Population collapse the greatest threat to humanity | Xfreeze & Stephen J.Shaw

Courtesy @Xfreeze. The dotted line is
replacement level, and all these are below it

Elon Musk — and Demographers— have been warning about this. 

It’s NOT the population "bomb” we must fear. It’s the population bust. 

Note how the very lowest birth rates are in East Asia. Where we live…. If I were a bit younger I'd try to give it a nudge along.

Demographer Stephen J.Shaw explains how immigration is not the answer to low birth rates. Neither for the country losing the emigrants nor for the country hosting the immigrants. 

Shaw also explains how it is that humans survived major population declines in wars and plagues. But how and why it’s different today. We are circling down a population plug hole. We ignore it at our extreme peril.

It's a long video. But then complex issues need complex explanations. 

Why don't people get married any more? Why the declining global birth rates?

Tell me, Grok: why do you think it is that people are getting married less these days? I have three children and several nephews and nieces. All in relationships. None of my kids or nieces is married. If I ask why not marry, they say "shut up, dad!" or similar. So... I don't know. Do you?

It's a common observation these days, and you're not alone in noticing it among your own family. 

In Australia (and similar trends appear in many Western countries), marriage rates have been declining for decades, with a particularly sharp drop among younger adults. Recent data from sources like the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), the Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS), and surveys like HILDA show that:

The crude marriage rate has fallen from around 7 per 1,000 people in the early 2000s to about 5–5.5 in recent years (even after a post-COVID rebound).

Among people in their 20s and early 30s, the proportion who are married has dropped dramatically — for example, only about 20% of women aged 25–29 were married in recent surveys, compared to over 35% two decades ago.

De facto (live-in partner) relationships have risen correspondingly, now common for many couples, especially those with kids.

Your children's and nieces/nephews' generation (likely millennials and Gen Z -- "Zoomers") often see little practical need for formal marriage, especially since Australian family law treats long-term de facto couples almost the same as married ones for property, superannuation, spousal maintenance, and children. 

The "shut up, dad!" response is pretty classic — it's a mix of independence, eye-rolling at "old-school" ideas, and perhaps not wanting to explain deeper reasons.

Here are the main factors driving this shift, based on research and reports:

Marriage has become optional and more "deliberate"
People now view it as a conscious choice rather than a default life step. Many couples "try before you buy" by living together first (83% of couples who do marry have cohabited beforehand, up hugely from decades ago). If the relationship works long-term without the certificate, why add the formality? Stigma around living together or having kids outside marriage has largely vanished.

Financial and economic pressures
Housing affordability, high cost of living, student debt, and career instability make big life commitments feel risky. Weddings themselves are expensive (even modest ones), and many young people delay or skip marriage until (or unless) they feel financially secure. Economic insecurity also contributes to fewer people forming partnerships at all, or keeping them informal.

Later life milestones
People spend longer in education, take time to build careers (especially women, with greater workforce participation), and travel or focus on personal growth. The median age for first marriage has risen steadily (now around 30+ for both men and women). By the time they're "ready," marriage might not feel urgent — especially if kids arrive via de facto relationships.

Changing attitudes and fear of divorce
Many in this age group grew up seeing high divorce rates among their parents' generation (boomers had the peak). That creates caution: "Why risk the legal/financial mess if de facto offers similar protections?" Marriage is sometimes seen as outdated, unnecessary for commitment, or even a potential trap if things go wrong. There's also more acceptance of diverse relationship styles — single life, serial monogamy, or long-term partnering without rings.

Cultural and social shifts
Less religious influence (fewer church weddings), dating apps changing how relationships form, and a broader cultural glamorisation of independence and self-fulfilment all play roles. For some, marriage feels like conforming to expectations they don't share.

In short, it's not that your kids and their generation don't value committed relationships — many are in them, having children, building lives together — they just don't see the legal/ceremonial step as adding much value in modern Australia. 

The practical rights are largely covered without it, and the costs (financial, emotional, social) can feel high for something that's no longer seen as essential.If you're curious, a gentle, non-judgmental chat about their specific views (maybe over a beer rather than "why not marry?") might reveal more personal reasons — like "we're happy as is" or "the wedding industry is ridiculous." But yeah, the era when marriage was the automatic next step after a relationship has passed for many. It's a big social change, but families still thrive in de facto setups just fine.

