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There's one graph that basically predicts which countries are going to fail and which are going to prevail. It's the graph that shows how many people in the "do

There's one graph that basically predicts which countries are going to fail and which are going to prevail. It's the graph that shows how many people in the "doing things" age bracket a country has. Compare these: (germany) https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=276&type=Probabilistic%20Projections&category=Population&subcategory=Age%2025-69 https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=276&type=Probabilis... (alternatively, Europe as a whole) https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=908&type=Probabilistic%20Projections&category=Population&subcategory=Age%2025-69 https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=908&type=Probabilis... (Japan) https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=392&type=Probabilistic%20Projections&category=Population&subcategory=Age%2025-69 https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=392&type=Probabilis... (China) https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=156&type=Probabilistic%20Projections&category=Population&subcategory=Age%2025-69 https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=156&type=Probabilis... to this one (US) https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=840&type=Probabilistic%20Projections&category=Population&subcategory=Age%2025-69 https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=840&type=Probabilis... A key aggravating factor is most countries in the first group have stagnating productivity and the country in the second group has raising productivity on top. This creates a compound advantage for the country in the second group. It seems likely to me that there is almost no degree of anti-national behavior the government of that country would need to exhibit or no amount of country-eroding policies that could forfeit this fundamental advantage. They'd need to get their country literally nuked or something similarly catastrophic.

morkalork 2y ago
Canada doesn't feel like it's winning despite what the graph says*. Bringing in tons of working-aged immigrants has caused housing (and other living) costs to explode, which in turn has lead to less people having children, which leads to more immigration to fill the gap and the whole thing has been spiraling. Not fun at all. * https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=124&type=Probabilistic%20Projections&category=Population&subcategory=Age%2025-69 https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=124&type=Probabilis...
- cayleyh 2y ago
  The problem with just "living by the graph" is that it ignores whether the country has the capacity to provide basics like food, clothing, shelter, and employment to the population. You need to have both to have the working-age population be able to engage productively in the economy. The problem Canada created is that it tried to reset it's population graph without ensuring that there was an adequate supply of said basics, and in many instances (housing, food prices) had policies that actively undermined what needed to a happen to support a rapidly expanding population. JT and the other liberal leadership read the Century Initiative and all they took away as "we need 100m people!" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Century_Initiative https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Century_Initiative) It's not that a country couldn't theoretically be successful resetting their population graph through immigration, but that they would also have to do things that would cause housing prices to fall or more competition (ie less corporate profits) in the other sectors to absorb the extra demand generated -- 2 things Canada has been absolutely unwilling to do in any meaningful until late last year.
  - 3vidence 2y ago
    Yeah there has been a pretty definitive drop in overall productivity in Canada since the sudden increase in population. I believe the economic term is population trap, where your society / economy can't expand fast enough to make efficient use of the addition in capital. It is pretty clear based on the constantly decreasing GDP per capita.
- greenavocado 2y ago
  Canada is a Calhounian behavioral sink except they stave off the extinction by importing. Summary with links to various publications at the end: https://notwokedot.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/The-Behavioural-Sink.pdf https://notwokedot.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/The-Behavi...
- thomassmith65 2y ago
  Immigration is no excuse for the Canadian housing shortage. Canada is one of the world's largest land masses, and - even in its South - mainly uninhabited.
petra 2y ago
Assuming a decent AI and robotics, is a lot of working age population still a good thing? Or just more mouths to feed?
mrtksn 2y ago
What happens when a country fails?
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- denkmoon 2y ago
  We need only to look to Sudan, Somalia, et al.
  - mrtksn 2y ago
    So Japan etc. are about to be like Somalia?
- gottorf 2y ago
  South Africa is a good example of a country that is currently in that trajectory.
  - mrtksn 2y ago
    Right, so you expect Germany be like South Africa soon?
    - gottorf 2y ago
      I was merely asking your question about what happens when a country fails. I have no expectation of Germany turning out like South Africa.
      - mrtksn 2y ago
        Right, I'm trying to find out what people expect to happen when a developed country fails.
        numpad0 2y ago
        Like post WWII Axis nations?
vpribish 2y ago
not often a comment here makes an impact like that. wow - holy crap.
alecco 2y ago
It is an important variable. But a more realistic picture needs to factor in: 1. median IQ 2. skills 3. future unfunded liabilities (welfare, pensions, public health, etc) China has demographics collapse like the West but they have high median IQ, high skills, and almost no unfunded liabilities. Meanwhile, Western IQ and skills are dropping like a stone and they have trillions in unfunded liabilities. And any attempt to fix it is either a drop in a bucket or going to trigger massive unrest. Just see what happened in France a year ago. I hope China learns this lesson an makes some changes. At least they have a bit more runway to do so.
- bobthepanda 2y ago
  I think this really depends on how you define unfunded liabilities. China, for example, has mostly not established liabilities because the social systems for retiring are a joke. People instead save personally and shovel those savings into real estate, but the real estate market is collapsing/collapsed because it turns out all that retirement saving driving up the median-house to median-income ratio to 40+x was not sustainable. To put in perspective how bad that is, cities the West considers expensive: Paris is 17x London is 12x NYC is 9.7x San Francisco is 9x --- Shanghai is down from peak but still at 33x, and that's a correction. Either people still can't afford to buy homes, or a large class of homeowners will become destitute elderly people and all that entails for social stability, or the government will have to make up the difference somehow.
  - alecco 2y ago
    Good point.
    - bobthepanda 2y ago
      I’d also add that China actually does have future pension liabilities. China’s past one child policy is causing the pyramid to quickly go from 4-2-1 to 1-2-4 in terms of ratio of working to dependents; and young people are already not participating in pensions because they think its highly likely the systems will go bust and they won’t see a cent of their contributions. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-01-07/why-millions-of-china-s-gen-z-millennials-are-not-paying-into-pensions-podcast#:~:text=Asia%20podcast%20today.-,China's%20pension%20system%20is%20in%20danger%20of%20running%20out%20of,refusing%20to%20pay%20into%20it. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-01-07/why-milli...
tokioyoyo 2y ago
China still has a good chunk of population in rural area that will keep supporting urban population growth for a while. That being said, I'm not sure how any of those graphs translate to quality of life of an average person living in those countries. When shit hits the fan, there will be drastic changes, just like how Japan is accepting more and more immigrants every year. That tap will be cut of in a decade or two, because every country will be fighting for them unless we have some magical economical overhaul. I have zero clues what predictions can be made for 2050 in terms of demographics.
Barrin92 2y ago
For one on a data level that's not an accurate statement even limited to the countries in question, here's productivity: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/labor-productivity-per-hour-pennworldtable?tab=chart https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/labor-productivity-per-ho... Europe has largely converged on American growth, the East in particular continues to grow fast. But more important is that this is obviously an intentionally selective group of countries. Add Taiwan or South Korea to this story and it becomes a lot more complicated, because the latter is about to/has overtaken Japan on a per capita basis while having some of the worst demographics on the planet. There's research by Keyu Jin that actually shows the opposite, globally growth after the year 2000 has been faster in aging countries for the simple reason that it increases returns on labor saving technology, i.e. automation (telling image:https://cdn.statcdn.com/Infographic/images/normal/13645.jpeg https://cdn.statcdn.com/Infographic/images/normal/13645.jpeg) and that is, even if you are conservative on technological developments in the next few decades, likely to accelerate quickly.

