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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsResearchers Say Earth Is Headed for "Jaw-Dropping" Population Decline
"It's extraordinary, we'll have to reorganize societies."https://futurism.com/global-birth-rates-falling-precipitiously?ref=thefuturist
People around the globe are having way fewer babies. By the year 2100, that might turn into a pretty big problem for humanity rather than the relief one might expect. If they arent already, dozens of countries populations will be going into decline in this century, according to a new study published in the Lancet this week. 23 countries are expected to feel this effect intensify, with their populations dropping to half of what they are now by the year 2100.
The global population will peak at 9.7 billion around 2064, according to the new projection, and then drop off to 8.8 billion towards the end of the century. Thats a pretty big thing; most of the world is transitioning into natural population decline, Christopher Murray, co-author and researcher at the University of Washington, Seattle, told the BBC. I think its incredibly hard to think this through and recognize how big a thing this is; its extraordinary, well have to reorganize societies.
The reality is that with more women receiving an education and entering the work force, combined with the wide availability of contraception, fertility rates are dropping, sometimes precipitously, around the world a stark reversal of the baby boom following the Second World War. Countries including Spain, Portugal, and Thailand will have their populations more than halve by the end of the century jaw-dropping, according to Murray.
But arent fewer humans better for a ravished world thats rapidly being drained of its resources? The researchers suggest that there may be fewer babies being born, but any positive consequences for the environment would be offset by the challenges of a rapidly aging population. Much older populations will create enormous social change, Murray told the BBC. Who pays tax in a massively aged world? Who pays for healthcare for the elderly? Who looks after the elderly? Will people still be able to retire from work? We need a soft landing, he added.
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Fertility, mortality, migration, and population scenarios for 195 countries and territories from 2017 to 2100: a forecasting analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study
https://tinyurl.com/ybadb2q7
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Findings
The global TFR in the reference scenario was forecasted to be 1·66 (95% UI 1·332·08) in 2100. In the reference scenario, the global population was projected to peak in 2064 at 9·73 billion (8·8410·9) people and decline to 8·79 billion (6·8311·8) in 2100. The reference projections for the five largest countries in 2100 were India (1·09 billion [0·721·71], Nigeria (791 million [5941056]), China (732 million [4561499]), the USA (336 million [248456]), and Pakistan (248 million [151427]). Findings also suggest a shifting age structure in many parts of the world, with 2·37 billion (1·912·87) individuals older than 65 years and 1·70 billion (1·112·81) individuals younger than 20 years, forecasted globally in 2100. By 2050, 151 countries were forecasted to have a TFR lower than the replacement level (TFR <2·1), and 183 were forecasted to have a TFR lower than replacement by 2100.
23 countries in the reference scenario, including Japan, Thailand, and Spain, were forecasted to have population declines greater than 50% from 2017 to 2100; China's population was forecasted to decline by 48·0% (?6·1 to 68·4). China was forecasted to become the largest economy by 2035 but in the reference scenario, the USA was forecasted to once again become the largest economy in 2098. Our alternative scenarios suggest that meeting the Sustainable Development Goals targets for education and contraceptive met need would result in a global population of 6·29 billion (4·828·73) in 2100 and a population of 6·88 billion (5·279·51) when assuming 99th percentile rates of change in these drivers.
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ret5hd
(20,433 posts)rusty quoin
(6,133 posts)PTWB
(4,131 posts)There are too many people. Managing depopulation will be a challenge, but a good one.
qazplm135
(7,447 posts)merely changing one set of problems for others.
If you don't have enough young workers, and you combine that with lengthening lifespans, then you have people working into their 60s and 70s because we can't afford the cost of retirement as a society...which is great for those who can afford a healthy lifestyle, but as usual, the poor and minorities will see their lives basically filled with work, no retirement, no benefits.
Add in medical costs and it gets harder and harder to pay for that as well.
I'm not suggesting we need runaway birth rates, but the reality is we just need better living standards and "greener" living standards, not necessarily "fewer people."
PTWB
(4,131 posts)Things will be challenging for a few generations but once populations stabilize at a sustainable level, Earth will be better off.
Alex4Martinez
(2,180 posts)Way too many.
I'll suffer the consequences to help it happen as a 63 year old.
qazplm135
(7,447 posts)the problem isn't the number, it's how we live.
Fix how we live and the Earth will be just fine even if there are more than us, which there will be for a long, long time.
PTWB
(4,131 posts)Id be fine if there were only half a billion people in the future.
qazplm135
(7,447 posts)even this article says it's going to get bigger than it is now for the next 100 years or more.