ME: You don't see any connection between low marriage rates and plunging birth rates in nearly all thew world?

Yes, there is a clear and well-documented connection between declining marriage rates (or more broadly, declining rates of stable partnerships) and plunging birth rates across much of the world, including Australia. This link shows up consistently in demographic research, and it's often described as one of the strongest proximate (direct, immediate) causes of falling fertility in recent decades.

The Global Picture

Fertility rates (measured as total fertility rate, or TFR — average children per woman) have fallen dramatically worldwide since the mid-20th century, now below replacement level (2.1) in most developed countries and dropping fast in many developing ones too. Recent analyses (up to 2025 data) attribute a large portion of this decline to fewer people entering committed relationships that lead to children.

In many societies, married people have significantly higher fertility than unmarried or even cohabiting ones. Studies from the Institute for Family Studies and others show married couples are far more likely to have children (and more of them) than singles or cohabiters.

Declining marriage rates explain a substantial share of fertility drops — for example, one analysis found ~75% of the U.S. fertility decline since 2007 tied to shifts in who is married. Similar patterns appear in cross-country data, where drops in people being married or in stable couples track almost one-to-one with fewer births.

In places like East Asia (e.g., South Korea, where extramarital births are rare), falling marriage rates account for the majority (80%+) of birth rate declines over recent decades. In Western countries, where cohabitation is more common, the story includes both fewer partnerships overall and sometimes lower fertility even within cohabiting unions due to greater instability.

Other factors contribute (economic pressures, education/career priorities, housing costs, shifting norms around family), but relationship formation — especially marriage as a stable context for kids — is frequently the biggest single driver in decomposition studies.

In Australia SpecificallyAustralia mirrors this trend closely. The TFR has continued falling, hitting around 1.48 in 2024 and projected to drop further to ~1.42 in 2025–26 (well below replacement). Marriage rates have declined steadily, with fewer people marrying young or at all, while cohabitation has risen but not fully offset the drop in partnered people (especially at peak childbearing ages).

From 1991–2019 (and trends continuing), the falling proportion of partnered women (particularly married) contributed negatively to fertility, especially among younger ages. Births to married mothers dropped from ~77% to ~64%, with cohabiting births rising but not enough to compensate fully.

Increasing singlehood (neither married nor cohabiting) among women in childbearing years has directly pulled down overall fertility levels.

Even though Australian law treats long-term de facto partners similarly to married ones for many rights, cohabiting couples often have fewer children on average than married ones (due to less perceived stability or commitment), and many people delay or skip partnering altogether.

Your observation about your kids and nieces/nephews fits right in: they're in relationships (often de facto), having or planning kids, but skipping formal marriage. 

In aggregate, though, fewer people reach that stable partnered stage (or do so later), fewer have multiple kids, and overall births drop. It's not that committed relationships have vanished entirely — many still form families — but the shift away from marriage (and sometimes away from any long-term partnership) means fewer births than in past generations.

In short, yes — the connection is strong and causal in many analyses: fewer marriages/partnerships → fewer babies. It's a key part of why global birth rates are plunging, even as other explanations (like costs or individualism) play supporting roles. If policymakers want to boost fertility, addressing barriers to stable relationships often comes up as more impactful than just cash incentives for kids.

=======================

Me, adding: Fear of Climate Change. I've had this mentioned direct to me, several times. And seen it written about. The fear -- in my view unfounded -- has led many to think that it's "not fair" or "too dangerous" to bring new young life into the world. 

Why the Dems love illegal immigration

David Sacks:

“ The Democrats want to thwart mass deportations because illegal immigrants are a vital part of their power base.”

