
This is one thing the book never talks about. Americans (in particular baby boomers) are pack rats and grow strong attachments to objects and never throw them away. Japanese people on the contrary have the peculiar habit of throwing away perfectly good electronics just because they are mildly outdated. With a country that posesses a massive recycling system and a society where people separate their trash with meticulous precision, they may enjoy a similar living standard as Americans but are fine with less. Furthermore, SUVs are just not well, needed in asian megacities. You don't need to buy a car to live in Tokyo because the subway service is so good and Chinese urban families simply buy a little scooter to supplement the subway. Americans are just too used to having everything big, super size me mega meals and too much. To triple the population, Americans would have to get rid of these perks they like so much and also cities have to be torn apart and everything crammed together. It is perfectly normal for a 5 floor building in Tokyo to have 1 floor for a restaurant or store plus 6 basement underground levels for even more restaurants and stores. I always felt it strange to visit basement restaurants but it is the social norm to save space.
To make this population growth feasible, 2 out of every 3 Americans would have to get into a trade which pay quite well or be content with a GED. Too many people are getting college degrees with massive debt for jobs that don't need the degree. The US would also have to become very protectionist and bring manufacturing back and make trade taxes so high that it would be simply easier to open things domestically. The book doesn't really delve into this. It also doesn't mention tort reform would have to become the norm. People would no longer be able to sue everyone because of a menial reason. For example, those Chinese that died from a crushed poorly built building in Sichuan will definitely not bother to sue the builders. While lawyer fears are some reasons why the US has cleaner air and higher safety standards for healthcare procedures, the burden of costs fall somewhere and tripling the population won't make it go away. Excessive regulation is also a reason why childcare is unaffordable in the US.
The book doesn't have typos and despite how preposterous the concept of 1 billion Americans is to me, the author's reasoning is an amusing enough read even if I disagree with it. I do take stars off the review mostly because I felt the book could have been better organized with less rambling and more defined concepts in more chapters.
One thing that is a recurrent theme in the book is that it is quite obvious the author has never actually been to China. I went mainly to Shanghai and Nanjing around 2 years ago and the country is very, very different from most of the US. I have never been to NYC, but Philly has around 2/3 of the population density of NYC and still felt reasonably empty in the pedestrian friendly downtown area. Curiously Santiago de Chile has 3 times Philly's population density but I didn't feel it to be so crammed outside of riding the subway at rush hour. Hip neighborhoods like Baquedano do fill up on Fridays but it isn't like... that full all day. If you walk in that area at 9 am on a weekday, chances are there will only be another 5 people you will see.
Guadalajara Mexico has twice the density of NYC and even their downtown doesn't cram up with people fighting for 1 centimeter of living space. Mexico City is apparently similarly congested as GDL, and chances are the stats is skewed because they might be counting the semi rural villages of Tlalpan and the expansive unpopulated marshes of Texcoco which will skew the results. If you remove those areas and focus on the 6 million people living in the densely packed suburbs of Ecatepec, Chimalhuacan, Nezahualcoyotl, Naucalpan, Tlalnepantla, and Atizapan, Mexico City's density will likely be closer to 35,000 people per square mile instead of around 28,000 vs NYCs approx 27,000. And yes, Mexico City is packed, go ride the subway or try to hitch a spot in the Metrobus on a weekday at 7:30 am and people are literally everywhere!
Shanghai's downtown area is 17 million and yes, downtown areas with malls are so infested with people everywhere it is literally dizzying. You can barely even enjoy yourself being flooded with so many people. But even then, pick a nice afternoon stroll near the Bund and you might only spot 2 or 3 people walking around. The city can get epicly crowded, but it isn't like it is jam packed like a rock concert 24/7 either.
And after this brief detour, I return to my statement the author writes wonders about tripling the US population without showing much proof he has actually lived in one of the world's top 50 most densely inhabited megacities. I seriously doubt he would believe overpopulation has made cities like Lagos or Kinshasa the top of everyone's bucket list.
