Fewer: How the New Demography of Depopulation Will Shape Our Future

The argument that the world is overpopulated is a common one now, especially with the increasing fears of global warming. Some have predicted that population growth would outstrip the food supply, causing famine. Authors such as Thomas Malthus in 1798 noted that the food supply grew arithmetically, while population grew geometrically, leading to devastation. The Population Bomb, by Paul Ehrlich in 1968 predicted that hundreds of millions would perish in the 1970's from famine. These disasters never occurred, and it seems now that quite the opposite might take place. Ben Wattenberg sheds new light on the issue about how we will have to deal with fewer people, and declining populations in the future. Currently, all European nations have below replacement-level fertility, and even Middle Eastern and Asian countries. The Europeans, even with heavy immigration are still experiencing negative population growth. Russia for example, is losing circa 700,000 people per year due to mortality and emigration. Interesting issues are examined such as integration into Western societies, for example, and whether or not democratic countries can remain so with an influx of people who reject its ideals. And can Europe remain economically competitive with a shrinking workforce that has to support an increasing percentage of those on pension? The author also discusses possible reasons why demographic decline in many countries is occurring, such as education levels, contraceptives, urbanization, and religious beliefs toward the issue, to name a few. I found the book not excessively political so I think anyone would enjoy reading it. Well researched, well referenced and above all captivating, Fewer is a great book regarding demographic decline.

World depopulation has become the most important, and alarming, new demographic trend to emerge in the past few decades. While the world has experienced low fertility rates before, they have been due to great social disruptions such as war, famine, depression or plague. But the rates always went up afterwards. Things are different now. The global downward trend in fertility is both long-term and pronounced. The numbers are alarming. There are now 63 nations with below-replacement fertility. The replacement level is a Total Fertility Rate of 2.1 children per women. Yet everywhere TFRs are plummeting. Today all 44 modern nations, with the exception of Albania, are below the 2.1 replacement level. America is just on that level. And consider this incredible statistic: European TFR has fallen for fifty consecutive years. Many European nations have a TFR of 1.2, such as Italy, Greece, and Austria. Spain's level is down to 1.1. The UN estimates that Europe's population of 728 million people today will shrink to 632 million within 50 years. The trend in the developing world is even more staggering. In 35 years the TFR there has fallen from 6.01 to around 2.8, and it continues to spiral downwards. South Korea, for example, has a TFR of just over 1.1, while China's rate is 1.8. This is down from 6.06 for China in the late 60s. Fertility rates are falling rapidly in Arab and Muslim nations as well. For example, forty years ago the TFR in North Africa was 7.1 children per woman. Today it is 3.2 and still falling. Now Wattenberg has written on these issues before. In 1987 he wrote The Birth Dearth. So why another book? What really shook up Wattenberg, and spurred on this newer book, was the fact that the UN made a major readjustment of its population projections in 2002. For decades prior to this date the UN had been predicting upward population trends for the developed world over the next half century. But in March 2002 it made a major revision of thinking on the trends in the developing world. Before this time it assumed that the TFR in the poor countries would fall to just 2.1 children per woman. It now changed that figure to 1.85, a full quarter of a child per woman. That meant that world population in the future would go down, not up. It is this new demographic that has really set off the alarm bells. Wattenberg gives us plenty of statistical information. And he points out that the US is one nation that seems to be bucking the trend. American TFR has actually risen lately, mainly due to immigration. But around the rest of the world the picture is bleak indeed. The causes are all the usual suspects: urbanisation, education, women in the workplace, contraception, abortion, etc. But the real question is, what will be the effect of this world-wide population implosion? We just do not know because it has never happened before, at least on such a large scale. How will economies fare? How will societies change? We do know that we are experiencing aging

