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Census

The boring stuff is often the important stuff.   Three weeks ago the US Census Bureau revealed the latest data.   Under the US constitution every 10 years the entire population is counted. contrary to some voices this is not a ploy by the Democrats (not a joke this is for real among some of the crazies on the right).   The questions can be political but more often than not, the questions are written by demographers to get a real understanding of the population shift.

In the last 10 years, there has been a negative shift in the US birth rate.  20 years ago, the US birthrate was about 2.2, (population replacement was 2.1).  this is not political or biased it is a simple statistical analysis.   The latest census shows that US birth rate has declined to 1.6.

This has short-term and long-term demographic consequences; economic growth in the short term will be more dynamic, and fewer children means more savings which means more capital for the economy.   In the long term, and we are talking 50+ years the implication is less positive, what we have then is what is happening at an accelerated rate in Germany, Korea and China, and what happened to Japan 20 years ago.

The Japanese economy has not had meaningful growth for 20 years.   The place is slowly emptying itself as the countryside slowly dies, how do we know this -- real estate in Japan that 30 years ago was the most expensive in the world is now incredibly cheap, there are numerous YouTube channels about young people in Japan buying nice homes in Japan for a dollar.  In the same way, you can buy property in Italy for nearly nothing.  

For the US the short-term consequence is that the economy for the next 20 years will grow quickly, more so than anywhere else in the world.   But eventually, they will pay the price.   More babies is obviously the solution, but it's not easy to convince young women to have more children.   One trend is that women have not only fewer children but also much later in life, 50 years ago, women would have children in their early 20s, and now it's the early 30s -- there is a real limit there, but demographic damage there is done.

Immigration is not the solution, it can help in the short term, but the economies that would gain the most are the most reluctant.   Here in Britain we even quit Europe to stop immigration (that's why most Brits voted for Brexit, they wanted to keep the foreigners out)

Here in the UK, the birth rate has been below 1.6 for more than 20 years, so we have reaped the economic benefits of such a population shift, however, we are now seeing rapid aging and within 30 years will be where the Germans and Koreans are today.

Interesting, no?

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