The next time you’re feeling frisky, consider the global job market. The World Watch Institute gave Fastcompany.com a peek at the statistics from its new pay-per-view database , which stands to become a catchall for anyone interested in parsing destructive global trends. Its findings on global workforce rates, for example, show a drastic shift in who’s earning what and where. The global worforce has skyrocketed over the past decade with 65 percent of the world population–a whopping 4.46 billion people–ready to collect a paycheck. That’s up about 20 percent from a decade ago and nearly triple the rate of the 1950s. Overall, the workers able to bring in paychecks in the global economy has stayed fairly consistent, hovering around 69 percent. But the countries that have less competition for their best jobs–meaning overall higher employment rates and better quality of life–are those where less children are born. A graph of the breadwinner’s boom proves the obvious: That we all basically bred our way into this mess in the first place. To take it a step further, another graph from World Watch Institute shows that its these high-income countries that control most of the world GDP. Look closer at the minutia of the report and there is at least one example for how countries can get back ahead. Since 1965 a handful of East Asian countries have essentially banked because of policies and cultural stigmas against over-breeding. As a whole, societal pressure for prudishness meant that not only was there a bit more disposable income lying around, but that there were fewer kiddos vying for well paying gigs in the local marketplace; more people could get employed and their overall wealth has quietly risen. (See Figure 2). The good news: Labor growth in most other industrialized countries appears to have finally peaked. So the next time the ailing economy (or your own unemployment) takes its toll on your libido, remember, that might be the best thing for you and the standard of living in your country.

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