morkalork 2y ago

Canada doesn't feel like it's winning despite what the graph says*. Bringing in tons of working-aged immigrants has caused housing (and other living) costs to explode, which in turn has lead to less people having children, which leads to more immigration to fill the gap and the whole thing has been spiraling. Not fun at all. * https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=124&type=Probabilistic%20Projections&category=Population&subcategory=Age%2025-69 https://population.un.org/wpp/graphs?loc=124&type=Probabilis...

cayleyh 2y ago
The problem with just "living by the graph" is that it ignores whether the country has the capacity to provide basics like food, clothing, shelter, and employment to the population. You need to have both to have the working-age population be able to engage productively in the economy. The problem Canada created is that it tried to reset it's population graph without ensuring that there was an adequate supply of said basics, and in many instances (housing, food prices) had policies that actively undermined what needed to a happen to support a rapidly expanding population. JT and the other liberal leadership read the Century Initiative and all they took away as "we need 100m people!" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Century_Initiative https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Century_Initiative) It's not that a country couldn't theoretically be successful resetting their population graph through immigration, but that they would also have to do things that would cause housing prices to fall or more competition (ie less corporate profits) in the other sectors to absorb the extra demand generated -- 2 things Canada has been absolutely unwilling to do in any meaningful until late last year.
- 3vidence 2y ago
  Yeah there has been a pretty definitive drop in overall productivity in Canada since the sudden increase in population. I believe the economic term is population trap, where your society / economy can't expand fast enough to make efficient use of the addition in capital. It is pretty clear based on the constantly decreasing GDP per capita.
greenavocado 2y ago
Canada is a Calhounian behavioral sink except they stave off the extinction by importing. Summary with links to various publications at the end: https://notwokedot.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/The-Behavioural-Sink.pdf https://notwokedot.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/The-Behavi...
thomassmith65 2y ago
Immigration is no excuse for the Canadian housing shortage. Canada is one of the world's largest land masses, and - even in its South - mainly uninhabited.

petra 2y ago

Assuming a decent AI and robotics, is a lot of working age population still a good thing? Or just more mouths to feed?

mrtksn 2y ago

What happens when a country fails?

