Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Sam Elder's avatar

One striking way to put this concept that I don’t see discussed enough: Births globally have already peaked. 2012, in fact, was the year that saw more births than any other year before or after, likely ever.

In other words, we are already at peak 13-year-old this year. Globally, peak baby and peak child have passed, and peak teenager, peak college-aged person, and peak military-aged-male are all right around the corner, with all the implications those entail. We can roughly track when those will happen by following the 2012 birth cohort as they age.

And births (or conceptions) are the right framing, because that’s the lever we can affect. Decline in the dozen or so cohorts since 2012 has already happened; we can’t go back and have more kids in 2013 or whatever. The question is: How long will that decline last?

Expand full comment
Magdalen's avatar

I don't think I see any level of planning for a future with fewer children at any level of society around me. I don't even see it where it would be the most directly rational--e.g. in people within my extended family/friends with no children, and who have not forged close relationships with and don't live near their relatives in the younger generation. I genuinely have no idea what these people intend to do when their care needs increase!

Expand full comment
20 more comments...

No posts