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A major point the article is missing is that after population peak comes population decline. The pattern of "demographic transition" is that as lifespans exten

by dzdt 7y ago

A major point the article is missing is that after population peak comes population decline. The pattern of "demographic transition" is that as lifespans extend, infant mortality declines, and lifestyles change the birthrate drops. But it doesn't drop just to replacement rate, it drops much below replacement rate. Most developed countries are in this state now where their population would be declining but for immigration. When today's fast-growing countries reach the same point in their demographic transitions, the whole world's population will enter decline. This could happen even earlier than around 2100 when the UN estimates; other demographers are forecasting a date more like 2065. [1] What will the economics be of a world in population decline? How will culture and policies change to eventually stabilise the decline? Lots of questions... [1] Lutz et al 2018 : https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/sites/jrcsh/files/lutz_et_al_2018_demographic_and_human_capital.pdf https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/sites/jrcsh/files/lutz_et_al_2018_d...

user17843 7y ago
Additionally the data points for the low-fertility countries are extremely reliable, while the data for the few countries with supposedely rapidly expanding population is only guesswork. Most of the projected population increase in Africa is based upon a small number of countries like Nigeria, where most of the people live on the countryside, and there never have been reliable census to accurately predict the future population. The only thing we know is that Africans moving to cities stop having many children, and that the fertlity rate in the richer African areas is rapidly decreasing. In Northern and Southern Africa the fertlity rate is already below 2.5, approaching sub-replacement levels. [1] Which means it is definitely possible that the entire world will be entering sub-replacement level in the coming decades. Unfortunately the African coutries with a high-fertility projection haven an interest in lying about their numbers, because it means more NGO money and political influence. [2] The country with the lowest fertility rate in the world is South Korea, which has a fertility rate of <1. [3] South-Korea is facing extinction. [4] Additionally there are hints that China is lying about their population numbers as well. [5] India, which is the most populated country in the world, has already fallen to sub-replacement levels in almost all counties, and stands at a fertility rate of 2.2, as of 2017. [6] [1] https://ourworldindata.org/fertility-rate https://ourworldindata.org/fertility-rate [2] https://qz.com/africa/1221472/the-story-of-how-nigerias-census-figures-became-weaponized/ https://qz.com/africa/1221472/the-story-of-how-nigerias-cens... [3] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/03/south-koreas-fertility-rate-set-to-hit-record-low https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/03/south-koreas-f... [4] https://www.businessinsider.com/south-koreans-could-be-extinct-by-2750-2015-6?IR=T https://www.businessinsider.com/south-koreans-could-be-extin... [5] https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/china/china-has-been-overstating-its-population-numbers-since-1990-says-us-academic/articleshow/58835756.cms https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/china/china-has-be... [6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_union_territories_of_India_by_fertility_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_union_terri...
adrianN 7y ago
With the current climate path we're on, catastrophic collapse of many ecosystems will likely accelerate the decline of the population.
nerdponx 7y ago
A major point the article is missing is that after population peak comes population decline. The pattern of "demographic transition" is that as lifespans extend, infant mortality declines, and lifestyles change the birthrate drops. But it doesn't drop just to replacement rate, it drops much below replacement rate. Great. Better to have it happen through declining birth rates than through natural disaster, pandemic, starvation, etc.
- raducu 7y ago
  Those are not exclusive, you know that, right? On the contrary, a shrinking population is much more likely not to be able to manage those issues.
  - hinkley 7y ago
    Or an aging population. When I was in college some of the profs offered extra credit if you wanted to go bag sand for major flooding about an hour away (a nice way to let people go home and help their family and friends). Strong backs and enthusiasm are good for augmenting the experts in a disaster recovery situation.
iandanforth 7y ago
I got a somewhat useful answer to this question over on economics stack exchange which could help people find related research. https://economics.stackexchange.com/questions/29461/what-is-the-proper-term-for-contraction-economics https://economics.stackexchange.com/questions/29461/what-is-...
Ntrails 7y ago
It's always fun to answer multiple choice quizzes like this. Work out what point they're trying to make and go from 0/2 to 10/13. I'm not informed, as the quiz result suggests, I just spotted the pattern.
- mikeash 7y ago
  Yep, I scored 12/13 and the only reason I missed one is because my pessimism briefly overrode the obviousness I’d the quiz’s bias.
  - AstralStorm 7y ago
    More importantly, the numbers are rough and in a few cases I had an off by one issue. (E.g. I know global median life expectancy is around 65 years, quiz shows 60 and 70 and asks after an average. Or the question about educated women in low income countries where I know it's roughly about half and test showed 40% and 60%, or being out by half billion in map question between Asia and Africa. Duh.)
Balgair 7y ago
Kevin Kelly talked about this issue a while ago. He points to the Amish as a counter example to general population decline. https://www.ted.com/talks/kevin_kelly_on_how_technology_evolves/transcript?language=en https://www.ted.com/talks/kevin_kelly_on_how_technology_evol...
rjf72 7y ago
Things aren't quite this simple because developed nations don't act as homogeneous wholes. The trends we see on the international level are followed within nations themselves and even down to the state, county, and city level. For instance this [1] is a graph of US income vs fertility. People who are earning substantial amounts of money are, like you said, simply not not reproducing enough to maintain their population. Yet people people who cannot even afford to feed themselves, let alone any children, are reproducing rapidly. The birth rate of those earning less than $10k is nearly 50% higher than those earning more than $200k per year. And the gradient between these two is somewhat disconcertingly smooth. Religion is another factor that plays into birth rates. Muslims, for instance, have extremely high fertility rates and that stays true even once they migrate to developed nations. For instance the Muslim fertility rate in North America is about 2.7. It's also why the Muslim population is expected to increase 70% by 2060 whereas the number of unaffiliated is expected to increase by 3%, Buddhists decrease by 7%, and so on. [2] Those number increases are not affected by conversion which plays a roughly net zero role in Islam with about 25% of people leaving the religion, and 25% joining it. So what you're looking at is more of a demographic switch than an economic one. People who are highly educated, secular, and high income will gradually die off, failing to replace themselves. At the same time individuals of lower income and those who place less value on education and more on religion will continue to increase in numbers well beyond replacement. Basically, so long as there is at least one group within a nation that consistently produces in excess of replacement, they will eventually replace any and every group that does not. And, in the longrun, that group will also guarantee that, over time, the population (local, nation, and world) will also continue to increase. So we'll see a population peak, a demographic swap paired with a population decline, and then a return to a growing population - likely with vastly different norms and values as a society than we have today. --- Of course my analysis is also flawed because it assumes no revolutionary change in the norms of today. These range from the unpleasant to consider such as changes to welfare systems, to the highly pleasant to consider such as the possibility of expanding our populations outward with the colonization of new planets and space in general. But ultimately, I do not see longterm population decline as probable in any scenario. Your article also affirms this hypothesis. For instance in their prediction graph they show that Sweden will now, even with 0 migration, see consistent population growth. Sweden is simply playing out this scenario in fast forward due to a very small population paired with high migration rates which did little than accelerate the rate of demographic replacement. E.g. in the 90s Sweden's population was less than 9 million and with negative fertility rates, they were starting to see population declines. Then enter the migrations and now their population is greater than 10 million and their population is now back to growing, even without any more migration. [1] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/241530/birth-rate-by-family-income-in-the-us/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/241530/birth-rate-by-fam... [2] - https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/04/06/why-muslims-are-the-worlds-fastest-growing-religious-group/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/04/06/why-muslims...
hkai 7y ago
Do you feel the assumption that all countries will follow the same pattern may be incorrect? Would it be possible to achieve high GDP and yet still maintain a high birth rate?