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
denkmoon 2y ago
We need only to look to Sudan, Somalia, et al.
- mrtksn 2y ago
  So Japan etc. are about to be like Somalia?
gottorf 2y ago
South Africa is a good example of a country that is currently in that trajectory.
- mrtksn 2y ago
  Right, so you expect Germany be like South Africa soon?
  - gottorf 2y ago
    I was merely asking your question about what happens when a country fails. I have no expectation of Germany turning out like South Africa.
    - mrtksn 2y ago
      Right, I'm trying to find out what people expect to happen when a developed country fails.
      - numpad0 2y ago
        Like post WWII Axis nations?

vpribish 2y ago

not often a comment here makes an impact like that. wow - holy crap.

alecco 2y ago

It is an important variable. But a more realistic picture needs to factor in: 1. median IQ 2. skills 3. future unfunded liabilities (welfare, pensions, public health, etc) China has demographics collapse like the West but they have high median IQ, high skills, and almost no unfunded liabilities. Meanwhile, Western IQ and skills are dropping like a stone and they have trillions in unfunded liabilities. And any attempt to fix it is either a drop in a bucket or going to trigger massive unrest. Just see what happened in France a year ago. I hope China learns this lesson an makes some changes. At least they have a bit more runway to do so.

bobthepanda 2y ago
I think this really depends on how you define unfunded liabilities. China, for example, has mostly not established liabilities because the social systems for retiring are a joke. People instead save personally and shovel those savings into real estate, but the real estate market is collapsing/collapsed because it turns out all that retirement saving driving up the median-house to median-income ratio to 40+x was not sustainable. To put in perspective how bad that is, cities the West considers expensive: Paris is 17x London is 12x NYC is 9.7x San Francisco is 9x --- Shanghai is down from peak but still at 33x, and that's a correction. Either people still can't afford to buy homes, or a large class of homeowners will become destitute elderly people and all that entails for social stability, or the government will have to make up the difference somehow.
- alecco 2y ago
  Good point.
  - bobthepanda 2y ago
    I’d also add that China actually does have future pension liabilities. China’s past one child policy is causing the pyramid to quickly go from 4-2-1 to 1-2-4 in terms of ratio of working to dependents; and young people are already not participating in pensions because they think its highly likely the systems will go bust and they won’t see a cent of their contributions. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-01-07/why-millions-of-china-s-gen-z-millennials-are-not-paying-into-pensions-podcast#:~:text=Asia%20podcast%20today.-,China's%20pension%20system%20is%20in%20danger%20of%20running%20out%20of,refusing%20to%20pay%20into%20it. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-01-07/why-milli...

tokioyoyo 2y ago

China still has a good chunk of population in rural area that will keep supporting urban population growth for a while. That being said, I'm not sure how any of those graphs translate to quality of life of an average person living in those countries. When shit hits the fan, there will be drastic changes, just like how Japan is accepting more and more immigrants every year. That tap will be cut of in a decade or two, because every country will be fighting for them unless we have some magical economical overhaul. I have zero clues what predictions can be made for 2050 in terms of demographics.

Barrin92 2y ago

For one on a data level that's not an accurate statement even limited to the countries in question, here's productivity: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/labor-productivity-per-hour-pennworldtable?tab=chart https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/labor-productivity-per-ho... Europe has largely converged on American growth, the East in particular continues to grow fast. But more important is that this is obviously an intentionally selective group of countries. Add Taiwan or South Korea to this story and it becomes a lot more complicated, because the latter is about to/has overtaken Japan on a per capita basis while having some of the worst demographics on the planet. There's research by Keyu Jin that actually shows the opposite, globally growth after the year 2000 has been faster in aging countries for the simple reason that it increases returns on labor saving technology, i.e. automation (telling image:https://cdn.statcdn.com/Infographic/images/normal/13645.jpeg https://cdn.statcdn.com/Infographic/images/normal/13645.jpeg) and that is, even if you are conservative on technological developments in the next few decades, likely to accelerate quickly.