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Page added on May 21, 2018
China ‘to scrap child limits altogether’ in effort to boost its ageing population
China is planning to abandon all policies restricting the number of children people can have, according to a report, in a move that would draw to a close one of the world’s longest, most ambitious and most controversial social experiments.
The one-child policy was introduced in 1979 before it was relaxed to two children in 2016, and the Chinese government claims it prevented 400 million births.
Critics dispute that figure, saying China’s birth rate was already falling anyway in line with other developing countries, and that all the policy did was encourage alarming rates of female infanticide and other abuses.
Bloomberg News quoted government sources as saying the new policy would be dubbed “independent fertility”, and that the change could come as soon as this year, or by 2019 at the latest.
And while there was no official confirmation or indeed comment from China’s National Health Commission, the report came on the same day as an article by the state-run Xinhua news agency which eulogised “how much China has changed over the past 40 years” since the one-child policy was introduced.
The article quotes a 63-year-old man as saying he gladly volunteered to have only one child at a time when the policy was needed “to cope with increasing population pressure”. Average salaries have grown, Xinhua says, and the food shortages of the 1970s and 1980s are a matter for “history”.
If China’s state media are preparing the ground for an announcement, they may have to move fast – an initial feasibility study suggesting there would be some “limited” economic gains from lifting child limits was presented to Chinese prime minister Li Keqiang in April, according to Bloomberg.
China owes much of its recent economic boom to a demographic bonus, with a young population providing cheap labour, but that balance has now shifted. The State Council has said around a quarter of China’s population will be 60 or older by 2030, up from 13.3 per cent in 2010, and an ageing society is putting a burden on pensions and services.
Coming so soon after the shift to a two-child limit, any change will inevitably be seen as a climbdown, an admission that relaxing the rules has not boosted birth rates in the way the government hoped, says Professor Steve Tsang, director of the China Institute at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London.
He told The Independent he didn’t think the new policy would have much impact either. “People are not having children in China because they cannot afford them. That’s not going to change whether you have a one-child policy, a two-child policy or a 200-child policy.”
So what will be the legacy of the one-child rule? Most statisticians argue that China’s birth rate was already falling dramatically when it was introduced, making it difficult to assess just how big an impact it had.
Prof Tsang points to the so-called Greater China territories of Hong Kong and Taiwan, where the policy was never implemented, but where fertility rates are among some of the lowest in the world.
One impact that can be measured is on child mortality. A UN report in 2011 found that in the 1970s 60 boys per 1,000 were dying before the age of one, compared with 53 girls. By the 2000s, the ratio had flipped – 21 boys to 28 girls.
“Where the one-child policy did have an impact was on the rights of individuals who were poor and couldn’t just pay [the fine for having more children],” said Prof Tsang. Scrapping the policy, he suggests, is “a step in the right direction” to putting that right.
20 Comments on "China ‘to scrap child limits altogether’ in effort to boost its ageing population"
MASTERMIND on Mon, 21st May 2018 8:31 pm
Right after oil has peaked and we are going to have shortages soon..Lets add more people into the world..I guess all those new babies can become dinner in the near future..
Harquebus on Mon, 21st May 2018 9:11 pm
What is the cause of this madness? How is it that so very few see the disaster that the growth ideology is creating?
“It’s coming home to roost over the next 50 years or so. It’s not just climate change; it’s sheer space, places to grow food for this enormous horde. Either we limit our population growth or the natural world will do it for us, and the natural world is doing it for us right now.” — David Attenborough
“Using his burgeoning intelligence, this most successful of all mammals has exploited the environment to produce food for an ever increasing population. Instead of controlling the environment for the benefit of the population, perhaps it’s time we controlled the population to allow the survival of the environment.” — David Attenborough
Sissyfuss on Mon, 21st May 2018 11:10 pm
DA is spot on about mans insane adherence to the growth paradigm. And like Xi relaxing the family size restrictions, Trump is destroying any and all restrictions on the collecting and burning of fossil fuels. It is one last great Saturnalia before the curtain comes smashing down on the unwitting actors.