by dzdt 7y ago

user17843 7y ago

Additionally the data points for the low-fertility countries are extremely reliable, while the data for the few countries with supposedely rapidly expanding population is only guesswork. Most of the projected population increase in Africa is based upon a small number of countries like Nigeria, where most of the people live on the countryside, and there never have been reliable census to accurately predict the future population. The only thing we know is that Africans moving to cities stop having many children, and that the fertlity rate in the richer African areas is rapidly decreasing. In Northern and Southern Africa the fertlity rate is already below 2.5, approaching sub-replacement levels. [1] Which means it is definitely possible that the entire world will be entering sub-replacement level in the coming decades. Unfortunately the African coutries with a high-fertility projection haven an interest in lying about their numbers, because it means more NGO money and political influence. [2] The country with the lowest fertility rate in the world is South Korea, which has a fertility rate of <1. [3] South-Korea is facing extinction. [4] Additionally there are hints that China is lying about their population numbers as well. [5] India, which is the most populated country in the world, has already fallen to sub-replacement levels in almost all counties, and stands at a fertility rate of 2.2, as of 2017. [6] [1] https://ourworldindata.org/fertility-rate https://ourworldindata.org/fertility-rate [2] https://qz.com/africa/1221472/the-story-of-how-nigerias-census-figures-became-weaponized/ https://qz.com/africa/1221472/the-story-of-how-nigerias-cens... [3] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/03/south-koreas-fertility-rate-set-to-hit-record-low https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/03/south-koreas-f... [4] https://www.businessinsider.com/south-koreans-could-be-extinct-by-2750-2015-6?IR=T https://www.businessinsider.com/south-koreans-could-be-extin... [5] https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/china/china-has-been-overstating-its-population-numbers-since-1990-says-us-academic/articleshow/58835756.cms https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/china/china-has-be... [6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_union_territories_of_India_by_fertility_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_union_terri...

