What sort of world will our children and grandchildren live in? Will it be crowded, nasty and polluted or will they enjoy better conditions that we do?
Economists are notoriously bad at forecasting, but some recent news items give interesting hints about how the 21st century may unfold in terms of population. On the whole, the news is encouraging.
Last week, an Austrian think tank announced that the world population is likely to peak in about 2070 at approximately 8.7 billion and decline through the last three decades of the 21st century.
In an ongoing process, the Census Bureau has been releasing detailed tabulations from the 2000 Census and results from surveys that show dramatic increases in minority populations in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area and in many smaller cities across the Midwest.
What does this all mean for our economy, either that of our own households and community? The simple answer is that population dynamics have a tremendous impact on virtually every household in the United States.
Let’s start with the macro study projecting world populations, carried out by a team of U.S. and European researchers at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis. The computer model of this reputable think tank projects that the world population, now just over 6 billion, will grow until 2070.
At that point it will peak at 8.7 to 9.0 billion and then decline to 8.4 billion by 2100. This will be accompanied by a steady rise in the average age in virtually all countries. In the United States, and other industrialized countries, persons over age 65 make up about a fifth of the total population; that will grow to 40 percent or more over the next 100 years.
Many people became very alarmed about world population growth after Paul Ehrlich published “The Population Bomb” in the late 1960s. Most failed to note that while the total world population has continued to grow, fertility rates have declined in most countries for the last 25 years.
This is true in many industrialized countries. The number of children each woman bears has dropped below the 2.1 average needed to maintain a level population in countries such as France, the Netherlands and Japan.
It has also dropped below that rate for Caucasian women born in the United States. Fertility remains somewhat higher for minorities and immigrants, so our overall fertility rate is higher than in most European countries. But it is dropping.
Fertility is also dropping in Asia, Latin America and most African countries. Some of this is due to population control programs in countries such as China and India, but in many cases couples are deciding to have fewer children.
This happens nearly universally as incomes rise and as women get more education. Many poor countries have young populations, with many females yet to enter their childbearing years, so total populations continue to rise even as the number of children per woman falls. But the trend toward slower, or even zero growth, is very widespread.
What does this mean for us in the U.S. and particularly in the Upper Midwest? The recent Census data noted above helps answer that question.
Minority populations are growing in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Fargo, Grand Forks, Sioux Falls, and many other cities in the region. Most of this growth is among Hispanics, largely from Mexico, and Asians, largely refugees from Laos, Vietnam or Cambodia. But there are also significant numbers from India, Somalia and other countries.
Some people born here bridle at the strange faces they see on the street and the strange languages heard at the mall. But these new immigrants bring economic vitality. They are willing to work at a time when many businesses need willing hands. And they have enriched the cuisine and cultural life of many regional cities.
Moreover, they will buffer the painful adjustments of an aging native population. Too much attention is being paid to how baby boomers will have financial resources for their retirement. Not enough is given to the more concrete question of who will produce the goods and services, cook the meals and staff the nursing homes an aging population will retire. The immigrants that offend some people today may bathe and change those they offend in another decade or two. We should count them as a blessing.
© 2001 Edward Lotterman
Chanarambie Consulting, Inc.