Humanity now numbers over six billion people. Most demographers expect that number will increase to between eight and nine billion in the year 2050 and then begin to decline. Already forty- four percent of the world's population lives in countries with negative population growth. Europe which numbers 72 million people today will decline by one hundred million by 2050. The United States thanks to immigration primarily is the only major industrial power that will continue to increase in population, despite its already having a close to zero population growth. China will peak at 1.5 billion people by 2030 and then begin to decline. Japan is already along with Italy, Spain and Germany a county with great negative growth. But what Ben Wattenberg presciently a couple of decades ago labeled ' the birth dearth' is not simply a question of numbers. Those numbers translate into social and economic consequences.A world in which people live longer , and in which there are fewer births is a world in which younger generations will be required to bear a larger and larger burden to pay for the social benefits of the elderly. A world in which there are smaller new generations is one in which there will likely be economic stagnation and even decline , as the number of new customers and consumers declines. A world in which there are increasing numbers of one- child only families is one in which there is less likely to be risk- taking entreprenurial activity. Wattenberg presents and analyzes the numbers while at the same time making a social critique . He sees that our modern world has pushed toward less and less value given to family and home. It has worked to provide more and more incentives for women to be in the workplace and at the university, without balancing this by giving proper economic reward for the raising of children. Wattenberg sees the birth dearth and the greying of mankind as connected with social pathologies which threaten the valuing of life, and the providing of hope in the human future. The facts he gives and the arguments he makes should be studied by all our political leaders, and should be part of the education of every individual who cares about the human future.

In this fascinating book, author Ben J. Wattenberg looks at a global phenomenon that is certain the change our view of the future. As early as the 1970s certain Western countries reached a point where their total fertility rate (TFR or children per woman) passed below 2.1, which is the replacement rate. At this point, the high TFR in Third World counties led to the idea that shrinking Western nations would find themselves overrun by the exploding population of these poorer nations. And now, much to everyone surprise, the United Nations Population Division finds that a number of Third World countries have passed below the replacement rate and nearly all of the rest will do so shortly. Truly the world of Paul Ehrlich is being turned upside down! But, what does all of this mean? In this fascinating book, the author looks at this phenomenon, examining it in some depth, and the questioning why it is happening and what it means for the future. But, don't misunderstand, as the author is careful to point out, this is a little understood phenomenon, and what its results will be are impossible to predict (there has never been a time before when the world passed into a population decline in the absence of famine or plague). I must say that I found this to be a fascinating book, and well reasoned book. I have heard a little about the drop in total fertility rate, but until I read this book I did not understand the scope of it, or its ramifications. Overall, I think that this is an extremely important book, which should be read by anyone who wants to know what the future of the Earth is certain to hold. I highly recommend this book to all thinking people!

Ben Wattenberg's "Fewer: How the New Demography of Depopulation Will Shape Our Future" is a remarkable book and, in terms of its importance for our country and the world, it should attract a great deal more attention than most of the presidential campaign advertising. Mr. Wattenberg reports conclusively that the world will have far fewer people than was expected even a decade ago, that in numbers and age and gender patterns this smaller population will be distributed in ways that will be significant, and that the implications for the environment, the economy and national security will be quite profound. The biggest news is that in sheer numbers the human race is now likely to peak at 8.5 billion people instead of the United Nations projection of 11.5 billion. Even the U.N. demographers now agree that the population explosion will never reach the numbers they had once projected. The biggest reason for this dramatic decline was captured in an earlier book by Mr. Wattenberg, "The Birth Dearth." Women are simply having fewer children and the result is that in some countries population is already starting to go down. As Mr. Wattenberg notes, in order to sustain the current population, the average woman would have to have 2.33 children. Falling below that average will result in a population decline. Today some 40 countries are already below the replacement rate and Mr. Wattenberg expects virtually every country to be below the replacement rate by the end of our lifetime. Fascinatingly, after all the focus on Chinese compulsory population control, it is not China that has had the most rapid change in birthrates among Asian countries. That honor goes to South Korea, where women now average only 1.17 children (even lower than Japan). China has dropped to 1.825 and is still declining. Mr. Wattenberg makes so many fascinating points in this thin book that it is impossible to cover them all in a review. However, a few deserve to be singled out. Europe is going to lose population dramatically by mid-century and therefore become significantly older. This will almost certainly entail a significant shift in power and in economic competitiveness away from an aging and shrinking European Union. Mexico is on the verge of dropping below the replacement rate; over the next generation this will almost certainly slow the rate of migration to the United States. Russia is facing a demographic crisis, with the shortest lifespan for males of any industrial country and a catastrophic decline in women willing to bear children. Mr. Wattenberg highlights the intellectual dishonesty of the Paul Ehrlich, left-wing environmentalists and their factual mistakes over the last generation. Mr. Ehrlich had predicted famines beginning in the 1970s. They simply haven't happened. The global warming projections all assumed a population of 11.5 billion. If the human race peaks at only 8.5 billion people - 3 billion fewer than predicted - and then starts a long-term decline, how th