The main ideas of Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal" are that the poverty and overpopulation of Ireland can be solved by selling the children of the poor as food to the wealthy. Swift suggests that this would benefit the economy, reduce the number of beggars, and provide a source of income for the poor. He also argues that the children would be better off as food than as beggars, and that the practice would be more humane than the current conditions of the poor.
