Current Population of Mega City One...?

[House of Usher]

Oh, and the point about radiation poisoning is spurious as well. For one thing, in Judge Dredd they have 22nd century technologies to deal with radiation and poisoning - 'anti-rad pills' for one (whatever they are).

Furthermore, in the real world one sees a lot of documentaries about old people in former Soviet republics ekeing out a living (rather than dying off) in poisoned towns abandoned by the young, and also a lot of children dying from radiation-induced birth defects; and one suspects rates of infertility and still birth must be quite high in heavily irradiated areas, which would tend to shift the age demographic in the upward direction.

[TordelBack]

That, and the fact that eldsters live up to 130, and who knows how long folk'll be fertile by 2129.  That's got to affect your demographic profile.

[SamuelAWilkinson]

I love this thread so much I wish I could marry it.

[Dudley]

The suggestion regarding better contraception is a good one, but you're ignoring the ever-present stench of death that hangs over MC1.  Fom Apocalypse War to Necropolis to the everyday high risk of violent death, the normal citizen should be traumatised beyond belief.  The normal human reaction to trauma followed by calm is to bonk like bunnies, and no to care about such things as contraception.  In the case of people who have lost children or loved ones, the urge to procreate is often very strong.  This is why Iran seems the best comparison to me.  I've heard (but can't now source) that the birthrate in Iraq is currently soaring.  Another comparison might be with the post-war years in US and Europe, where even though times were hard the Baby Boom occurred.

Although you are correct that thermonuclear warheads and plagues don't discriminate on grounds of age, the point is that only the youngest demographic is constantly being replenished: take a chunk out of any other demographic and it remains permanently depleted, while the young uns just keep on coming.

[worldshown]

Although you are correct that thermonuclear warheads and plagues don't discriminate on grounds of age, the point is that only the youngest demographic is constantly being replenished: take a chunk out of any other demographic and it remains permanently depleted, while the young uns just keep on coming.

True, but factor in migration and you'll still be topping up the 15-45 demographic. MC1 might not be a great place to live, but it's probably better than say, Pan Andes Conurb or Bruja.

Also, given the number of nuclear incidents that have occurred in MC1/USA (Booth's war, the Apocalypse, Total War etc.) this is going to increase the number of birth defects and the infant mortality rate. And we all know what happens to mutants (at the moment).

Post-Chernobyl Belarus saw rates of birth defects rise to 5.5% with infant mortality of 2.5%. That's a 1 in 12 chance a child won't make it. The fear of having deformed children also reduced the birth rate. With multiple nuclear incidents, these figures could be much higher.

Plus, low levels of employment can lead to high levels of crime. Not much procreating taking place in the cubes.

Also, it would be very Dredd to have someone arrested for wasting city resources if they had loads of kids they couldn't support independently.

Finally, back to the demographics and population pyramids. I found a US census projection for 2050 where they have estimated a potential population of 420 million (not far off our figure of 400 million for MC1). We're looking at about 40% population under 30 and about 20% over 65. That's a lot of eldsters to keep in pan drops.

And fegbarr, I saw this thread before you ;)http://photobucket.com" target="_blank">http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb239/worldshown/2050.jpg" border="0" alt="Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket">">

[Funt Solo]

::"Not much procreating taking place in the cubes."

400,000,000 cits
100,000 judges

How many in the cubes?

[Large48]

Helter Skelter quotes half a billion

[Dudley]

I'm not so sure that immigration is a factor here.  Remember, we're not talking about the present day US or UK, where borders too large to be guarded exist.  We're talking about a walled city, albeit a Mega-City, with thousands of guards on duty plus machine guns with automatic targeting systems (see that Christmas tale about Ebeneezer McScrooge).  Plus a thousand miles of irradiated desert surrounding it, terrain so tough that it almost destroyed Judge Dredd.

We've seen from various stories (e.g. the first Waugh/Dredd crossover) that there's tight immigration control.  In a city where almost everyone is unemployed already, the barriers to immigration must be set very high.

In a world with anti-rad pills, as Usher has pointed out, birth defects from radiation poisoning would also be wiped out, except in the still relatively rare cases of mutation, which are ruthlessly expelled from the city.

It would definitely be very Dredd to have someone arrested for wasting city resources if they had loads of kids they couldn't support - but this is a city where the roboticisation of labour has produced a world in which such a situation isn't really possible.  There's a great welfare state in MC1, and since beyond food virtually every need a child might have could be taken care of by automated nurseries and robot teachers it's much less likely the the fckless citizen will actually have to deal with the consequences of their lack of foresight.

[worldshown]

Good question. I don't think it's ever been mentioned in 2000ad or the Meg.

Current US prison population is 2.2 million for a country of 301.1 million.

Factor that up and we can speculate about 2.9-3 million for MC1.

[worldshown]

Half a billion?

That's everyone and a bit more isn't it?

[Funt Solo]

Yeah - I think he's saying Helter Skelter quoted the population of MC-1 at half a bill.  

But then, Helter Skelter had Ace Garp in it, so...  

Pinch of salt all round.

[Funt Solo]

At 50000 cits / block, how did you end up with 50 blocks per sector?  It's more like 26 on straight arithmetic.

[SamuelAWilkinson]

Based on, I believe, the post Apocalypse War sector renumbering. Logan'll be along in a minute with the map.

[Funt Solo]

Sector renumbering gives 305 sectors.

800 mill cits at 50 thou per block, gives 16000 blocks, which is 52 per sector.

Oh.

How the hell did I end up with 26 last time I did that?

Look - over there - it's a three-headed monkey!

[worldshown]

Okay Dudley, I just had to check the figures in the progs.

I'll concede a baby boom after the Apocalypse war. There are 400 million citizens after the war and two years later there are the 420 million implied in 'Bob's Law'. The model for slow growth would predict 407-8 million under normal conditions so we have an extra 12-3 million kids.

However, whether by accident or design, 15 million children were killed/removed in Anderson's 'Crusade' some 13 years later. There go the baby boomers and a potential massive population increase.

How many died in Necropolis? Was it 30 million? A city the size of MC1 would get those back within 8-9 years at 0.9% growth per year.

No, the problems we have with both theories is that the population is always given as 400 million. No growth. There's no continued population explosion to support your massive increase in the ratio of juves and even my figures require 3-4 million citizens to disappear every year.

Let's leave it to the scriptwriters. Let them sort out if MC1 is a young dynamic city or if it's stymied by coffin dodgers.