Nicholas Eberstadt
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China will see its population peak by 2027, according to projections by
the U.S. Census Bureau. Its working-age population has already been
shrinking for the past Ãve years, and it is set to decrease by at least 100
million between 2015 and 2040. The country will see a particularly
large decline in its working-age population under 30, which may plunge
by nearly 30 percent over these years. Although this rising generation
will be the best educated in Chinese history, the country’s overall
growth in educational attainment will slow as the less educated older
generations come to make up a larger and larger share o the total
population. The Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Hu-
man Capital estimates that by 2040, China’s adult population will have
fewer average years o schooling than that o Bolivia or Zimbabwe.
As China’s working population slumps, its over-65 population is
set to explode. Between 2015 and 2040, the number o Chinese
over the age o 65 is projected to rise from about 135 million to 325
million or more. By 2040, China could have twice as many elderly
people as children under the age o 15, and the median age o Chi-
na’s population could rise to 48, up from 37 in 2015 and less than
25 in 1990. No country has ever gone gray at a faster pace. The
process will be particularly extreme in rural China, as young Chi-
nese migrate to the cities in search o opportunity. On the whole,
China’s elderly in 2040 will be both poor and poorly educated,
dependent on others for the overwhelming majority o their con-
sumption and other needs.
Taken together, these unfavorable demographic trends are creating
heavy headwinds for the Chinese economy. To make matters worse,
China faces additional adverse demographic factors. Under the one-
child policy, for instance, Chinese parents often opted for an abortion
over giving birth to a girl, creating one o the most imbalanced infant
and child sex ratios in the modern world. In the years ahead, China
will have to deal with the problem o tens o millions o surplus men,
mostly from disadvantaged rural backgrounds, with no prospects o
marrying, having children, or continuing their family line.
China will also face a related problem over the next generation, as
traditional Chinese family structures atrophy or evaporate. Since the
beginning o written history, Chinese society has relied on extended
kinship networks to cope with economic risks. Yet a rising generation
o urban Chinese youth is made up o only children o only children,
young men and women with no siblings, cousins, aunts, or uncles.