“And you can see this in the 2030 apportionment forecast, which just came out. “Illegal aliens count towards the census, which occurs every decade, and the census determines the apportionment of congressional seats and electoral votes. “And what you see in these maps is that citizens of blue states have been migrating to red states because those blue states are failing. “As a result of that, blue states are expected to lose nine house seats and electoral votes because of the changing population numbers. “Illegal aliens in blue states have been propping up those numbers, and so for example, in the last election, President Trump would've won an additional nine electoral votes if we had an accurate accounting.” [Link]

************

To which: 

Eric Schmitt:

My colleagues on the Left are smart enough to know about the trail of American victims that mass immigration has left in its wake, but have made a conscious decision to sneer and roll their eyes and pretend like it’s all a hysterical right-wing fantasy—all to advance their agenda. What’s really going on here? Well, it’s a desperate and intentional thirst for power at all costs—padding their numbers by importing new voters and illegally adding people to the census rolls to distort congressional apportionment and the Electoral College, even if Americans are less safe and it destroys our way of life in the process. [Link]

What's happening to China's population?

Source: China National Bureau of Statistics

There was a time we worried about population explosions. Now we worry about population extinction. 

China was the main culprit of population explosion. Until it wasn't. 

The latest figures for 2025 are available, from China's own National Bureau of Statistics. The number of births in China in 2025, is down to the level that China last had in 1727... 300 years ago in the Qing Dynasty. 

Imagine! Population births barely matching the number from three centuries ago...

What does this mean for the future?

Google Gemini:

After peaking at over 1.42 billion in 2021, current forecasts project that China's population will shrink by over 100 million people by 2050. By the end of the century, China's population may dwindle to less than 800 million, with more dire scenarios putting the figure at less than 500 million.

That's an issue that geopolitical analysts have to consider. As I'm sure they are. What it means for world peace, for example, is something. But What? More peaceful or less peaceful? Could be either, IMO. 

Population-wise, things are even more dire in places like South Korea. At its current under replacement rate, in three generations, Korea will have only 3% of its population today. That's the extinction of a whole country. 

Women across the world are choosing not to have children. 

Birth of a Grand-Nephew

Grand-Nephew, Noah, born to Dr Meredith Davies and Zed. 

A birth. Always a thing to celebrate. Especially these days of such low birth rates. 

A son to my niece, daughter of my sister and Ian. 

Hurrah! 

Perilously low birth rates

Spain, Italy, Finland and Germany are at crisis low levels of under 1.5 births per fertile woman. 

Imagine being the last generation to know what it was like to have grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins.

The rapid decline means a lot of people have no children and those who do have one; they won’t ever know much family.

Many rural areas will have few kids, local and regional cultures and accents and traditions will vanish, cuisine as well; knowledge of local sites and folklore will fade.

Source.

The real population bomb: DEpopulation

We were discussing population decline. 

Example: 

South Korea’s population is around 51 million. Its current birth rate is 0.8 per fertile woman. 

That means in 2 generations, 40 years, in the lifetime of our kids, its population will decline to under 12 million. In 3 generations, 60 years, it will fall to just 4 million. 

IOW: In 60 years, South Korea will have less than one person for every ten people it has today. 

Most of that population will be old. 

The same sorts of declines are already happening in all the developed world, all of Europe, most of Asia and even much of the developing world. 

Food for thought.

Population decline is happening all over the world | Stephen Shaw

Click above for the video

The main reason is not that women on average are having fewer babies. The main reason is that the number of women who are childless is increasing. The number having one or more children has stayed the same. The number having zero has surged. 

The reason for the increase in childless couples is social. The pressure is on to get a job and have a career. Men and women alike feel they can have children "later'. Just that "later" never happens, or happens suddenly, and then there's no time.  

I'd not heard of Stephen Shaw before. He's speaking above at the recent Alliance for Responsible Citizenship conference in London. 

That the world faces a true existential crisis from declining population hasn't really hit the public yet. Elon Musk has been banging on about it for some time. As have I here on this blog. See here. 

(And as early as 2010, I posted about declining world birth rates: "The end is nigh; don't do anything")

Kids not having kids

Click above for the video

Was at a party last night which had a few young adults -- in their twenties. Living here in Hong Kong, or visiting back from America, or Canada or France. 

I asked them, young men and young women, what's the dating scene like? 

"Not good", they said. 

It's tough to meet up and it's even tough on the internet. Seems many put their political leanings in their bios, and will only meet up with similar. Cutting out half the population, whichever side you're on. These young men and young women agreed this was crazy. 

Seems young men are put off from making moves on women. Too much danger of something happening to them that's not good. Disgruntled women accusing them of something, say. Which, even if they're innocent, will mark them for life. It's an outcome of the "Me Too" thing. 

