Global Birthrate Collapse Will Be Worse than The Black Death
Jim Rickards warns of the collapse in China's population and collapse in global population. Nextbigfuture described these issues in mid-2023 over 15 months ago. I described the collapse as worse than the black death and Jim use the same description.
Jim Rickards is an economist, lawyer, and investment banker with 40 years of experience in the capital markets on Wall Street.
Jim emphasizes China population collapse problem but it is more than just China. It is Japan, Korea and all countries.
The Rule of TWO… point one
Husband and wives MUST average 2.1 children. It is not optional for humanity and society.
2.1 children replace 2 (the husband and the wife). Half of the children are female. 1.1 females at birth means 1.0 females should get to child bearing age and have a child.
In biology, when a population starts declining, it is usually not a controlled thing that re-stabilizes at a lower level.
Self-Genocide
If Aliens from space or an other country were forcing the disappearance of large numbers of the next generation, then the population would fight and resist. Japan losing 30 million people from a peak of 128.2 million in 2008 to 98 million in 2055 would be worse than all its losses in WW2. It would be 200 times worse than the Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear bombs.
China could lose over 300 million people 2050 out of 1.42 billion. China lost 20 million people in WW2 out of 525 million. China could kill its future at 15-40 times more than what Japan did to China in WW2.
If the cycle of not replacing women continues at only have half as many daughters then every 35 years there would be half as many women in 100 years there would be 12% as many women and in 200 years there would be 1% as many.
Black Death
The Black Death was the most extreme pandemic. It killed 30 to 50 percent of the entire population of Europe. The plague might have reduced the world population from c. 475 million to 350–375 million in the 14th century. (1346-1353)
A global TFR of 1.4 over the remainder of the century could bring global population from a peak of 9-10 billion in 2050 to 6-7 billion in 2100. It would be a Black Death over 50-60 years instead of 7 years. But the low birth population decline might not stop.
China with 1.0 to 1.18 total fertility could drop 30% from 1.41 billion to 980 million by 2055. The drop could happen in 30 years.
Nextbigfuture has written many times that a Population Collapse Will Reshape the Global Economy by 2050.
If people or kids do not exist, then they cannot contribute to a nations economy. These will be huge effects by 2050 and even larger by 2100 and beyond. All of the forecasts that China and India will have economies many times larger than the USA will NOT happen. It is not just that the countries get old before they get rich, the countries economies shrivel up and shrink.
Population loss does directly cause economic losses. Population loss from now to 2050 will cause about 20-30% in economic damage or about a $60 trillion in economic loss. The GDP of a country is the amount of working people times the average economic contribution from each person. If your economy has 30% fewer people and all the people had on average the same productivity then you would lose 30% of your economy.
China currently has a total fertility rate of 1.18. However, a survey of Chinese women indicates similarities to South Korean women for family size. South Korea has a total fertility of 0.78. IF China will struggle to stabilize its fertility rate at 0.8, then its population will fall to less than 1.02 billion by 2050 and 310 million in 2100. If China succeeds in holding its fertility rate to 1.1 and prevents it from declining, its population will likely fall to 1.08 billion by 2050 and 440 million by 2100. This would be 232 million fewer people in China in 2050 than the UN projections. The UN was assuming that China would have a total fertility rate of 1.5. This would be about a 18% drop in total population but a 30-40% drop in the working age population by 2050.
China will be losing 10 million people per year from its working age population from 2027-2050. Japan will be losing 1 million people per year from its working age population from 2023-2050. The working age populations for China, Japan, Italy and Spain will be about 20-30% smaller in 2050 than today.