So yeah, changing our nature is going to have more success than thinking all the humans are going to start going away.
PTWB
(4,131 posts)The article says the population will peak in 64 and then start declining.
qazplm135
(7,447 posts)than we have right now.
PTWB
(4,131 posts)based on what? For how long? Forever?
100 years from now we will STILL have more people than we have right now.
Thekaspervote
(32,606 posts)Hortensis
(58,785 posts)of the needs of more older people. In a future when we have vast energy and production capacities and fewer people, but also more machines providing labor and brainpower, meaning that EVERYONE can be effectively rich while working far less long and hard for it.
It's the transitions that are hard. We're in one now after great advances in energy, technology, and multiplication of planetary wealth are forcing change RW plutocrats and knuckledraggers kept us from preparing for. But tomorrow is going to be great if reactionary idiots don't manage to blow us up first.
smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)stabilize and there will be fewer older people to support and maintain.
If we don't start doing something to control population now, Mother Nature will find a way to cull the herd.
As for work, the only reason so many people need to work is to fund the capitalist machine. There will always be a need for people to perform work to meet the basic needs of society, but if there are fewer people, there will be less of a demand for goods and services and fewer people needed to meet those demands.
Maybe we need to get our priorities straight and not consume so much.
HelpImSurrounded
(441 posts)...the only system that benefits from constant population growth is capitalism and, without it, capitalism collapses.
qazplm135
(7,447 posts)ok then
Kashkakat v.2.0
(1,752 posts)only had SS check. Not complaining- I have a comfortable life - just saying what youre presentingn as a "problem" already exists for vast nos of people throughout US, and more so throughout the world.
Who was it who said - if we humans don't willingly curb over-population, nature will do it for us and she will not be so kind.
marybourg
(12,540 posts)who thinks the past tense of forecast is forecasted. I know, it's acceptable, because poorly educated people use it, but it's neither correct, nor preferred. Signed, grammar police
Celerity
(42,662 posts)(regardless of regional origin) very common in academic, scientific, and financial writing. I am London raised, have multiple degrees in the financial-related arts and sciences, and can attest to this fully.
The use of forecasted you are taking umbrage with is from a scientific paper. published in The Lancet, one of, if not the foremost scientific medical journals in the world (and British).
I am afraid I am going to have to ask you to turn in your grammar police badge. (having a laugh )
https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(20)30677-2.pdf
more examples
https://pubs.rsna.org/doi/full/10.1148/radiol.2017161800
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/forecast?q=forecasted
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/dec/04/hurricane-sandy-won-president-obama
smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)Initially, a smaller, younger population will be difficult while there are still larger older populations, but if that smaller rate begins to hold steady, eventually I think it will improve conditions on the planet once the older populations die off and things are normalized.
Then, eventually, every generation will have a replacement population equal to the one before it, and it will be much smaller than what we have now, which is a huge burden on the planet.
It will balance out and I believe the quality of life of everyone will improve.
We have to get over this ridiculous capitalist notion that we constantly need to grow, get bigger, produce more, make more money and profit every year and that there can be no end to it. It's sick and it is not good for human beings.
mr_lebowski
(33,643 posts)Thekaspervote
(32,606 posts)greytdemocrat
(3,299 posts)Just too bad for the people your ideas kill.
But it's all good.
smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)Nobody. It would simply be attrition. How can lower birthrates be percieved as killing people? We have plenty of money to take care of the elderly, it's just a matter of straigtening out our fucked up priorities. No more corporate welfare, no more excessive overseas aid, cut the military budget in half, no more tax breaks for the wealthy. If we wanted to, we could easily make this work.
The government should make a provision for taking care of the excess elderly until the population balances out, when there are equal amounts of old and young again, although fewer amounts of both. Which I think would be a good thing.
CatLady78
(1,041 posts)I am childfree for many of these reasons.
former9thward
(31,802 posts)Voltaire2
(12,626 posts)Nevilledog
(50,679 posts)mr_lebowski
(33,643 posts)Celerity
(42,662 posts)791 million, and that is in 2100, post peak for the rest of the world (although I assume they will be still be growing post 2064.)
Ace Rothstein
(3,109 posts)I'm gonna guess that they'll run into a lot of issues that will slow their population growth before there are 700m people living there.