Not having kids: they say most who don't want kids are thinking "we don't want to bring children into this crazy world. Climate change. Wars."

In the video above there's other reasons: I want to keep developing a career; it's too expensive; I need to save for a house. 

Whatever the reason, according to Mads Larsen, talking above to Chris Williamson, if we don't reverse the rapid and unexpected decline in fertility -- which is now across the whole globe -- humanity is doomed. We will gurgle down the drain. Yet the world is not talking about it. Or, if mentioned, lower birth rates are seen as a good thing. No, they're not. 

The oldies agreed: we need to pressure our kids. Don't worry about them saying "shut up, Dad". We don't mind who you have your kids with, or if you're married or not. As for partner: Good enough is good enough. Don't wait for your "soul spirit". And don't worry about climate change, ffs! It's going to be fine. We need you, baby homo sapiens. 

“What will the world be like in 10 years” | An Occasional Reader asks

An Occasional Reader asks me:  “What will the world be like in 10 years?” 

I answer: "I don’t know". [And wonder: why should I be asked? What do I know?]

Pressed, I do answer. Kind of. Quick and Dirty. TL;DR: Avoid “Suicidal Empathy”. 

Europe and the U.K.:

I’m pessimistic about Europe and the UK. 

There are two major themes here: one is that the governments of the European Union -- in which we must include the U.K. despite Brexit -- are stubbornly bureaucratic, given to winding red tape around every industry, hostile to innovation. Count the number of new world-class companies in America. It’s easy to name a dozen or more. Count the number of new world-class companies in Europe, that aren’t the likes of Siemens, Krupps or Airbus, and see how many you can come up with. 

The second problem is that of uncontrolled immigration. And here the main issue is of Muslim immigration, because Muslims have -- by their own stated preferences -- the least tendency to integrate into the society they emigrate to, coupled with the most intense desire to get the rest of society to hew to Islam. 

Islam is an openly, unabashedly supremacist religion, which makes no secret of its desire to see the ideology of Islam spread across the globe. And that brings Sharia law. And that brings all sorts of negative values into a society: misogyny, homophobia, intolerance of minorities, anti-free speech, anti-freedom of conscience, anti-freedom of religion. That’s not the agenda of a modern tolerant liberal. 

Islam is a serious threat across Europe and the U.K. and it’s getting worse. Madame Merkel was largely responsible: in 2015 she said “Wir schaffen das” -- We can manage this. Turns out they couldn’t. Germany has become more unmanageable because of it, and so has the rest of Europe. In just ten years. 

Together, the lack of vibrant economic growth, coupled with the incursions of a supremacist ideology are going to make Europe a worse place to live over the next ten years. At least to those of us who find the freedoms and tolerance of the west rather more bracing than the values of a medieval theocracy. 

Russia/Ukraine:

More hope than prediction: in ten both are at peace. An armistice has been in place for 8 years. Whereby it was agreed in 2025 that Russia keeps occupied Donbas and Crimea and Ukraine committed to not joining NATO. 

The alternative is the super scary scenario. That the United States has so provoked Putin that he launches tactical nukes. Then all bets are off, for the world. It doesn’t bear contemplating, but must be contemplated. We would be foolish to think Putin is bluffing. 

Which of these scenarios depends a lot on the United States. 

And if the worse, the latter, the nuke, scenario, it makes all other scenarios moot. Boom goes the moot.

United States:

I’m either way about the United States: could be great, could be a huge mess. It’s not a coin toss but a matter of choices. I hope they make the right ones, in which case it’s going to be “great”. 

The big thing on America’s side is its sheer exuberance. Its passions. Its optimism. Its can-do attitude. 

America has one huge advance over its main rival China. That is a very vibrant and deep civil society. But that I mean every type of non-government institution. The church, charities, societies, human rights bodies, hobby clubs, sports clubs.... You get the picture. Everything and anything is the go in the United States, and you’re allowed to pursue any wild and wacky idea you have. 

That’s the genesis of an Elon Musk. Wanted to build Electric Vehicles. Wanted to launch rockets. That happened. It probably could only have happened in America. 