Davy on Tue, 22nd May 2018 5:28 am
We have a confusion today with economic populations and carrying capacity populations. It is true many nations including China are faced with demographic shift that will make it harder to maintain the all-important growth impulse we need for modern economies. This is worst in Europe where unless immigration continues national populations will shrink beyond recognition. China is overpopulated as-is so they have both demographic issues for their dynamic modern economy and carrying capacity issues. Clearly China’s population and its resulting mega cities will have to shrink and catastrophically in the next 10-20 years. A similar trend will happen in the west but the numbers are not as bad. All the globe has carrying capacity issues but some of the worst is in Asia. Most modern economic powers have demographic population issues and this will not be fixed easily.
We always get back to behaviors when faced with these macro issues. Change comes when there is crisis and with these big issues when crisis comes it is too late. China’s population policy changes are not significant in the bigger picture. Other forces are more important and working quicker and these forces are negative for demographic and overshoot levels. Economies are hitting diminishing returns and natural limits. It is just a matter of time. Technology and innovation will help slow the dangerous results but not stop them.
kanon on Tue, 22nd May 2018 9:44 am
Davy: “. . . the all-important growth impulse we need for modern economies.” This is a feature of banking cartel money systems — debt money — which require compounding growth to maintain their financial and political balances. We know perfectly well the likely future, but we cannot deal with it unless we can imagine and work out a new system. A new system, however, means the existing social order would be transformed and all participants are afraid they would lose out. I suspect that detailed analysis of our predicament is another form of denial.
GregT on Tue, 22nd May 2018 10:12 pm
“The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function.”
Albert Bartlett, RIP
AND:
Our inability to understand how our monetary systems work, and who is in control of them.
MASTERMIND on Tue, 22nd May 2018 10:29 pm
Greg
Enough with your banker paranoia..they have done everything they can to keep BAU going post the great recession..if it wasn’t for their polices that created the shale boom..We would have had major oil supply shortages by now that would have collapsed BAU..And you cant survive without BAU in place..without the rule of law and a prosperous society..You are dead meat..All you have done is prepare for a last stand..And the keyword is last..
Makati1 on Wed, 23rd May 2018 5:09 am
Greg, few here understand math or money. The serfs are being set up for the great fall by their school system and the Federal Reserve. Keep BAU going for as long as the top 0.01% can bleed the serfs and then let it collapse. The Great Leveling is nearing its finale. That is how I see it.
Davy on Wed, 23rd May 2018 5:36 am
The self-organizing of billions of people appears to be beyond control. We feel like we have control or could have control if only leaders would do the right thing. We have a civilization that is amazing and it feels like there is so much control. We feel exceptional in this regards and a higher life form. Yet, when we try to control it is not real control. It is a fantasy or abstract control. It is more the thought of theoretically control.
All species at population levels beyond a certain level are destructive. Should we call into question intelligent species populations too? I am even pointing to higher intelligence than our modern example. How much understanding can humans have at the population levels we are at of ourselves? Science can tell us our situation in vast stores of knowledge but how can individuals reflect on this and make decisions that impact civilization? Could one leader actually handle intelligence and fit it into the planetary system and the web of life? It is safe to say our civilization is beyond control at our current levels. It has a life of its own and that life is parasitic now that we are beyond proper population levels. The understanding we have of human’s greatest shortcomings is too many intelligent humans. This is really the rendered down problem to consider.
Humans appear to be out of scale with natural proportionality with both population and intelligence. This is important to consider because it represent a dilemma of being unable to control ourselves and being too big for nature to manage in her normal life cycles and greater planetary systems. Of course nature manages us but in regards to the finely tuned highly productive planetary and life system humans were blessed with post last ice age. That resulting planetary phase allowed us to become intelligent and it appears intelligence is what destroyed it. We have destroyed that evolution with extinction and destruction that resulted from population and intelligence in overshoot.
In this regard then we can call into question intelligence itself. Maybe it is only when intelligence is combined with overshoot of population we should question intelligence as an example of a positive life force. Considering it takes large population to achieve modern intelligence at the level we consider higher intelligence then maybe it is only modern and higher intelligence. We are so proud of our modern intelligence but should we be? The intelligence of tribal man pre-modern may be as good as it gets. The passing on of culture and knowledge by word of mouth instead of written language marked the fateful departure into destruction and extinction.
So maybe we are actually in intelligence overshoot along with population overshoot. Population would never have grown to our current levels without intelligence and intelligence would not have become modern without population at levels we see today. If this is the case then intelligence at our current levels is an evolutionary dead end. It is a destroyer of balance and complex ecosystems. If this is the case then there is nothing we can do to save ourselves and our current wonderful planetary period from a brutal succession. Is this the paradox of intelligence? Is intelligence its own demise?