Celerity
(42,662 posts)Area
Total
148,460[6] km2 (57,320 sq mi) (92nd)
Water (%)
6.4
Area
Total
923,769 km2 (356,669 sq mi) (32nd)
Water (%)
1.4
List of countries and dependencies by population density
Ace Rothstein
(3,109 posts)Never realized how small it is land-wise.
Celerity
(42,662 posts)random pics
then there was this
100,000 gather for funeral in Bangladesh, defying lockdown and sparking outbreak fears
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/more-100000-ignore-coronavirus-lockdown-21894302
Celerity
(42,662 posts)Bangladesh is roughly the same area, size-wise, as Iowa, and is smaller than Georgia (the state, not the nation)
madness
smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)extreme weather conditions) or violence will cull the herd via wars, genocide, imposed starvation, etc. Population growth at those levels is not sustainable, especially in poor countries with few resources.
The best thing we can do in those countries is to educate women and economically empower them. The men too. The women need autonomy over their own bodies so that they are not just broodmares who keep popping out children that they cannot afford to feed or take care of. That is not a good life for anybody!
I really believe we should be shooting for zero population growth on a global level. Human beings are a detriment to the planet.
BGBD
(3,282 posts)We already have way, way too many people on earth. Want to see a bad scenario, google what happened when a species exceeds carrying capacity for an ecosystem. That's a lot worse than need to figure out what taxes are going to need to be paid in 100 years.
roamer65
(36,739 posts)World War 3 is coming.
Wednesdays
(17,248 posts)Baclava
(12,047 posts)NickB79
(19,113 posts)We're so far past multiple climate tipping points that our ability to maintain our current population is just starting to be threatened. And that's with only 1C of warming.
By 2100, with 4C of warming, most of our breadbaskets will be destroyed. Ocean life will be decimated, starving the communities that rely on it for protein. Vast areas in the tropics will be too hot to inhabit, creating vast refugee migrations. We'll be lucky to be at 5 billion.
JI7
(89,174 posts)is because there will be a lot more older people compared to younger people and they don't know who will take care of those older people.
This is where things like automation will be helpful .
PSPS
(13,512 posts)We're already seeing some effects of global warming arriving 80 years earlier than forecast.
brooklynite
(93,853 posts)rusty quoin
(6,133 posts)He made several movies during WWII, against the Nazis, yet his involvement with socialism became real. Forget what he did for the war effort.
Its back.
Mariana
(14,849 posts)I love how it doesn't even occur to them that the older people who are wealthy can be taxed.
Crunchy Frog
(26,548 posts)is going to be very difficult to sustain, even with falling birth rates.
I wouldn't be surprised if climate change and environmental degradation result in a much more rapid and dramatic population decline.
There's too many unpredictable elements to really know what's going to happen in the future.
CatLady78
(1,041 posts)dustyscamp
(2,221 posts)Initech
(99,914 posts)meadowlander
(4,358 posts)that could increase quality of life and need for invasive and expensive treatments. People may live longer but they may be able to work longer, have a better quality of life and might have a shorter window where they need care.
Look at where we were 100 years ago with medical technology and where we could be in 100 years. If research on the coronavirus develops new treatments that could be applied to other viruses we could massively increase productivity by "curing" the flu and common cold. There's no reason to think in 100 years we won't have much better treatments for diabetes, Alzheimer's and cancer. Those advances alone would reduce the four of the top eight causes of death and two of the most persistent and expensive conditions in terms of long-term care needs.
Celerity
(42,662 posts)Major strides in forecasting future health.
Lancet. 2018; 392: e14-e15
Full-TextPDF
CatLady78
(1,041 posts)We are wiping out all the other species that share it with us, factory farming more and more animals.....
Even that-as other posters have pointed out-is too many people.
milestogo
(16,829 posts)ucrdem
(15,512 posts)Malthus was always wrong, his predictions were always preposterous, and his thinly veiled chauvinism fooled no one but those who wished to be fooled. But there are plenty of those unfortunately.
muriel_volestrangler
(101,153 posts)For instance, in their reference scenario, they have the Total Fertility Rate for India (currently 2.14) dropping to 1.29 by 2100, but for France (currently 1.84) to 1.78. That might be because they expect France to continue to get immigration from higher TFR countries. They have the USA dropping to 1.53, and the UK to 1.61. In fact, they expect more overall population growth in the UK than in the USA. Which I think, given the available space, historic immigration rates, and current TFR, seems unlikely.
Calculating
(2,954 posts)I'm expecting some mass dying to start soon after 8 billion. We're getting near the point where some areas of the world are going to start getting too hot for continued habitability.