When the Census Bureau reported earlier this year that the U.S. population had swollen to more than 327 million people, it likely didn’t surprise drivers fuming in traffic jams, airline passengers shuffling through security lines, or telephone callers waiting in queues to talk to a live person. Nor is the remedy building yet more roads, wearing shoes during airport checks, or hoping for more call centers to be built in the Philippines.

There are simply too many of us. The United States is third in the world in population size.  We rank behind only China and India. What’s the answer? Should we limit immigration or even births as some have suggested?  No. Instead, let us look to the past for a solution.

This year is the 351st anniversary of the birth of Jonathan Swift, novelist, essayist, and clergyman. Swift is best known for writing “Gulliver’s Travels.” But he also wrote “A Modest Proposal,” an essay satirizing a solution to Irish population in his day. In the essay, Swift suggests that the children of destitute Irish parents should be used to reduce the burgeoning population and to make money. He proposes stewing, roasting, or baking older children to provide healthful meals. Swift notes that infants could furnish skin for the boots and shoes of fine ladies and gentlemen.

Outrageous? Of course.  And misguided as well. Why children? The young represent our future. Who knows what destitute lad or lass who winds up in the soup might have turned out to be another Stephen King or Oprah or Tom Brady?

Today, as in 1729 when “A Modest Proposal” was written, the same cloud of overpopulation darkens our lives. But to deal with the problem we should forgo sacrificing children— humanity’s seed corn—as a solution. Instead let us consider judicious pruning of the withered branches of the tree of life—the elderly. They have gamboled on the greensward of pleasure while enjoying society’s generosity for too long. Now let them pay for dawdling in passing lanes on freeways, monopolizing harried clerks at computer stores with too-simple questions, and voting down needed tax increases. The aged are living too long and consuming more than just air and sunshine. The Pew Research Center reports the number of people 65 and older may triple throughout the world to 1.5 billion by 2050. Scan the obituaries (now euphemized as life tributes) in a newspaper and see how many people live past the age of 90. Too many by far. It is obvious that nature’s historical brakes upon overpopulation such as war and famine and disease aren’t sufficient to curb the increase in longevity due to improved diet and access to medical care.

If Swift were alive today, he might take pen in hand (or sit down at his computer) to offer a modern solution to the problem of overpopulation. I shall attempt to do so, in language he might have used.

A Modest Proposal to Slash the Elderly Population

To Prevent Some Citizens in America from Being a Burden on Their Children or Society, and for Making Them Beneficial to the Public Purse.

It is a depressing sight indeed for those who frequent the nation’s great shopping malls to witness the sad plight of old people. They move slowly and cautiously, eschewing escalators and overcrowding elevators. See them struggle, virtually immobilized by dependence upon canes, wheelchairs, and aluminum walkers tipped with scuffed tennis balls,

Are they entitled to our sympathy? Of course. But the elderly, through no fault of their own, ravage the earth like an endless cloud of locusts. At the wheel, they sometimes cause more auto accidents than teenagers with surging hormones. They reduce the gross national product by buying less because their homes and garages are filled to overcapacity with objects of previous consumption. Bicycles? Skateboards? Scooters? Use them now and an emergency room visit awaits.

The elderly are constant irritants, clogging checkout lines as they fumble for change and uttering the same irritating query while adjusting hearing aids: What did you say? … What did you say? Science has eased the years of decline with assistive devices such as vision and hearing aids, dental implants, prosthetics, up-to-the-last breath medical care, and drugs. Viagra for late-life sexual satisfaction? Is there no shame?

Moreover, the cost of maintaining the aged is great. Feeble and tottering, many wind up in nursing homes where costs are so high it could trigger strokes in those who must support elderly relatives financially. The very phrase Affordable Care mocks reality when some assisted living facilities charge more than $100,000 a year to provide lumpy beds and skimpy meals to seniors unable to fend for themselves. For some, society has treated the low-income elderly generously with subsidies for Social Security and Medicare.

Unlike Swift, I do not propose that people be utilized for culinary purposes. My observations lead me to conclude that many of the elderly are lean and stringy, unfit for consumption due to the constant stress of worrying about driver-less autos, hordes of illegal border crossers, and concerns politicians will slash Medicare to provide further tax cuts for corporations and America’s oligarchs.

I shall, therefore, humbly present my own ruminations, which I hope will not be liable to the least objection, as they have been carefully considered.  It is apparent from watching the dour, lined faces of the elderly that for many life during the so-called golden years often is less than pleasant in a highly mobile, youth-oriented society. Try balancing a checkbook or texting rapidly on a tiny cell phone while encumbered with a forgetful mind and arthritic fingers.

What is to be done to speed their exit from a no longer productive life? First, we must employ the carrot, and then, if necessary, the stick.

The carrot:

Congress should create a program to encourage voluntary self-termination by the elderly. A working title might be Sunset Of Great Opportunity! (SO, GO!). Let the government offer a modest sum, say $25,000, to anyone aged 55 or older willing to take an early exit from worldly woes. The stipend could finance a last trip to the slot machines and craps tables of Las Vegas casinos. Or the money could help pay for a grandchild’s college education and continued attendance at TGIF beer keg parties.

Let the aged emulate the actor Edward G. Robinson’s gracious end in the 1970s science-fiction film Soylent Green. Robinson sips poison and nods off while listening to the music of Mozart and Beethoven.

Surely the generous financial incentives of SO, GO! and the opportunity to end life peacefully accompanied by loved family and friends would be attractive. Those departing could watch rock concert videos and pass while listening to Elvis Presley or Mick Jagger or the Beatles.

The stick:

But if volunteerism doesn’t work, sterner measures would be needed. I propose establishment of terminal taxes—Remuneration in Place of Full Future Service (RIPOFFS)—to be assessed at age 65. This would acknowledge seniors’ lessened contributions to society. Exceptions could be made for members of Congress, billionaires, players on Super Bowl and World Series teams, popular entertainers, and finalists on the Dude, You’re So Fired! television series. If too few of the elderly took advantage of this generous offer, names could be drawn from a national lottery of tax evaders to make up any shortfall.

Family members of the departed could purchase the cremated remains of loved ones (tax deductible!) for $1,000.  Major credit cards and bit coin would be accepted. Unclaimed remains would be strewn in the Garden of Greatness at the nation’s capital, guaranteeing the departed an opportunity to render a final public service as fertilizer.

Since I am an octogenarian myself, you may safely assume that I have no personal purpose or motive in promoting this necessary work other than advancing the public interest. My goal is to reduce the pressures of overpopulation, to restore the natural ebb and flow of life, and to spare the public purse. If Jonathan Swift were alive today, I suspect he would be nodding in agreement. Or laughing.