This game is a weird one for me. It kind of punishes growth or improvement to me, and neither are necessary or forced.
Every time I play it I realize I can just not have any offspring except when needed to keep the population at exactly the same amount.
Then you just don't build upgraded buildings or anything and everyone lives a happy, safe, and stable existence lol.
I'm not sure what mechanic or combination of mechanics in this game specifically become the burden that makes me not want to expand but something in it makes me just want to start at beginning tech. The word snowball effect of new problems and challenges...
It's only 0.28% of the population of that makes any difference.