Many people think overpopulation is the biggest threat the human race will face in the future,
but this is not true. The biggest problem of the future is actually population decline. In
a world where the population in a country decreases rapidly, economies will crash,
aging citizens won't be able to get the help they need, and progress will stall.
You might be thinking: aren’t there already too many people on the planet using too many
resources? Or: wouldn’t a smaller population be better for everyone? The answer to these
and your other burning questions are all about to be answered. First, let’s be clear:
humans are not in danger of overpopulating the planet. There are vast amounts of resources,
and although they are limited, we likely could never reach the carrying capacity of Earth.
Instead, the real problem is that people living in wealthier nations consume much more resources
than they should. It’s overconsumption that is driving the current problems of climate
change and resource loss. Even still, you would assume less people would equal less consumption,
and therefore population decline should be a good thing. But this is not necessarily the case.
To better understand the ramifications of population decline in a country,
we must first examine what causes it,
why it's harmful, and which countries are in the most danger because of it.
There are several nations whose populations are already in decline. However, even in
countries that are still currently growing, most will begin to stagnate in the near future
as birth rates decrease. This is one of the key reasons why populations are starting to
fall around the world. Over the last couple of decades, women have been choosing to have
fewer children or to start families later in life. As birth rates and the number of
children in a family decline, the population also declines as older generations pass away.
However, there are other ways that a country's population can decline even if birth rates
exceed death rates. For example, in countries like Venezuela, birth rates are still high,
but emigration rates are causing a decline in the country’s population. Due to the economic
crisis and harsh living conditions, more and more Venezuelans are leaving for a better life outside
their home country. This happens in many other places around the world, and it’s a combination
of declining birthrates and high emigration rates that can cause populations to rapidly decrease.
The causes of population decline have a large effect on a country itself. Unfortunately,
even though there are several pros to a decreasing population—such as more space
for native habitats to regrow and less strain on natural resources—there are many cons as well.
Let’s discuss the repercussions a country faces when it finds itself with a dwindling
population size. The scariest part of this whole thing is that most countries in Europe,
Asia, and much of the Americas are all about to experience these phenomena.
The main concern for many countries is that a declining population can have drastic consequences
on their economy. Less young people means less workers are entering the workforce every
year. This is a huge problem because as older generations retire, there are fewer and fewer
people to take their place. A shrinking labor pool inevitably leads to a decrease in economic growth.
If a country doesn’t have enough workers for entry-level jobs,
entire businesses come crumbling to the ground. A huge economic burden is placed
on those who are working as they need to pick up the slack of the increasing number
of retirees. The working class is forced to put ever-increasing amounts of money into
social services to ensure that older generations receive the support they need while also having
access to programs such as social security that provide them with some form of income.
Another economic problem that occurs as a population grows older is that retired individuals
tend to spend less money. This slows the economy even more in countries with shrinking populations
because their overall consumer base is buying fewer products and spending less money. Without
young people to pick up the consumer slack, a country's economy once again begins to shrink.
And this is not just a hypothetical situation. In 2016, Heilongjiang
Province in northeastern China became the first municipality to run out of money in
its pension system. The population in the region had been steadily declining,
and more people were retiring than entering the workforce. At the moment,
there just aren’t enough workers to fund the pension system for the older generation. This
may become the norm across the world in countries that rely on workers paying into social security
and other unsustainable systems that were set up on the premise of an ever-growing workforce.
This lack of young laborers causes other problems as well. When there is a shortage of cheap labor,
wages tend to increase as the demand for employees increases. This may seem like
a good thing at first, but it actually can hurt an economy. As young unskilled
laborers that would normally take entry-level jobs become more scarce,
companies begin moving their operations to countries with cheaper labor pools to keep
costs low. In parts of the world like Europe and Japan, this is becoming more and more common.
But there is a much bigger problem with having a shortage of young people in an economy. It’s
the younger generations that tend to drive innovation. The fresh minds and dreams of
young business people coming out of school and into the workplace are what drive change. Young
entrepreneurs disrupt the status quo, which helps economies innovate and grow. However,
with graduating classes of skilled students becoming smaller and smaller due to shrinking
populations, the innovators that drive progress are becoming few and far between.
