{"id":231578,"date":"2020-09-28T12:40:16","date_gmt":"2020-09-28T17:40:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=231578"},"modified":"2020-09-27T20:59:35","modified_gmt":"2020-09-28T01:59:35","slug":"fertility-rate-economic-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/fertility-rate-economic-crisis\/","title":{"rendered":"Low fertility rate around the globe is leading to economic crisis"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Researchers from the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation say the global fertility rate was nearly cut in half in 2017 \u2014 and predicts it has much further to fall.<\/p>\n

Currently, the world fertility rate sits at about 2.4%, but the research, published in the journal Lancet<\/a>, projects that it will drop to below 1.7% by the year 2100. A healthy replacement rate is 2.1%, and yet, 23 countries are expected to see more than a 50% decline in their populations. This, experts say, will lead to an economic crisis, with nations becoming unable to support health care programs or welfare systems.<\/p>\n

Shockingly, the research was funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which gave more than $11 million<\/a> between 2018 and 2020 to the Population Council<\/a>, which has the goal of ending overpopulation and which promotes the abortion pill worldwide. Researchers found that “continued trends in female educational attainment and access to contraception will hasten declines in fertility and slow population growth.” Yet, the Gates Foundation continues to promote birth control<\/a>\u00a0among African countries and other developing nations. Those efforts may help lead to a global economic collapse.<\/p>\n

READ: Tesla\u2019s Elon Musk: \u2018Population collapse\u2019 (not overpopulation) is \u2018biggest problem\u2019 facing world<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

“It will create enormous social change,” Professor Christopher Murray told<\/a> the BBC. “It makes me worried because I have an eight-year-old daughter and I wonder what the world will be like.\u00a0Who pays tax in a massively aged world? Who pays for healthcare for the elderly? Who looks after the elderly? Will people still be able to retire from work?”<\/p>\n

In some nations, the decline in the fertility rate has already prompted<\/a> governments to raise the retirement age. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) warned that there won’t be enough people working to pay the pensions of retirees at the current retirement age. In a paper<\/a>, the OECD argued that “in 1980, there were 20 people aged 65 and older for every 100 people of working age (that is, aged between 20 and 64). By 2015, this number had increased… to 28 people aged 65 or over for every 100 of working age. Project forward another 35 years, the ratio will be 53 to 100 in 2050 based on UN mortality projections (United Nations 2017)… This is because we are living longer and having fewer children.” They conclude that the retirement age will increase by 8.4 years between 2015 and 2050, bringing the retirement age to 73.4.<\/p>\n

“To be successful we need a fundamental rethink of global politics,” Professor Ibrahim Abubakar of the University College London told the BBC. “The distribution of working-age populations will be crucial to whether humanity prospers or withers.”<\/p>\n