China’s shrinking population, we are told, poses an economic threat to that country, as well as an economic drag for us.
Here are the numbers: Deaths exceeded births in 2022 by 850,000. That leaves over 1.4 billion Chinese. That’s over four times the U.S. population occupying about the same land mass. More than 1 billion people would be a lot of people in anybody’s book.
Two reasons for concern are flawed. One is the idea is that an economy needs more people to grow. The other is that aging societies need vastly more young people to support their elderly.
Start with the notion that fewer workers restrain economic growth. That might hem in the gross domestic product, but what does that big number mean to the average worker? The GDP could stay the same, but if it was applied to fewer people, the average product per capita would go up.
Worries about worker numbers often ignore gains in productivity. Labor shortages often spur technological advances that let a worker produce more in the same amount of time. (In a fair world, the worker shares the rewards of improved productivity.)
Longer life spans mean there are more people we consider old, but they also reflect a slower aging process thanks in good part to modern medicine. Therefore, more people in their late 60s, 70s and beyond can remain in the workforce, especially in jobs that don’t…
