U.S. Population Growth: Cause For Concern?

"Virtually alone among big, advanced countries, the United States is experiencing significant population growth. This is a sign of either impending calamity or enduring vitality...

Aging and immigration -- the big population trends -- are vexing...about half of the last 100 million Americans are immigrants and their U.S.-born children. Without them, the population would be 247 million...But history suggests that America will change them more than they change us. Our national character and culture are enormously powerful and resilient...

Going from 100 million to 200 million, we became a nation of subdivisions and shopping malls. From 1950 to 1970, two-thirds of metropolitan growth occurred in suburbs. Some central cities (Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland) lost population for the first time. The upheaval in ensuing decades has been the rise of the Sunbelt. Since 1970, 84 percent of U.S. population growth has occurred in the South and the West...

...we are creating overcongested communities that will demand energy and—particularly in the Southwest — water that won't be there or will be there only at an exorbitant price. Population growth will cause an economic and social backlash...If Southern and Western metro areas become too crowded or costly, maybe people will return to Cleveland and Milwaukee, where water is plentiful and housing prices are low..."