China’s National Bureau of Statistics said the country’s population grew through just 480,000 more people in 2021, a record that took it to 1,412,600,000. Ten years ago, the annual population expansion was about 8 million. We might not possibly know for a few months, however, it suggests an absolute population decline in 2022, the first decline in sixty years.
More importantly, the overall fertility rate (births consistent with women) fell in 2021 to just 1. 15, well below the 2. 1 required for a robust population.
These figures are encouraging, but similar disorders further worsen the scenario. It sounds bad as a demographic problem, and it can be worse as a socio-political problem.
Why are all the societies of the world and all the religions of the world pro-natalist?Why is having young people such a vital cultural norm?Having young people will ruin your health, ruin your finances, and ruin your free time. In fact, until a hundred years ago, the mother’s life is also in danger. It is only in the long run that parents see that young people can bring great joy and a sense of satisfaction. Therefore, the goal of those socio-religious norms is to bridge the gap between short-term pain and long-term smart news.
But what happens when this universal pronatalist message is closed or even cancelled?What happens to people’s appetites and plans in this new environment?
We are beginning to notice that the Chinese government has been quite successful in preventing the birth rate, but it is having a much harder time reinvigorating it. This demographic challenge is also faced across Japan, Korea and many European countries, but we can also simply see it more acutely in China because none of those other corporations have taken the enforcement measures that China has taken to lower the birth rate. Simply put, no society has controlled for opposite birth rates. China may be the first, but it faces five problems.
First, the new normal. Once other people get used to a way of doing things, it becomes their default behavior. Everyone needs a car; You deserve to need a car. Everyone has a small dog; You deserve to have a small dog. Everyone needs to take one to Europe; you deserve to take you to Europe. Every family circle is made up of 0 or one child; You deserve to be satisfied with 0 or a child. You may have faced legal disorder or public complaints for having two children just a few years ago, why would that be your purpose today?
Secondly, a victim of success. Mass influx and mass education have opened the world to China like never before in history. For many other people in China, this is the greatest prosperity they have ever known and, for the first time, they can live their lives as they please.
Third, bureaucratic inertia and exculpatory political culture. The starting point for adopting a new policy is that no one can say that the old policy is bad or harmful. Therefore, policy advances will tend to lag behind. tight. There is no sense of urgency, only a preference for continuous adjustments. China moved slowly to allow two children, then moved slowly to allow more than two children, and has yet to make progress on similar issues such as IVF liberalization, embryo freezing and single mothers.
Fourthly, the camouflage of GDP. In the short term (20 to 30 years), economic expansion will be sufficient to offset the damage caused by population decline. There will be fewer Chinese, but the total number of Chinese college graduates will increase. The economy will also grow. Covid also adds to this cover-up, allowing politicians to decrease marriages, for example.
Finally, the time horizon. Government decision-making is even more complicated when decisions have long-term benefits but short-term prices (just look at the efforts made in the United States to combat the budget deficit). news. If you’re a minister, and you’re only a few years away from retirement, are you most likely signaling a challenge or will you most likely minimize it?
So the challenge for China is so much that it is in a bad demographic position. The challenge is that it has limited equipment and appetite to replace its policies. It will do so only slowly and with incremental efforts.