So, how does cities like Mexico City, Tokyo and Shanghai pack so many people? Most people lived crammed up in teeny tiny condos arguably just 1/5 of the size of the condo Rachel inhabits in the Friends show. Japanese people make every centimeter count and the living room is also the kitchen and bedroom. Families of 4 might live crammed up like this and feel it is perfectly normal. I bet most urban Chinese tourists feel shocked when they visit their first mega McMansion in suburban Texas with 6 bedrooms 8 bathrooms and 4 garages and still a family of 4 Americans may complain they feel crammed.
This is one thing the book never talks about. Americans (in particular baby boomers) are pack rats and grow strong attachments to objects and never throw them away. Japanese people on the contrary have the peculiar habit of throwing away perfectly good electronics just because they are mildly outdated. With a country that posesses a massive recycling system and a society where people separate their trash with meticulous precision, they may enjoy a similar living standard as Americans but are fine with less. Furthermore, SUVs are just not well, needed in asian megacities. You don't need to buy a car to live in Tokyo because the subway service is so good and Chinese urban families simply buy a little scooter to supplement the subway. Americans are just too used to having everything big, super size me mega meals and too much. To triple the population, Americans would have to get rid of these perks they like so much and also cities have to be torn apart and everything crammed together. It is perfectly normal for a 5 floor building in Tokyo to have 1 floor for a restaurant or store plus 6 basement underground levels for even more restaurants and stores. I always felt it strange to visit basement restaurants but it is the social norm to save space.
To make this population growth feasible, 2 out of every 3 Americans would have to get into a trade which pay quite well or be content with a GED. Too many people are getting college degrees with massive debt for jobs that don't need the degree. The US would also have to become very protectionist and bring manufacturing back and make trade taxes so high that it would be simply easier to open things domestically. The book doesn't really delve into this. It also doesn't mention tort reform would have to become the norm. People would no longer be able to sue everyone because of a menial reason. For example, those Chinese that died from a crushed poorly built building in Sichuan will definitely not bother to sue the builders. While lawyer fears are some reasons why the US has cleaner air and higher safety standards for healthcare procedures, the burden of costs fall somewhere and tripling the population won't make it go away. Excessive regulation is also a reason why childcare is unaffordable in the US.
The book doesn't have typos and despite how preposterous the concept of 1 billion Americans is to me, the author's reasoning is an amusing enough read even if I disagree with it. I do take stars off the review mostly because I felt the book could have been better organized with less rambling and more defined concepts in more chapters.
October 12, 2020
Good idea, but lackluster execution. The parts on trains and public infrastructure felt like a copy-pasted Vox essay. Still, it has given a name to a laudable political goal and given an effective way to achieve staying ahead of a rising China.
October 21, 2020
When I first heard about this book, I was a little puzzled. Why write a book like this, and why at this moment? It seemed like an idea coming out of the blue. After reading it, I realize that it's exactly the kind of book we need right now. In the modern political climate, how often do you encounter a big idea, one that feels fundamentally new? It's great to start thinking constructively and positively about the future of America again.
The core proposal is a simple one, but the great thing about the book is that Yglesias, after describing it, methodically goes through and addresses basically all objections that someone could think up. After you read the book, you realize that a lot of the negative reviews are coming from people who simply haven't read it and are only reacting to the title.
It's definitely a work of policy, and a little dry - if you listen to The Weeds or read the author's articles on Vox, you'll be familiar with the style. In that way, the book is very realistic and practical, even though it contains a big idea. I do wish that, even if it retained the focus on policy, the book provided a little more color or anecdote as well, to bring it all together. I understood, intellectually, that this is something we can do, but it would be even better to feel it emotionally as well.
The core proposal is a simple one, but the great thing about the book is that Yglesias, after describing it, methodically goes through and addresses basically all objections that someone could think up. After you read the book, you realize that a lot of the negative reviews are coming from people who simply haven't read it and are only reacting to the title.
