2 ms·

China has a demographic collapse coming in a few decades. The long term is very much uncertain. Apart from the US becoming Russia 2, that seems set at this poi

• maxglute 1y ago
  A "few decades" = a few decades +40-50 years that PRC workforce will hang around, i.e 2070/80, aka most of our/next generations useful lifespans. They're simply going to be milking the greatest high skill demographic divident in recorded history, basically roughly OECD combined in STEM, for any remotely useful extrapolatable/relevant "long term" period. Even then by 2100 their "hammered" demographics, factoring in PRC scale, they are going to produce more tertiary talent with shit TFR than US projected to gain via natural births and immigration (as in pre Trump, immigration rates). Depending on how retirement age extends workforce particapation (which it will, PRC retirement very young), they will still have decisive effective skilled labour pool advantages. That's without mentionining all the shit that suppresses PRC TFR, i.e. real estate prices, high skill absorbtion, are all downstream from current population levels/density. Once they shed 100s of millions, all those stressors will alleviate (abundance of housing, work opportunties) + one child couples will get like 4 wealth transfers from parents, i.e. might not get back to 2.1 replacement TFR, but if it gets to 1.7-1.8 (reasonable range with pronatal policies) that's a few 100m more births to workforce.
  • karmakurtisaani 1y ago
    You're right, now that I checked, the demographics don't actually look all as bad as I thought. There are very few babies being born at the moment, but there was a surge roughly 10-15 years ago which will support the country for another 40-50 years. Thanks for correcting.