The average annual rate of increase in the Chinese population is equal to 0,57%, about a third of what was recorded in the 80s. While in the United States between 2000 and 2010 the average rate was 0,9%, well above that of China, not to mention that of the EU 27 equal to 0,28%. These are the data that emerged from the censuses just completed in the two world powers and which we derive from a report by Simone Carletti in Focus, the weekly BNP-Paribas Study Service (attached).
In China, between 2000 and 2010, the growth rate almost halved compared to the 1,07% recorded in the 90s. The sharp slowdown in births is changing the age structure of the population: the number of people over 60 has increased by a third (+47 million) while young people under 14 have decreased by 67 million (about a fourth). According to the latest United Nations projections, China's population will reach its peak around 2025 (almost 1,4 billion), a period in which it will be overtaken by India. Another figure that emerges from the census is the impressive internal migration: if in 2000 100 of every 36 people lived in cities, in 2010 the population is divided almost exactly in two: 49,7% in urban areas and 50,3% in rural ones.
In the United States, the first years of the so-called baby boom generation, a term that identifies those born between 1946 and 1964, are beginning to retire. Compared to the 2000 census, adults aged 65 and over increased by 15,1% ( 40,3 million) and are almost six times the number of young people up to 18 years of age, which grew by only 2,6% to 74,2 million. Even if less markedly than in China or Europe, the United States has a problem of population aging. The average growth rate, equal to 0,9%, is the lowest since the decade of the great depression. An important contribution has come from immigration: citizens born abroad increased from less than 14 million (6,2% of the population) in 1980 to 38,5 million (12,5%) in 2009.
The most relevant consequence from a political point of view is that citizens over 45 years of age have become the majority of the US electorate. The candidates for the next presidential elections will have to take this into account.
