Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Great Recession Porn: Economic Crisis Slows U.S. Population Growth


As it turns out, a bad U.S. economy is not conducive to robust U.S. population growth. Here is the USA Today with the details:
The U.S. population is growing at the slowest rate since the Great Depression after two decades of robust increases.

For two consecutive years since 2009, the population has grown just 0.7% a year, down from annual increases around 1% in previous years and the lowest since the late 1930s. The U.S. gained 2.2 million people from 2010 to 2011 — fewer than the 2.8 million added a decade earlier — reaching a total of 311.6 million.

"Almost anybody who observes these things over the years can say this is almost all recession-related," says Carl Haub, demographer for the Population Reference Bureau.

The government says the recession ended in June 2009. Although the economy has improved, the downturn's effect on birth and immigration lingers. The number of babies born from July 1, 2010, to July 2011 dropped 200,000 from the same period in 2008-09. The number of additional immigrants fell 150,000.

"It's an indicator of an unhealthy economy," Haub says. "People are obviously still delaying births, and immigration has continued to drop because job opportunities are not there."

The U.S. fertility rate — which has been close to the replacement level of 2.1 children per woman in contrast to many developed nations that are well below that level — now is estimated to have fallen to 1.9, says demographer Joseph Chamie, former director of the United Nations Population Division and more recently research director at the Center for Migration Studies.
Putting aside the looming collapse of our economy for a moment, long term this portends a real disaster for an aging population which expects to be supported by government programs post-retirement. Demographics were already working against the long term solvency of Social Security and Medicare even before the downturn hit.

Though the article doesn't say so, I would gather that a large percentage of those delaying having children are the sons and daughters of the middle class who have not been able to find the types of secure employment that would allow them to settle down and raise a family. Which means the trend is doubly bad because it is the middle class that pays the lion's share of the overall taxes in our society.

Nevertheless, somehow despite this very bad news hope still springs eternal:
Demographers expect population growth to pick up when the economy rebounds fully, but a bounce-back in births is likely to lag.

"Many — but likely not all — of the postponed births can be expected to be made up," Chamie says. "Even with the slight current downturn in births, the U.S. population will very likely reach 400 million midcentury."
There it is again, that completely faith-based belief that real economic growth just HAS to resume, because in always has in the past. The demographers would do us all a much better service if they would instead devote some time studying what the effects would be if economic growth DOESN'T resume. Because that is the reality we all face and the one for which we need to start basing our planning for the future.


Bonus: "I think I'm sophisticated 'cause I'm living my life like a good homosapien. But all around me everybody's multiplying 'till they're walking round like flies, man"

6 comments:

  1. Keep in mind that the change in population is Births - Deaths + (Net Migration), where Net Migration is Immigration - Emigration.

    The majority of US population growth is due to immigration rather than birth rates. The US birth rate has been pretty consistently in a downward trend since the baby boom. A little more so in recessions, a little less so in good times. Lots of things feed into this. Two-income families, stagnant real wages, delayed families, etc.

    Still, the immigration issue is important. Why do people immigrate mostly? I'll give you a hint, it isn't freedom. It's basically "show me the money!" People come here because it is supposedly the land of opportunity. However, right now, it doesn't look as attractive as it has in the past. When the economy sucks and jobs are scarce, some of the people who would otherwise immigrate decide to stay where they are. And, on a smaller scale, more Americans who are frustrated with their situation consider taking the step of leaving the US in search of work.

    So, the recession is definitely causing a population growth drop (note that it's still growing), but I suspect it is just as much about immigration as it is about births.

    Now all that said, I personally think that a negative growth rate is required, given that we are already demonstrably over ecological capacity. So, less is probably better. Not without pain and consequences, but better.

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    1. We must also remember the example of the Soviet Union's collapse. Russia's population has been declining ever since. Of course, immigration has never been much of a factor there.

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    2. bmerson is right. The US has always been a prefered destination for Irish emigrants, we are currenly loosing a lot of young Irish people but they are heading for Canada, Australia and New Zealand. I know of no one in the last few years who has gone to the US.

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  2. There is a good discussion on the population delusion here:

    False Hope (or, how the Green movement will insure the collapse of civilization)

    http://www.populationelephant.com/PEfalsehope.html

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    1. Good article, Gail. Too bad most greens will never be convinced that their "solutions" are yet another dead end.

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    2. Not dead ends; necessary, but insufficient.

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