Global Demographic Crash and the Death of Growth | Anu Madgavkar

Falling fertility rates below replacement (2.1 children per woman) in two-thirds of humanity are driving global population shifts toward depopulation by 2100. UN projections show populations in major economies declining 20-50%, with age structures inverting from pyramids to obelisks: fewer youth, more seniors. 

 

Demographic shifts are transforming population pyramids into shallots or obelisks, with fewer youth and more seniors. The world’s countries are grouped into ten regions: Advanced Asia, Central/Eastern Europe, Emerging Asia, Greater China, India, Latin America/Caribbean, Middle East/North Africa, North America, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Western Europe. In advanced economies, population structures are increasingly top-heavy, resembling obelisks, due to declining fertility and aging populations. 

First-wave regions (advanced economies and China) face immediate impacts, with working-age shares dropping from 67% to 59% by 2050. Later-wave regions (emerging Asia, India, Latin America, Middle East/North Africa) peak in the 2030s; Sub-Saharan Africa, the exception, peaks post-2080.

 

The story of collapsing demographics starts in Luxembourg, the first country the United Nations recorded as having a fertility rate below replacement in 1950, when it first started collecting data.

Luxembourg’s fertility rate rebounded in the 1950s, however, making Serbia and Croatia, both part of Yugoslavia at the time, the first countries where fertility permanently dropped below the replacement threshold, in 1963 and in 1968, respectively. Within a year, fertility rates in Denmark, Finland, and Luxembourg had followed suit. None of these countries has had a fertility rate equal to or above replacement since then.

Twenty years later, most countries in Advanced Asia, Europe, and North America had crossed the replacement fertility threshold.

Subsequently, fertility rates in countries at varying levels of economic development around the world have fallen below replacement—in Thailand in 1989, Mexico in 2015, and India in 2019.

Sub-Saharan Africa is the one region of the world today where fertility rates remain high and are likely to stay above the replacement rate beyond the next quarter century.

Economic consequences include slowed GDP per capita growth by 0.4% annually on average in first-wave regions through 2050, unless offset by levers: doubled-to-quadrupled productivity growth, 1-5 extra weekly work hours per person, or migration boosting working-age populations. Senior dependency rises, with support ratios (working-age per senior) falling from 6.5 globally to 3.9, widening the "senior gap" (consumption minus income) by 1.3-1.5 times. Public pensions, covering 40-80% of gaps, strain finances; asset appreciation (e.g., real estate) has supported seniors but may falter for future generations.

Global Fertility Rate and Annual Population Growth: Top and Bottom 20 Countries in 2025.

Consumption shifts: seniors drive 25% of global spending by 2050 (double 1997), favoring healthcare (up 5-29% per capita) over education (down 4-33%). Labor markets age, with 50+ workers comprising 37% of hours worked in first-wave regions by 2050.

 
Later-wave regions must "get rich before old," accelerating productivity (median $13/hour vs. $60 in high-income) via investment, human capital, and job creation to capture demographic dividends before they vanish. Two-thirds may not reach high-income thresholds before matching first-wave aging.

Responses: Boost productivity through AI/automation; adapt workforces for seniors via flexible hours, retraining; target senior consumers with tailored products (e.g., adaptive clothing, fall sensors); reform pensions by raising retirement ages; enhance female participation and migration integration. Societies must rethink norms on fertility, caregiving, and intergenerational equity to avert lower growth and eroded wealth flows. 

 

Reference:
Anu Madgavkar et al. (2025) - Dependency and Depopulation: Confronting Consequences of New Demographic Reality.

Fertility Rate, Life Expectancy and the Solar Cycle

Source: Huffington Post

Scientists at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim looked at the age of death of individuals born in Norway between 1676 and 1878 and compared the data to solar activity data. In addition to showing that individuals born during a solar maximum tended to die younger, the comparison showed that fertility was reduced in certain women born in years with high solar activity. In an unusual study, Norwegian scientists claim people born during periods of solar calm may live around five years longer than those born when the sun is feisty. They argue peak solar activity brings higher levels of ultraviolet radiation to Earth, which may increase infant mortality by degrading folic acid, or vitamin B9. Both of these are key to rapid cell division and growth that happens during pregnancy. The lifespan of those born in periods of solar maximum was 5.2 years shorter on average than those born during a solar minimum. High solar activity at birth decreased the probability of survival to adulthood,' thus truncating average lifespan.  

Source: Gine Roll Skjærvø, Frode Fossøy and Eivin Røskaft (2015) - Solar activity at birth predicted infant survival and women’s fertility in historical Norway. In: Proceedings of the Royal Society, Biological Sciences 282.

Demographics as Destiny

Business Insider (Nov 30, 2015) - What the size of the world's workforce will be like in a decade is well predictable, since the future workers have already been born. Demographics have long been a key determinant of potential growth rates, but the change in the global population over the next few years is unprecedented. Japan's population started to shrink in the mid-1990s and Germany's started shrinking around the year 2000, but the world's most populous country, China, is now seeing its working-age population shrink for the first time. Though the overall global population will continue to grow for some time yet, the growth of the working-age population is slowing down pretty much everywhere. That's relevant for a bundle of reasons. Around the world there will be fewer workers to support a growing number of retirees. But it also has some economists expecting significant pressure on wages.