It's definitely a work of policy, and a little dry - if you listen to The Weeds or read the author's articles on Vox, you'll be familiar with the style. In that way, the book is very realistic and practical, even though it contains a big idea. I do wish that, even if it retained the focus on policy, the book provided a little more color or anecdote as well, to bring it all together. I understood, intellectually, that this is something we can do, but it would be even better to feel it emotionally as well.
September 21, 2020
What a delight to read someone who has a positive and totally feasible vision for the country, who engages and takes seriously the complaints of his opponents, who realizes that a bold vision requires a broad coalition. Sadly, but surely, much of the public debate over the ideas in this book will "degenerate into a kind of toxic identity politics rather than a discussion of what we're trying to accomplish as a country," as the author laments tends to happen in debates over housing policy. But for those of us dedicated to national greatness and human thriving, this book offers an excellent guide to secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity. I hope it gets the wide and influential audience it deserves.
October 8, 2020
Yglesias, a center-left polemicist and podcast policy type, has grown on me in the past year or so.
I would cringe sometimes at how the most common word on his podcast The Weeds seemed to be "right!" As everyone furiously agreed with one another on everything. The book advances that same can-do, "things'll be great" agenda. I wavered between a 3 and 4 star review of the book here. 4 stars out of appreciation for the ambition of the project and his willingness to make a pro-national progressive agenda. 3 stars for how breezy and anecdotal much of the policy discussion is, even if you take the book on its terms. Overall, the positive, refreshing, creative approach tipped it to a 4 for me.
I would cringe sometimes at how the most common word on his podcast The Weeds seemed to be "right!" As everyone furiously agreed with one another on everything. The book advances that same can-do, "things'll be great" agenda. I wavered between a 3 and 4 star review of the book here. 4 stars out of appreciation for the ambition of the project and his willingness to make a pro-national progressive agenda. 3 stars for how breezy and anecdotal much of the policy discussion is, even if you take the book on its terms. Overall, the positive, refreshing, creative approach tipped it to a 4 for me.
February 4, 2021
This book puts aside culture war and special interest politics (from both parties) in favor of practical policy that would provide tangible benefit for all Americans. An enlightening and inspirational read.
December 13, 2020
Interesting claim but much of the book covers issues that are only tangentially related (e.g. mass transit construction). The rate of insights per page is not that high.
July 15, 2022
I'm a huge Matty-bro, so I obviously loved this book. For those who don't know him, he's a supply-side progressive thinker who writes prolifically and, for a reasonable fee, provides an unadulterated set of generally solid takes on his Substack. His book is great - it's a political pretzel guaranteed to please no one (fighting China by upzoning the coastal cities while welcoming immigrants only to force them to live in cold places like Toledo and Grand Rapids and pay most of their incremental wages in tax?) but that describes a policy agenda that gives me great joy about the future. I'm a huge fan of basically everything in the book, and if you've missed Matt's voice, he narrates the Audiobook.
As Teddy says: "If we of the great republics, if we, the free people who claim to have emancipated ourselves from the thralldom of wrong and error, bring down on our heads the curse that comes upon the willfully barren, then it will be an idle waste of breath to prattle of our achievements, to boast of all that we have done. No refinement of life, no delicacy of taste, no material progress, no sordid heaping up of riches, no sensuous development of art and literature, can in any way compensate for the loss of the great fundamental virtues; and of these great fundamental virtues the greatest is the race's power to perpetuate the race."
French-density USA, here we come!
As Teddy says: "If we of the great republics, if we, the free people who claim to have emancipated ourselves from the thralldom of wrong and error, bring down on our heads the curse that comes upon the willfully barren, then it will be an idle waste of breath to prattle of our achievements, to boast of all that we have done. No refinement of life, no delicacy of taste, no material progress, no sordid heaping up of riches, no sensuous development of art and literature, can in any way compensate for the loss of the great fundamental virtues; and of these great fundamental virtues the greatest is the race's power to perpetuate the race."
