Critical Issues and Vantage Point are occasional issue brief series jointly published by the Global Aging Institute (GAI) and The Terry Group, an actuarial consulting firm. Both publications explore the demographic, economic, and social trends reshaping America and the world, and in particular the future environment for retirement and health care. While Critical Issues offers in-depth analyses of these trends, Vantage Point features mini briefs on important new developments.
Although both series are primarily U.S. focused, some of the issues review global trends or turn the spotlight on developments in other countries. The Terry Group and GAI hope that the series will help inform policymakers, business leaders, and strategic planners as they prepare for a rapidly changing future.
Vantage Point
America's Looming Fiscal Crisis
According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), large chronic budget deficits will push the national debt up to 156 percent of GDP by 2055, a level once associated with banana republics. By then, America will be spending twice as much each year on interest payments to bondholders as it will be on national defense. In this Vantage Point, we offer an overview of the long-term budget outlook and the dangers it poses. We also explain why, as daunting as they are, CBO’s projections may greatly understate the magnitude of America’s looming fiscal crisis.
The latest UN population projections reveal a world on the cusp of a stunning demographic transformation. The global baby bust continues to deepen, countries almost everywhere are aging, and a growing number face long-term demographic decline. In this issue of Vantage Point, we discuss the coming global demographic transformation, as well as the daunting social, economic, and geopolitical challenges it poses.
According to new CDC data, the U.S. total fertility rate (TFR), a measure of average lifetime births per woman, resumed its decline in 2023, falling to an all-time historical low of 1.62. The drop more than erased a post-pandemic uptick in the TFR that some experts hoped might herald a turnaround in U.S. birthrates, which have been falling almost continuously since the Great Recession. Now it looks more and more like low fertility is here to stay. In this Vantage Point, we look at the latest fertility numbers and what they mean for America’s future.
It’s not surging productivity that’s driving today’s surprisingly resilient economic expansion. Nor is it surging labor-force participation. It’s surging immigration. In other words, the same development that has unleashed chaos at the southern border, overwhelmed the asylum system, and overburdened state and municipal governments is also what has helped the U.S. economy defy gravity in the face of rising interest rates and ebbing fiscal stimulus. In this Vantage Point, we examine the role immigration is playing in today’s expansion—and explain why it is becoming ever more critical to growth as America ages.
South Korea’s fertility rate fell to just 0.72 in 2023, another world record low and barely one-third of the 2.1 replacement rate needed to maintain a stable population from one generation to the next. In this Vantage Point, we discuss the causes of South Korea’s fertility freefall and draw lessons for the United States and other developed countries. The most important is that seeking to maintain traditional gender roles does not raise birthrates, but lowers them.
America's Rapidly Deteriorating Demographic Outlook
According to new Census Bureau projections, the U.S. population will peak later in the century, then decline. Until just a few years ago, it seemed certain that the United States would have a growing population for the foreseeable future. What explains the rapid deterioration in America’s demographic outlook? And what does it mean for America’s future? In this Vantage Point, we discuss the new Census Bureau projections and consider their long-term fiscal, economic, and geopolitical implications.
According to the latest UN projections, China is on track to lose nearly one-half of its current population by the end of the century. Over the past few decades, China’s unusually favorable demographics have helped to propel its stunning economic rise. In the future, its deteriorating demographics threaten to place an ever larger drag on economic growth. In this issue of Vantage Point, we discuss this reversal and the economic and geopolitical risks it poses.
Immigration is already the only reason that the United States still has a growing workforce, and by the 2040s it will be the only reason that it still has a growing population. In this issue of Vantage Point, we take a step back from today’s politically polarized immigration debate and consider the critical role that immigration can and should play in an aging America.
Between the new CBO budget baseline released in February, the President’s 2024 budget proposal released in March, and the looming debt ceiling crisis, the federal budget has been much in the news lately. To help our readers navigate the sometimes confusing issues, concepts, and terminology in the budget debate, this issue of Vantage Point offers a concise budget primer.