There’s a huge future in AI, in robots, it driverless cars, in private space travel. All of that can be to the benefit of America. 

The pessimistic side is what’s going on in academia -- the “long march through the institutions” by modern Marxism, aka neo-Marxism, aka cultural Marxism. That’s a real thing. We should not allow these that are infiltrating this into schools, to pretend -- as they do -- that there’s none of this happening in schools, in Universities, then out into the broader society. Because it most certainly is happening. 

The panoply of TLAs -- three letter acronyms -- the DEI, the CRT, the ESG -- all of these are poisonous and harmful to broader society. I say this as someone who witnessed the end-game of this kind of Marxism in the late stage Great Proletariat Cultural Revolution of China in the 1970s, something that they were about to overthrow, because of how harmful it had been. That’s what’s going on in so many institutions in America. It could fatally wound the country. 

The adherents to this neo-Marxist piffle, schools, Universities and woke companies, express contempt and hatred for America. They fly flags of Palestine and Pride, but burn the American flag. That hatred can only go on for so long before the wounds on the body politic -- on society, on the very nature of what it’s been to be “America”, the ideals of freedom and e pluribus unum -- become fatal injuries. 

East Asia: 

Will do pretty well, but depending on the United States. I don’t have much to say here, save that South Koreas seems in pretty good shape to me. That Japan seems to be able to keep on muddling through, although its population decline may come to bite its bum. The rest of ASEAN, Malaysia, Indonesia, etc.. they seem to be in their own worlds, and fine for them. 

China: 

I’m neutral on China. That is: I think it could go either way: recover and re-grow, or fall down badly.

It’s currently in a big funk. But shorting China over the last 40 years has been a losing bet. Still, they got huge problems. And seem to be looking inwards, looking to revive Marxism, which is always a loser, in my view. So: neutral bet on China in ten years. It’ll still be there. And somewhat richer. But maybe not so much. And maybe in an ongoing funk. 

The big issue for China and the world is what happens to Taiwan. I’ve always thought the best thing, for all parties, is the status quo. Don’t do anything to change the perfectly fine relationship Taiwan has with the mainland, with cross Strait tourism and good economic exchanges. China may well try to take it back by force at some stage. Though I’d always be asking “why”? Just for pride? There can be not other reason, given that everything goes along fine as long as Taiwan doesn’t make the mistake of trying to become independent. It doesn’t need to be de jure independent, when it’s already de facto  independent. 

Australia: 

it could go either way, a bit like the U.S. It’s a matter of choices. If Australia chooses to let ideology drive its immigration policy, for example, and keep the very high levels of the last few years, and to have big increases in Muslim immigration, then that’s not going to be good for the peace, stability, unity, comity, and economic development of the country. Already we have a new “Muslim Voice” party which threatens to make Australian politics more sectarian. Not good. 

If Australia becomes a bit more robust, if we make better choices -- which, yet, includes having a more discrimination immigration policy -- it has everything it needs to be a huge ongoing success. 

And, by the way, another matter of choice is now on the table: do we go nuclear or not for our caseload electricity. In my view we must. But many are against it. Mostly on the Left, amongst the Greens. This is a matter of choice. A good choice, a wise choice, or not. 

So, toss up for Oz, like the U.S.. 

Middle East

I can’t think of much positive to say about the developments in the Middle East. Iran is moving ever closer to having a nuclear weapon. And when they have one, they may well use it in a war to extinguish Israel. 

That would be the most catastrophic thing to happen in the region, but it could. And that would be the result of policy. Specifically of western (Barack Obama and Ben Rhodes)  policy to try to buy Iranian niceness in return to cutting back on sanctions. Result: Iran has more money to pursue both the nuclear weapon policy and to fund its proxies of Hamas and Hezbollah. 

Saudi will stumble along, I guess. 

Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, all stumbling along, too, all still killing their own people while denouncing Israeli “genocide”, no matter there’s a war or not. And not at all improving the quality of life of their citizens, for their obsession with Jew hatred and the desire to obliterate Israel. Which may have happened via their friend and mentor, the Islamic Republic of Iran. 