There is also a crazy and unexpected phenomenon happening in countries that experience population
decline. Depending on who you are, you may or may not agree with how the government is running your
country. For younger generations, it feels like it’s becoming more and more difficult
to make progress, and part of that is due to population decline. In many European
countries and even the United States, there are more older voters than young ones. This
means that the political majority is in favour of the older, often more conservative voters.
This is not because a country, as a whole, desires to be more conservative, but because
older generations that tend to be set in their ways have a larger voter base than younger,
more liberal voters. These shifts can have huge ramifications for progressive policies
such as combating climate change, increasing equality, and providing better social services.
But the economy and political system are not the only parts of a country affected
by population decline. The distribution of where people live can also shift. In most countries,
cities continue to grow even as the population declines. This is because
cities tend to have more jobs and opportunities even when economies
are shrinking. As more and more people flock to cities, rural areas become ghost towns.
Entire town centers, including schools, shops, and homes, are being abandoned as populations decline.
Nature slowly takes back these areas, and in some places like Germany, abandoned buildings are torn
down and replaced by parks and green spaces. This is definitely a good way to repurpose these areas,
but the problem is that the people who once lived in these towns and have moved are now putting
greater pressure on the infrastructure, housing, and services of major cities.
While a country as a whole may experience population decline,
cities are seeing more and more growth. This is quite the conundrum and one
problem that desperately needs to be addressed by governments. With more people in urban centers,
there is a greater need for investments in public transportation, sanitation,
and emergency services. And as a reminder, all of these things tend to be paid for by
taxpayers. As the working class becomes smaller, there will be less available income to tax,
which will make funding vital services even more difficult than it already is.
The sad reality is that in some countries, people are being asked to come out of retirement and
work longer. In others, people don’t have a choice and must keep working well past the
age they had initially planned to retire at just to make ends meet. Germany has raised
its retirement age to 67 and has plans to bump it up to 69 in the near future. At this rate,
citizens of countries experiencing population decline may be working for their entire lives.
So, now you’re probably wondering where population
decline is the highest and how much it will affect you in the future.
Eastern Europe contains the majority of the countries that are predicted to experience
severe population decline in the next 30 years. Several factors affect this region,
many having to do with living conditions and political strife after the fall of
the Soviet Union. This has led to low birth rates and high emigration rates,
a combination that has drastic consequences on a population.
Bulgaria is currently expected to lose 22.5% of its overall population by 2050. This means
that the country's population will decline by almost a quarter in the next 30 years,
from 6.9 million people to 5.4 million. This huge drop in population will have
drastic consequences for the country in the future.
The largest contributing factor to Bulgaria’s population decline is the migration of workers
to countries with more job opportunities. The main group of people leaving the country are
actually young and middle-aged workers that are so desperately needed to keep Bulgaria's
economy from collapsing. The emigration of people from Bulgaria means that not
only is its population getting smaller but that the older generation will make up more
of the overall population as the years go by. But Bulgaria isn’t the only country experiencing
this phenomenon. Latvia is expected to experience a 21.6% decline in population
by 2050. This decrease is attributed to low birth rates and the migration of young workers
to countries in the European Union with better opportunities. Latvia has been looked at as a
clear indicator of what population decline can do to a country’s economy. As fewer Latvians are
entering the workforce and more citizens are seeking opportunities elsewhere, the
Latvian economy has stalled and begun to decline. Again, this is to be expected as there are fewer
workers and consumers every year, two things a struggling economy desperately needs to grow.
Unfortunately, there are other factors outside of the control of a country that
can also lead to population decline, such as war. Perhaps there is no better example of
this than in Ukraine. Before Putin decided to invade the country and start a war that
has raged for what seems like an eternity, Ukraine’s population was already in decline.
