Demographic Trends In The 20th Century

The United States is in the midst of a major demographic shift. In the coming decades, people aged 65 and over will make up an increasingly large percentage of the population: The ratio of people aged 65+ to people aged 20-64 will rise by 80%. This shift is happening for two reasons: people are living longer, and many couples are choosing to have fewer children and to have those children somewhat later in life. The resulting demographic shift will present the nation with economic challenges, both to absorb the costs and to leverage the benefits of an aging population. Aging and the Macroeconomy: Long-Term Implications of an Older Population presents the fundamental factors driving the aging of the U.S. population, as well as its societal implications and likely long-term macroeconomic effects in a global context. The report finds that, while population aging does not pose an insurmountable challenge to the nation, it is imperative that sensible policies are implemented soon to allow companies and households to respond. It offers four practical approaches for preparing resources to support the future consumption of households and for adapting to the new economic landscape.

Drawing data from official sources in 60 countries, as well as from the United Nations and the World Bank, this compendium of statistical information on population, fertility, and mortality treats every one of the UN-recognized countries in at least summary form. With data from 1950 onward and projections through 2020, this volume extends the dataset of Nathan Keyfitz and Wilhelm Flieger's landmark work, World Population: An Analysis of Vital Data (1968), with virtually no overlap. All the life tables, standardized rates, and projections have been generated by uniform methods to ensure easy comparison among countries. More than 800 charts provide a foundation for analyzing the radical demographic changes now taking place: the historic lows of fertility in Germany and other industrial countries, Africa's persistently high fertility, and the worldwide extension of life expectancy. The product of cautious and painstaking labor, this work promises to be an important resource for further demographic research as well as a valuable comparative resource for studies of the status of global social welfare and the environment.

This reader on the history of demography and historical perspectives on "population" in the twentieth century features a unique collection of primary sources from around the globe, written by scholars, politicians, journalists, and activists. Many of the sources are available in English for the first time. Background information is provided on each source. Together, the sources mirror the circumstances under which scientific knowledge about "population" was produced, how demography evolved as a discipline, and how demographic developments were interpreted and discussed in different political and cultural settings. Readers thereby gain insight into the historical precedents on debates on race, migration, reproduction, natural resources, development and urbanization, the role of statistics in the making of the nation state, and family structures and gender roles, among others. The reader is designed for undergraduate and graduate students as well as scholars in the fields of demography and population studies as well as to anyone interested in the history of science and knowledge.

This book examines the interrelations of population change, developments in projection methodology, and politics in the 1920s and 1930s. Together, the contributions in the book represent an important scholarly and critical contribution to the history of d

One of the most striking features of the demography of twentieth century Britain and its constituent countries has been the persistence of rates of population growth far lower than those of the nineteenth century. By the 1980s even the absolute size of the population had begun to decline. Why has this happened? And why have falling rates of population growth been accompanied by equally dramatic changes in the geography of human residence? In an attempt to answer these questions, the book traces the evolution of trends in levels of fertility, mortality and migration and considers the nature of the forces responsible for these trends.

This book presents the first systematic evidence on long-term trends in global well-being since 1820 for 25 major countries and 8 regions in the world covering more than 80% of the world’s population.