I guess one very different outcome might be that there’s a popular revolt in Iran, that overthrows the horrid theocratic government. There are a few straws flowing in the wind that could lead to that. A resurgence of Persia, of the non-Arab, non--Islamic republic of independent Persia, would be a game changer. The United States should be on the lookout for this, and not let the opportunity to slide by, as did Obama with the Iranian Green Movement of 2009-10

All up, for the Middle East, I guess it all comes down to how Iran acts, and that, to quite a degree, comes down to how the west treats it, and that in turn comes down to how the United States treats it. Being “nice” to Iran, the basis Obama strategy, pushed by his aide Ben Rhodes, has backfired. A be tough to Iran policy is in order.

================

A Norwegian politician was once asked what accounted for the success of Norway. He answered: “Norway and Venezuela have the same amount of oil and gas. We are successful and Venezuela is not. The difference is we made better choices”. 

Norway chose to use the money from oil and gas to establish a National Wealth Fund. Which is now the largest in the world. And is there to help with the retirements of its citizens. Venezuela chose to elect a Marxist to head the country -- Hugo Chavez -- who set about looting the country’s resource wealth. His successor Maduro has done the same. Result: penury. 

================

It’s all down to choices. We all have choices. Countries have choices. Those choices should be driven by self-interest. We need to have empathy for foreigners who want to migrate to successful western countries. But we also need to have justice for our citizens, the ones already living in our countries. If we have so much empathy for others that we lose our sense of justice for our own, we end up destroying our successful countries. 

That’s “Suicidal Empathy”. 

“China population: …demographic woes deepened”

Dramatic!
Snip: 

The total fertility rate – the average number of children that are born to a woman over her lifetime – could drop below one in 2023, compared with 1.05 in the previous year, He warned. More… [Wayback]

Remember: it takes 2.13 children per woman to keep a population stable. Only 1 per woman means tepid population decline. 

“Childless couples reach ‘alarming’ level” | Paul Yip

There's an interesting pod by John Anderson with Louise Perry discussing the issue of declining birth rates globally. Louise says there's only 3% of countries where the birth rates are not declining . That includes places like India and Bangladesh where birth rates are also declining. 

Many people (David Attenborough) think this is a good thing. "We have too many people!" Demographers say that when you get into a downward trend it can lead to a death spiral. 

Monika Lam, highlight above, says we need a "holistic approach" to getting the rate back up — it's now well below replacement at just 772 babies per 1,000 women — but experience elsewhere suggests that's really difficult. Even in China. Where it was easy, kind of, to reduce population growth by the horrid One Child Policy, but where they're finding it difficult to bring the rates back up now they realise they're going to get old before they get rich. 

Sent from my iPad

“China births risk falling to record low, expert warns” | SCMP

Previous posts on challenges of China population decline:

• Demography, Debt, Decoupling 30 May 2023
• Cost of China’s zero-child  policy 22 January 2023
• China population crisis, 17 November 2021
• Could China be 5 Aussies smaller? 11 November 2021
• China biggest problem is ageing 14 May 2021

China’s “Grey rhinos”: Demography, Debt, Decoupling

Black Swans: very unlikely events that may have a great impact. Eg, a rogue asteroid hitting the earth; or a pandemic. 

Grey Rhino: nice neologism, based on the Black Swan = Very likely events, that also will have a great impact. And therefore more important than Black Swans. 

And for China, that’s the Demography, Debt and Decoupling trap. The three Grey Rhinos. Debt is something that has been on the worry list for decades. I guess we don’t hear more about it, or more about actual debt-fuelled disasters that have already happened, because China keeps it all under wraps. Censorship, don’t you know. The Demography one has hit the news recently. The drop in new births is precipitous. Decoupling, of course, started with Trump, continued with Biden and has been worsened by Xi Jinping’s actions. And Covid. 

“Hong Kong’s population drops for 3rd straight year…”

👋👋 Hong Kong ?

/Snip: 

Hong Kong’s population has dropped for a third straight year, with a net outflow of 60,000 residents contributing to a decline of nearly 1 per cent in 2022.

According to official figures released on Thursday, the city’s population dipped 0.9 per cent from the year before to 7,333,200 in 2022, while births plunged to a record low of 32,500. The overall population drop was deeper than the previous year’s 0.3 per cent decrease.

