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816 STATE ST., P. O. DRAWER QQ, SANTA BARBARA, CALIFORNIA 93102 . . . TEL. (805) 965-0551 ADVANCED STUDIES

12 February 1970

Mr. Joshua Lederberg -
Department of Newrelegy Crrutes
Stanford University

Palo Alto, California

Dear Mr. Lederberg:

Your column on ''overbreeding" that appeared in the February 7
Washington ''Post'', mentioning Judy Blake, stressed an important
point too often overlooked.

Every parental couple wants for itself more children — a larger
completed family size — than all other parents should have in the best
interests of each couple.

Hence some government set of incentives on parents, through
various bonuses and penalties (financial), is ultimately inevitable.

Enclosed are two items that may be useful to you. "The Economics
of Having Children" is the one most relevant to your recent article. The
other is a result of an AID project.

Incidentally, on April 29 the National Academy of Engineers will be
having its annual meeting in Washington, with a major session on world
population problems no less.

Hope you do some more columns on population, O

Sincérely.
C—

—

oo

Stephen Enke, Manager
Economic Development Programs
SE/hh
Enclosures: ''The Economics of Having Children"
"Birth Control for Economic Development"

( Main inhibition is perplexity what useful to say.

Thank you for the reprints, and please do keep ,me on your mailing list. Wave you
te9)9 .
resp@nded to Leibenstein's criticisms (Top. Stud., 235:161 169)?
Thahk you,

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