The problem of demography does not only concern Italy. Recently, worrying data has emerged on the world's leading economic power, the China, which in the coming years will have to deal with the consequences of falling birth rates and aging.
Last year the Asian giant saw the population decrease for the first time since 1949. Newborns recorded a drop of 15% compared to 2019 (to 10,4 million, according to preliminary estimates), bringing the total population below the record level of one billion and 400 million, surpassed in 2019. Even if the drop in The birth rate has been going on for years now, the trend reversal came much earlier than expected, considering that the Beijing authorities estimated that the demographic peak would only be reached in 2025.
The regime's first reaction was to try to hide the news. At the moment, the numbers that testify to the demographic decline remain in the field of rumors: the official document that contains them - a census completed in December - should already be in the public domain, but its dissemination has been postponed. The reason is simple: these are politically sensitive data, "to be handled with care", because they are potentially capable of undermining citizens' confidence in the future, revealed the Financial Times sources of Chinese diplomacy.
In fact, if China is aging so rapidly, the responsibility lies mainly with the "one child policy”, a strategy inaugurated in 1979 and continued until 2016. Beyond the abominations it produced from a social and humanitarian point of view, the rule introduced by Deng Xiaoping was based on an erroneous assumption, namely that the excess population long-term economic growth. Now that the weight of exports on Chinese GDP has dropped sharply compared to 40 years ago, Beijing has realized that demographic growth is actually essential for economic growth, because it feeds domestic consumption and avoids a decline in the workforce.
The problem is that at this point, perhaps, it's too late to fix it. In past decades, the effects produced by the one-child policy were compensated for by the young age of the population and the progressive increase in life expectancy. Today, however, things are different: according to projections, the number of over-300s could exceed 2025 million by XNUMX, forcing the authorities to one of the most unpopular reforms: raising the retirement age, which today in the industry is set at 60 for men and between 50 and 55 for women.
For this reason, China has been allowing married couples to do so for five years a second child. A course correction which however did not produce the expected results: in 2016 the growth in the birth rate was not particularly intense and from 2017 the decline resumed, until it reached the collapse of 2020.
For months, therefore, there has been talk of completely overcoming family planning, eliminating the limit of two children per couple. The measure is also supported by the People's Bank, the Chinese central institution, which however is also asking for incentives for motherhood, because changing the rules risks being useless if families do not want (or cannot) have more children.
