1. Population Issues in Developed Countries

2. What’s happening? fertility rates in the developed world have plunged only one country (USA) has a rate above 1.8 and 20 developed countries have rates below 1.4 the decline in the TFR shows no sign of ending the global average fertility level now stands at 2.7; in contrast, in the early l950s, the average number was 5; fertility is now declining in all regions of the world

3. What’s the scope of the issue? from 1990 to 2030 there will be three times the number of people 60+ years from 500 million to 1.4 billion. the rest of the world’s population will experience only a 68% increase the developed world’s population may decline by as much as 50% by 2100 North America’s population will rise slightly from the current 300 million and then begin to decline to about 250 million

4. http://www.ifa-fiv.org/menu7_demographie/menu7_cadre_eng.htm

5. called the “ birth dearth ” Europe’s population has already begun to decline: by 2100 it will be 290 million, about the same as the population of Russia, Germany and France today

6. Causes: life expectancy has increased, primarily due to improved health care. other factors include:  healthier lifestyle  reduction in cancer deaths and heart disease.  improved auto safety (tires, speed limits, seat belts, air bags, etc.) this may change with environmental degradation or the outbreak of a disease

7. the role of women is key:  better educated and have greater career aspirations  children can be an impediment to career advancement  marry later, more likely to divorce; growing numbers of women don’t marry  access to effective birth control

8. Problems: 1. family structure changes 2. population gets older - the aging population 3. labour shortages 4. economic effects 5. shift in world power

9. Solutions? adopt pronatalist strategies - policies designed to encourage higher birth rates eg. - baby bonus; child tax credits; cash payments for each child; long parental leaves; flexible daycare and working hours; subsidize the cost of post-secondary education the bad news: little evidence that it works: Sweden has very generous policies and also the lowest TFR

10. encourage private savings to address pension problems (so seniors won’t be poor) public (ie., government) pension plans are notoriously poor performers called “flow-through” plans, ie., paid for with tax revenues; not a real fund of money governments often “raid’ plans or force them to invest in struggling state-owned companies

11. hand over government pension plans to private managers. raise retirement age, eliminate rewards for early retirement, reduce retirement benefits, redesign plans to aid the poor elderly only.

12. encourage immigration. easy for Canada as we have experience with immigration and pride ourselves on being multicultural tough for Japan and much of Europe many problems with tolerance and acceptance, eg., France and Germany have significant opposition parties with strong anti-immigrant platforms