The world’s population passed the 8 billion mark in November, triggering renewed fears about runaway population growth. These fears are largely misplaced. Global population growth is in fact slowing, and the world’s population will likely peak later in the century, then decline. In this Vantage Point, we offer an overview of the global demographic outlook during the rest of the century. Although population growth will remain a serious challenge in some parts of the world, especially sub-Saharan Africa, the challenge for an increasing number of countries will not be population growth, but population decline.
U.S. life expectancy has been much in the news lately, and the news has been mostly grim. The recent CDC report showing that life expectancy fell for the second straight year in 2021 was the most widely covered development. But there have also been new and worrisome reports on the large and growing gap in life expectancy between the United States and its developed world peers, as well as on the enormous variation in life expectancy across America’s fifty states. In this Vantage Point, we review recent developments on the life expectancy front. We also consider the disconnect between the increasingly uncertain prospects for U.S. life expectancy and the optimism of most projections, which continue to assume that it will rise steadily in decades to come.
With the exception of a minor uptick in 2014, the U.S. birthrate has fallen every year since 2007. Or at least it did until last year. According to preliminary data released in May by the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics, the birthrate rose in 2021, a development that surprised many demographers. What accounts for the unexpected increase? And does it mean that America’s baby bust is finally over? In this Vantage Point, we explore recent developments on the fertility front.
Why the Collapse in U.S. Population Growth Matters
Declining birthrates and declining immigration are pushing the United States toward a future of much slower population growth and perhaps even population decline. As population growth slows, so too will economic growth. Domestically, living standards may stagnate, while internationally America’s stature may erode. Why the Collapse in U.S. Population Growth Matters examines the economic and geopolitical challenges posed by slowing population growth and considers a variety of policy responses that could improve America’s long-term demographic and economic outlook, from increasing labor-force participation to increasing immigration. Much is at stake, since a slow-growth America may be a less prosperous and less hopeful America, as well as a less safe America. The issue brief is part of a series called Critical Issues which the Global Aging Institute is producing in collaboration with The Terry Group.
Elderly workers have become an increasingly critical driver of U.S. economic growth, accounting for almost three-fifths of all gains in employment in the 2010s. Yet since the pandemic began, nearly one in ten have dropped out of the labor force. Rethinking Retirement in an Aging America examines recent trends in retirement behavior, explores the economic, fiscal, and individual benefits of longer work lives, and identifies a variety of policy initiatives which could make remaining on the job longer more attractive for those workers who are able to do so, while at the same time protecting those who are not. America’s success at reversing the recent decline in elderly labor-force participation and more fully unlocking the productive potential of the elderly, it concludes, may well determine whether it prospers while it ages. The issue brief is part of a series called Critical Issues which the Global Aging Institute is producing in collaboration with The Terry Group.
Not so long ago, the United States was among the rich world’s longevity leaders. Today it is its longevity laggard. From Longevity Leader to Longevity Laggard explores the reasons behind the startling U.S. slide in world life expectancy rankings. It digs deep into the worrisome divergence in trends in morbidity and mortality by socioeconomic status, warning that America risks becoming two separate nations, one long-lived and one short-lived. Along the way, it also clears up the widespread confusion about the impact of COVID-19 on life expectancy. The good news is that the large pandemic-related reduction in life expectancy will almost certainly prove transitory. The bad news is that if we fail to confront the gathering health crisis afflicting much of America we may find out too late that stagnating or retrogressing life expectancy is the new normal. The issue brief is part of a series called Critical Issues which the Global Aging Institute is producing in collaboration with The Terry Group.
Until recently, America’s relatively high fertility rate seemed to ensure that it would remain the youngest of the major developed countries for the foreseeable future, as well as the only one with a steadily growing workforce. But birthrates were already in a steep decline before the pandemic hit, and now have plunged to European levels. The End of U.S. Demographic Exceptionalism digs deep into the story behind the new “baby bust,” exploring why birthrates have been falling, whether they are likely to rise again, and, if they don’t, what it means for the budget, the economy, and the position of the United States in the world order. The issue brief is the first in a series called Critical Issues which the Global Aging Institute is producing in collaboration with The Terry Group. The series aims to provide timely and authoritative analysis of key demographic and economic trends and developments that are reshaping America and the world, and in particular the future environment for retirement and health care.
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