French-density USA, here we come!
February 23, 2022
A fascinating and new idea to make the U.S. the best country it can be
February 17, 2025
[Audiobook] 4.5 stars. As America is fundamentally a global force for good and stability, we will need more people in order to counter growing populations in adversary nations.
August 18, 2021
Very thought-provoking, made me actually think about population growth
September 21, 2022
He's right
April 28, 2021
Punches above its weight in policy discussion and technocratic solutions. Well worth reading and re-reading.
October 17, 2020
In the increasingly ideologically polarized climate (for more on this, see Yglesias' colleague Ezra Klein's book Why We're Polarized), the political debate feels like trench warfare over just a handful of topics. We are not making much ground in any direction, and the policy ideas somehow oscillate between unimaginative and tired (top marginal tax rate, single-payer healthcare, carbon tax, Trump's "wall") or fantastically unrealistic (wealth tax, universal student loan forgiveness, Bernie's "revolution", Trump's "wall"). This divisiveness has made us completely inept at solving basic problems where we should have shared goals (opioid crisis, COVID-19) and it's depressing.
I'm ready for a new way to look at our future—a national project to give us a shared purpose and shake up the debate with ambitious yet realistic policy goals. With One Billion Americans, Matt Yglesias provides a framework for Rs and Ds to rally around the goal of America solidifying its status as top dog on the world stage.
It's short, it's punchy, and it's forward-looking. He spends all of a chapter summarizing the economics of industrial development and China's (and India's) rise in recent decades. That's not what this book is about. Instead, this book is about using the One Billion Americans framework for solving a lot of the problems we face today—depopulating rural towns, insanely expensive urban housing costs on the coasts, increasing unaffordability of childcare, and worsening commutes. This book is chock-full of policy ideas that don’t get discussed often enough in the current debate.
There are plenty of factoids that will leave you more informed after reading it. However, One Billion Americans is primarily a breath of fresh air in an otherwise stale political discourse. Enjoy it!
I'm ready for a new way to look at our future—a national project to give us a shared purpose and shake up the debate with ambitious yet realistic policy goals. With One Billion Americans, Matt Yglesias provides a framework for Rs and Ds to rally around the goal of America solidifying its status as top dog on the world stage.
It's short, it's punchy, and it's forward-looking. He spends all of a chapter summarizing the economics of industrial development and China's (and India's) rise in recent decades. That's not what this book is about. Instead, this book is about using the One Billion Americans framework for solving a lot of the problems we face today—depopulating rural towns, insanely expensive urban housing costs on the coasts, increasing unaffordability of childcare, and worsening commutes. This book is chock-full of policy ideas that don’t get discussed often enough in the current debate.
There are plenty of factoids that will leave you more informed after reading it. However, One Billion Americans is primarily a breath of fresh air in an otherwise stale political discourse. Enjoy it!
May 29, 2021
I found the book interesting and easily readable, but not particularly convincing. The book does a sort of slight-of-hand where he lays out all the positive effects population growth has on an economy, which is well and good, and it's just supposed to follow that this is what we, as a society should want. This book would have been better if it was approached from a more philosophical lens: Why should we focus on adding more people with some fixed level of happiness and life satisfaction rather than, say, just making a smaller population that is really, really, happy? (This would be a variant on the 'repugnant conclusion' thought experiment). Another line in the book left relatively unexplored is the moral-value difference between new immigrants and native newborns, Bryan Caplan makes an interesting argument that there is no difference and relatively free migration is the only logical and consistent position. It's a really interesting and persuasive argument, but there is no mention of the debate. All in all, I feel like there is a lot of "putting the cart before the horse," by not putting the hard moral questions first and jumping to "look how great this would be." By doing so, the book is merely preaching to the choir and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who is skeptical prima facie of this kind of wonky neoliberalism as they are unlikely to be persuaded.
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