Previous estimates projected that the Ukrainian population would shrink from 43.7 million people
to 35.2 million by 2050. This was because there were around 9.2 births for every
1,000 people in the country, while the death rate was approximately 15.2 deaths
per 1,000 people. Obviously, this math paints a grim picture. Over
50% more people die each year than are born. This, coupled with migration out
of the country for job opportunities, puts Ukraine in a dangerous position.
However, with Russia's aggression and the war taking place on Ukrainian soil,
the population decline in the country will be worse than anyone could have ever predicted.
The obvious cause of the population decline currently happening in Ukraine is death due
to combat or collateral damage. The United Nations estimates that somewhere around
14,200 to 14,400 Ukrainians have died in the conflict. At the same time, the decline is
exacerbated by people are seeking refuge in the surrounding nations to try and escape the carnage.
Over five million people have fled the borders of Ukraine since the war began,
and it’s likely more will follow. Some will return home once the war ends, but many will start new
lives in a different country. These displaced Ukrainians may visit their former home, but
they will probably never move back permanently. This is especially true for anyone who can set
up a new life for themselves and their families in the country they are currently seeking asylum in.
The bigger threat to the future of Ukraine's population is that people are not having babies
or starting families during this time for obvious reasons. The last thing on anyone’s
mind during a war is procreating. This means that while the war persists, birth rates will
continue to decline. Even after the war ends, there will be a period of time where birth
rates will continue to decrease sharply until some form of normalcy is returned to the region.
When looking at the rate of population decline worldwide,
it’s clear that Eastern Europe is in a bad spot. However, as can be seen, several other
countries outside of Eastern Europe seem to be facing a decrease in population as well.
Japan is an economic powerhouse. It has the third highest GDP in the world, behind the
United States and China. But Japan faces a huge crisis. Its population is in decline,
which is bound to cause an economic shockwave that will rock the island nation.
By 2050 Japan’s population is predicted to fall by 16.3%. This is due to very low
fertility rates at an average of 1.42 births per woman. This is well below the 2.1 births
per woman needed to keep a population stable. What this means is that in the coming years,
Japan’s overall population will be made up of mostly older individuals,
with fewer and fewer young workers to take their place and support the economy.
As Japan’s population and economy shrink, the effects will be felt
across the world. Japanese companies will not be able to produce as many products,
and innovation will slow down due to a smaller number of young people entering
the workforce each year. This also means that Japan will consume fewer goods, and therefore,
their imports will also decrease. Since Japan has such a large GDP,
its population decline is not just a problem for the country but for its trade partners as well.
Japan exports a massive amount of cars, circuitry, and other types of technology across the world,
which will all come to a screeching halt if it doesn’t find a way to boost its population.
Japan is not the exception either; they just happen to be experiencing
population decline at this very moment. Other countries will follow. In fact,
many demographers and population scientists agree that the global population will stop
increasing around the year 2100. Population growth is already beginning to slow in
countries like China, the United States, and most of Europe. It will not be long until
these countries find themselves in the same predicament that Japan is currently facing.
This brings us to the simple reason why population decline is happening
in certain countries. Yes, a lot of it has to do with low birth rates. But why
are birth rates falling in certain nations? The answer is twofold.
Firstly, women have greater access to education and, therefore, more job opportunities. We still
have a long way to go in the quest for equality, but strides have been made.
Study after study shows that when women have access to education, birth rates decline.
There are a few reasons for this. The first is that educated women can pursue careers and
therefore put off having children until they’ve accomplished their goals. When this happens,
women tend to wait until they are older to start a family and, as a result, have fewer kids.
Education for women is not universal around the world, and more often than not, countries that
do not provide quality education for their female citizens tend to have higher birth rates. There
are definitely other factors that play a role in these statistics, but all evidence points to the
fact that the more educational opportunities women have, the less children they have on average.
The second factor that is causing a decrease in birth rates is advances in health care. There are
many more options for people who want to have sex but do not want to have babies than in the
past. Contraceptives, birth control, and abortions are now more widely available than ever before.