adrianN 7y ago

With the current climate path we're on, catastrophic collapse of many ecosystems will likely accelerate the decline of the population.

nerdponx 7y ago

raducu 7y ago
Those are not exclusive, you know that, right? On the contrary, a shrinking population is much more likely not to be able to manage those issues.
- hinkley 7y ago
  Or an aging population. When I was in college some of the profs offered extra credit if you wanted to go bag sand for major flooding about an hour away (a nice way to let people go home and help their family and friends). Strong backs and enthusiasm are good for augmenting the experts in a disaster recovery situation.

iandanforth 7y ago

I got a somewhat useful answer to this question over on economics stack exchange which could help people find related research. https://economics.stackexchange.com/questions/29461/what-is-the-proper-term-for-contraction-economics https://economics.stackexchange.com/questions/29461/what-is-...

Ntrails 7y ago

It's always fun to answer multiple choice quizzes like this. Work out what point they're trying to make and go from 0/2 to 10/13. I'm not informed, as the quiz result suggests, I just spotted the pattern.

mikeash 7y ago
Yep, I scored 12/13 and the only reason I missed one is because my pessimism briefly overrode the obviousness I’d the quiz’s bias.
- AstralStorm 7y ago
  More importantly, the numbers are rough and in a few cases I had an off by one issue. (E.g. I know global median life expectancy is around 65 years, quiz shows 60 and 70 and asks after an average. Or the question about educated women in low income countries where I know it's roughly about half and test showed 40% and 60%, or being out by half billion in map question between Asia and Africa. Duh.)

Balgair 7y ago

Kevin Kelly talked about this issue a while ago. He points to the Amish as a counter example to general population decline. https://www.ted.com/talks/kevin_kelly_on_how_technology_evolves/transcript?language=en https://www.ted.com/talks/kevin_kelly_on_how_technology_evol...

rjf72 7y ago

Things aren't quite this simple because developed nations don't act as homogeneous wholes. The trends we see on the international level are followed within nations themselves and even down to the state, county, and city level. For instance this [1] is a graph of US income vs fertility. People who are earning substantial amounts of money are, like you said, simply not not reproducing enough to maintain their population. Yet people people who cannot even afford to feed themselves, let alone any children, are reproducing rapidly. The birth rate of those earning less than $10k is nearly 50% higher than those earning more than $200k per year. And the gradient between these two is somewhat disconcertingly smooth. Religion is another factor that plays into birth rates. Muslims, for instance, have extremely high fertility rates and that stays true even once they migrate to developed nations. For instance the Muslim fertility rate in North America is about 2.7. It's also why the Muslim population is expected to increase 70% by 2060 whereas the number of unaffiliated is expected to increase by 3%, Buddhists decrease by 7%, and so on. [2] Those number increases are not affected by conversion which plays a roughly net zero role in Islam with about 25% of people leaving the religion, and 25% joining it. So what you're looking at is more of a demographic switch than an economic one. People who are highly educated, secular, and high income will gradually die off, failing to replace themselves. At the same time individuals of lower income and those who place less value on education and more on religion will continue to increase in numbers well beyond replacement. Basically, so long as there is at least one group within a nation that consistently produces in excess of replacement, they will eventually replace any and every group that does not. And, in the longrun, that group will also guarantee that, over time, the population (local, nation, and world) will also continue to increase. So we'll see a population peak, a demographic swap paired with a population decline, and then a return to a growing population - likely with vastly different norms and values as a society than we have today. --- Of course my analysis is also flawed because it assumes no revolutionary change in the norms of today. These range from the unpleasant to consider such as changes to welfare systems, to the highly pleasant to consider such as the possibility of expanding our populations outward with the colonization of new planets and space in general. But ultimately, I do not see longterm population decline as probable in any scenario. Your article also affirms this hypothesis. For instance in their prediction graph they show that Sweden will now, even with 0 migration, see consistent population growth. Sweden is simply playing out this scenario in fast forward due to a very small population paired with high migration rates which did little than accelerate the rate of demographic replacement. E.g. in the 90s Sweden's population was less than 9 million and with negative fertility rates, they were starting to see population declines. Then enter the migrations and now their population is greater than 10 million and their population is now back to growing, even without any more migration. [1] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/241530/birth-rate-by-family-income-in-the-us/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/241530/birth-rate-by-fam... [2] - https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/04/06/why-muslims-are-the-worlds-fastest-growing-religious-group/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/04/06/why-muslims...

hkai 7y ago

Do you feel the assumption that all countries will follow the same pattern may be incorrect? Would it be possible to achieve high GDP and yet still maintain a high birth rate?