 The sea of red and pink across the advanced world means contraction, no growth,
or slow growth. Only in a belt of the developing world (in Africa particularly)
is there any substantial expansion coming by 2020. Credits: HSBC (Nov 2015)
Enlarge

 

If employers have to fight for a group of workers that is growing more slowly, or even declining, they will need to encourage people to move, and their labour will be more valuable. Some countries, like Japan, Russia, and parts of Europe, have already entered the stage that the rest of the world is going into — and they've struggled with it. In Japan, slowing economic growth has made the county's ever-expanding pile of public debt more and more difficult to deal with, and the working-age population has already declined by 11.1% in the past 20 years. Smaller populations mean less demand and less potential output. More retirees relative to the number of working-age people means more fiscal pressure: greater expenditure on healthcare and less tax income. Globally, although working-age populations are still growing, HSBC expects global potential growth to be 0.6ppt lower per year over the next decade compared with the past decade given these demographic changes. Not great news for heavily indebted economies (see also HERE).

The Demographic Crash of Civilizations

According to the latest United Nations World Population Report, the current global population of 7.3 billion is projected to rise to 8.5 billion by 2030, 9.7 billion by 2050, and 11.2 billion by 2100. Yet, perhaps the most significant development of the twenty-first century is not population growth, but the silent extinction of peoples, nations, cultures, and civilizations.

The so-called "developed world" is neglecting one of the most fundamental responsibilities of any enduring civilization: raising the next generation. Civilization, culture, social cohesion, and economic prosperity all depend on a basic prerequisite—continued human existence. Without reproduction, all other achievements ultimately become irrelevant.

 Prosperity, war, birth control, decadence, exploitation, austerity, abortion, and social decline are all mirrored in the changing age structure of the German population across the years 1910, 1970, 2009, and the projection for 2060. (HERE)

 

Take Germany as an example. The country has a population of approximately 82 million, with a fertility rate of 1.43—a figure that continues to decline. Of this population, around 17 million have a recent immigrant background, and roughly 22 million are retirees. Germany’s labor force still numbers about 40 million, but neoliberal reforms under the Schröder-Merkel governments have contributed to the marginalization of an estimated 11 to 18 million people, creating a socio-economic underclass.

Approximately 8 million working-age adults (18 to 65) are unable to sustain themselves—either unemployed or trapped in precarious, low-wage employment such as contract work, “One-Euro jobs,” part-time roles, mini-jobs, and other exploitative schemes tied to the Hartz labor market reforms. Around half a million Germans are homeless, many of them children, in a system where the remaining taxpayers finance what can only be described as institutionalized social neglect.

The average worker surrenders nearly two-thirds of their gross income to taxation, while the state has poured €400 billion into rescuing failing banks and continues to pay €100 million in daily interest on public debt. Within this socio-economic landscape, roughly 650,000 children are born each year—one-third to parents of immigrant backgrounds—compared to around 840,000 deaths annually, resulting in a net loss of nearly 200,000 people per year.

In essence, as it rapidly ages and grows poorer, Germany loses the equivalent of a mid-sized city every year. Official projections indicate the population will shrink to between 65 and 74 million by 2060, depending on annual net migration levels (ranging from 100,000 to 400,000). Meanwhile, demographic collapse among the native population continues, marked by a third of women remaining childless, over 200,000 abortions annually, and other structural factors contributing to a sustained decline in birth rates.

Combined with immigration policies perceived by critics as prioritizing replacement over integration, Germany faces the potential erasure of its historic national identity within this century. This trajectory is not unique; similar patterns can be observed across nearly all other European nations.
 

 The Pentagon’s all-season recipe for disaster—straight from the NATO playbook—consists of orchestrated regime changes and civil wars, which in turn trigger mass migration and the subsequent settlement of a globalized lumpenproletariat and refugee populations among 30 million unemployed and 120 million impoverished native Europeans. (HERE + HERE + HERE)

As of today, the global average fertility rate stands at 2.3, with 80% of the world’s population living in countries where women, on average, have fewer than three children. This means that global fertility is only marginally above the replacement level, and current population growth is primarily driven by increased life expectancy rather than high birth rates. In 1960, China’s fertility rate was 6.1; today it has fallen to 1.6. Iran’s fertility rate dropped from 6.3 in 1985 to 1.9 today. Thailand followed a similar trajectory: from 6.14 in 1955 to 3.92 in 1985, and down to 1.49 today.

The issue facing the developed world is not only economic stagnation but also demographic decline. Many nations are aging rapidly and experiencing fertility rates well below the replacement threshold—some have arguably passed the demographic point of no return. The lowest fertility rates globally are concentrated in the most industrialized regions of Asia: China (1.55), Japan (1.40), South Korea (1.25), Taiwan (1.11), Hong Kong (1.04), Macau (0.91), and Singapore (0.80). Similarly low, near-extinction fertility rates are seen in parts of Southern Europe and former Soviet states: Portugal (1.52), Spain (1.48), Italy (1.42), Greece (1.41), Poland (1.33), and Ukraine (1.30).

In contrast, Africa remains demographically youthful. In 2015, children under 15 made up 41% of its population, with another 19% aged 15 to 24. Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as much of Asia—regions that have seen substantial fertility declines—show smaller proportions of children (26% and 24%, respectively) and comparable shares of youth (17% and 16%). Together, these three regions were home to 1.7 billion children and 1.1 billion young people in 2015.

Source: UN DESA

 Source: CIA World Factbook.