That being said, not every country provides these services, and where they are in short supply,
birth rates tend to be high. This is unsurprising but brings up an interesting point. As more and
more countries advance in health care and gain access to family planning resources,
birth rates will continue to decrease. Obviously,
these advances can be hindered in parts of the world that see contraceptives as being evil or
in regions that don’t believe in giving women the right to choose what to do with their own bodies.
However, an increase in education and advancement in health care are the main
factors causing people to start families later in life, and as a result have fewer
children. You may be asking yourself: is this a bad thing? Absolutely not,
but it does explain why certain countries are experiencing population decline.
Take the United States, for example. The U.S. is not losing its population to mass migration.
It’s seen as the land of opportunity and a melting pot where people from cultures
around the world can come together and work in harmony. This is not always what life is
actually like in the United States, especially for certain immigrants and disenfranchised people,
but there is no doubt that the U.S. has a strong economy and there are opportunities.
However, the birth rate in the country is dropping. In recent years the birth
rate has declined from 2.0 births per woman to 1.7 births per woman. This is
below what is necessary to maintain a stable population, which means the United States will
experience a population decline in the coming years unless something changes.
Within the next decade, population growth will stagnate in the United States. At that point,
it’s only a matter of time before the country’s population begins to decline. Economists are now
worried that when this happens, there will be a disastrous shortage of young laborers
entering the workforce. Also, there will be fewer high school graduates,
which could send educational institutions such as colleges and universities crumbling
to the ground as there won’t be enough enrollment to keep them all open.
However, there is a silver lining. Even though birth rates are declining,
many believe the U.S. population will continue to grow steadily. But,
there is only one way this could happen. Population scientists are banking on the
United States allowing more immigrants into the country. As immigration increases, population,
and the amount of young workers entering the workforce, also increases. This is especially
true if immigrants are allowed to make the U.S. their home and start their own families within
its borders. As a result, increased immigration can offset the low birth rates in the country.
That being said, if politicians put roadblocks in place to make immigration more difficult,
immigrants will take their skills and families elsewhere. Therefore,
it would be beneficial for everyone the United States to allow more people into its borders.
This will boost the economy and solve the problem of population decline. Oh, the irony.
The bottom line is that birth rates in the United States are on the decline
and likely will continue on that trend due to the availability of education for women
and relatively easy access to birth control in the country. Therefore,
the only way the U.S. can avoid a drastic decline in its population
and all of the problems that go along with it is by welcoming more immigrants into its borders.
This is true for any country experiencing population decline that can also provide economic
opportunities for immigrants. European countries, Japan, and eventually other countries such as
China will need to rethink their immigration policies if they want to continue their economic
growth. To make this even more blatantly clear, we can look at South Korea as a case study.
Like many countries, South Korea is starting to see its population
stagnate and decline. To combat this problem, South Korea invested billions of dollars into
programs to encourage its citizens to have more babies. The government increased child
allowances and medical subsidies for fertility treatments. They covered buses and subway cars
with advertisements to encourage people to start a family while also installing
pink seats on public transportation that are reserved for pregnant women.
To show their commitment to the cause, the South Korean government also built hundreds
of kindergartens and daycare centers to provide families with the resources they
need to have kids while also advancing their careers. All in all, South Korea spent $178
billion over the past 15 years to encourage women to have more children. Even still,
the Deputy Prime Minister of the country said there just was not enough progress being made,
and South Korea would still begin to experience population decline in the near future.
This is a warning for countries that think they can combat population decline without opening
their borders to immigrants. It just can’t be done. Having a baby is expensive. Having
multiple children is even more expensive. This is why many people are moving away from
having large families. It’s not because they don’t want to have multiple kids; it’s that
they just can’t afford it. This fact, coupled with an increase in education and birth control,
are the main reasons many countries with strong economies will experience population decline at
some point in the next century. For countries that are struggling economically, it’s the
combination of mass emigration and low birth rates that will drive their populations down.
Now watch “The Truth About Why America Dropped
Atomic Bombs on Japan.” Or check out “Countries Easiest to Invade.”