About 62,100 deaths were recorded last year, outweighing births by 29,600. It was the third consecutive year that there were more deaths than births in Hong Kong, after the city recorded its first ever negative natural population growth in 2020. [More…]

I was watching a show on Australia’s ABC last night, a little outback town near Quilty where people had departed, first in a trickle then in a flood, till just one lady was left, making patisseries for herself and her animals. I wondered “why stay, when everyone is leaving?”. And thought if Hong Kong. We’re not Quilty. But still, got to keep it in mind. You don’t want to be the one turning off the lights as you go out the door. 

The optimist on this is that Hong Kong will recover. It’s always recovered. With more from the mainland this time. I’m on that side of it, for now. Not leaving quite yet…

ADDED: Hong Kong’s crude birth rate plunged 63% since 2011. Source. That’s an annual drop of 9.5%.

“The world’s craziest population pyramids"

Click above to view video

 Interesting comments at the YouTube site

“The cost of China’s zero-child policy” | Unherd

Click above for the article

I noted the other day the decline in China’s population. The first time since the disastrous Great Leap Forward in 1961. World-shaking consequences. 

You can have too many people. You can also have too few.

As Paul Moreland says:

China is the world’s great population behemoth: what happens to the nation’s demography has significant ramifications for the rest of the world. As Charles Goodhart and Manoj Pradhan pointed out in their book, The Great Demographic Reversal, the tremendous flow of subsistence peasants into the factories of China’s coastal plain not only fuelled the country’s stratospheric economic growth but also provided the developed world with a vast pool of cheap labour. Manufacturing transitioned out of Europe and North America to the PRC, where there was an endless supply of cheap labour. Now this era has ended. As this vast labour reservoir dries up, expect to pay more for everything from toys to tablets.

$US 75 Billion to make Lantau islands outside our front door

The idea is to join up these islands with reclamation, build
masses of apartment blocks and join up to Lantau by bridge 
We live up there on the top left of the photo, in Discovery Bay

This is still on the table, despite projected Hong Kong population declines — 210,000 apartments. About, what, a million people? Discovery Bay, where we live, is on Lantau Island. In other words, we live right by where all this is set to happen in the next decade or so. Hmm…

A HK$580 billion (US$74 billion) plan to create three artificial islands off Lantau despite a population decline was on Friday defended by Hong Kong’s planning authority on the grounds a land bank had to be created to avoid the problem of supply shortages in the future. More…

This is how they see the above islands in a decade or so. “Lantau Tomorrow” they call it:

Lantau at top, and Discovery Bay at top left

China’s population fell in 2022 | First time since 1961

Births in China dropped 10% in 2022, to 9.56 million

Surely major news. The fall in 1961 was because of widespread famine, caused by Mao Tse-tung’s disastrous Great Leap Forward policy. Today the fall is structural. And long-term. A historic year that marks the beginning of a long decline in population, maybe irreversible. With China about to get old before it gets rich. 

Observers like Peter Zeihan have been predicting this for some time, and indeed claim that the fall is much greater. China, he says, has been reporting a population 100 million higher than it actually is. Though how he knows this is not clear to me. Due to this decline, says Zeihan, China now has an inverted population pyramid, so not enough young to produce what’s needed by the older nor enough to support the eldest. He gives the Chinese regime ten years or less. This may be analysis by wishful thinking, as China has consistently confounded cynics. As a certain man would say “we’ll see”.

‘Falling regional births point to growing population crisis’ | SCMP

The nurse is looking at the baby with such
love and tenderness. You can tell even 
through the mask

I read somewhere recently-ish that China would start feeling an economic and social impact from a shrinking and aging population while the US, mainly because of immigration, would keep a young and growing population. And that therefore the narrative of an inexorably rising China, with a world-dominating economy, may not happen. That’s looking at the medium term, say 20-50 years, rather than soon.

The article above suggests some serious concern about falling birth rates, like right now. In some places up to 21% falls y-o-y. That’s dramatic (to say the very least). Last year deaths in China outpaced births. 

Couple that with a report I posted last week: that China may have a smaller population than it thinks because regional officials have been inflating their census figures (latest 2020), because of unintended consequences of some policies, like.bigger population = more subsidies. 

“Population is destiny”.