GregT on Wed, 23rd May 2018 6:14 am
“Enough with your banker paranoia..they have done everything they can to keep BAU going post the great recession..if it wasn’t for their polices that created the shale boom..”
It was the central bankers who caused the Global Financial Crisis MM, if not for debt money there would be no need for exponential growth, and a barrel of oil has far more real value than a couple of hundred bucks.
You would be a very good example of what Albert Bartlett was talking about.
fmr-paultard on Wed, 23rd May 2018 6:37 am
yawn as a former paultard who think sleep and drink gold, i’ve lost so much shekles so my bs attenna stands up when i see our resident tard gregt who obtained his wisdom while having sex with the PhD gf.
GregT on Wed, 23rd May 2018 10:26 am
“yawn as a former paultard who think sleep and drink gold, i’ve lost so much shekles so my bs attenna stands up when i see our resident tard gregt who obtained his wisdom while having sex with the PhD gf.”
Like I’ve said before paultard, you’ve obviously made some rather poor choices, and have nobody to blame but yourself. Neither my wife, or myself, have anything to do with your failure.
MASTERMIND on Wed, 23rd May 2018 10:36 am
The $100 a Barrel Oil Wager Comes Back to the Options Market
While triple-digit oil may be a way off in practice, talk that prices could top that barrier over the next 12 months is gaining traction. Bank of America said earlier this month that oil could rally to $100 by the middle of next year, a view echoed by veteran developing-nation investor Mark Mobius. Meanwhile Pierre Andurand, one of the most prominent hedge fund managers in the oil market, recently said that $300 a barrel was “not impossible”. Among the rationale behind those views are shrinking global oil stockpiles and more hawkish U.S. foreign policy.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-23/the-100-a-barrel-oil-wager-comes-back-to-the-options-market
CommiesRus on Wed, 23rd May 2018 3:29 pm
BS. They need fresh organs to harvest and sell.
Antius on Wed, 23rd May 2018 5:46 pm
“We have a confusion today with economic populations and carrying capacity populations. It is true many nations including China are faced with demographic shift that will make it harder to maintain the all-important growth impulse we need for modern economies. This is worst in Europe where unless immigration continues national populations will shrink beyond recognition. China is overpopulated as-is so they have both demographic issues for their dynamic modern economy and carrying capacity issues. Clearly China’s population and its resulting mega cities will have to shrink and catastrophically in the next 10-20 years. A similar trend will happen in the west but the numbers are not as bad. All the globe has carrying capacity issues but some of the worst is in Asia. Most modern economic powers have demographic population issues and this will not be fixed easily.”
Good post Davy. Who until recently would ever have predicted that it would end this way? Ageing and shrinking populations. Production and demand shrinking at the same time; making it impossible to maintain an expanding economy. The situation is worse in the west. White populations are declining so fast that by end of this century our numbers will have dropped by two-thirds. Why are people not having children?
Boat on Wed, 23rd May 2018 6:47 pm
Ageing and shrinking populations are great. Buy stock in adult diapers. And white populations could drop 75% and still the earth would be considered overpopulated. Where is your sense of sustainability. Europeans always pariniod about race.
MASTERMIND on Wed, 23rd May 2018 6:59 pm
The last law of nature says: that any creature that despoils and outbreeds its natural habitat will be culled to bring its numbers under control and restore a stable environment.
http://worldpopulationhistory.org/carrying-capacity/
MASTERMIND on Wed, 23rd May 2018 7:00 pm
Prince William warns that there are too many people in the world
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/11/02/prince-william-warns-many-people-world/
MASTERMIND on Wed, 23rd May 2018 7:13 pm
Peak oil is now..
IEA Chief warns of world oil shortages by 2020 as discoveries fall to record lows
https://www.wsj.com/articles/iea-says-global-oil-discoveries-at-record-low-in-2016-1493244000
Saudi Arabia’s Energy Minister Warns of World Oil Shortages Ahead
https://www.wsj.com/articles/saudi-minister-sees-end-of-oil-price-slump-1476870790
Saudi Aramco chief warns of looming oil shortage
https://www.ft.com/content/ed1e8102-212f-11e7-b7d3-163f5a7f229c
Sleepwalking Into The Next Oil Crisis
https://www.forbes.com/sites/rrapier/2018/03/23/is-the-world-sleepwalking-into-an-oil-crisis/#509edc8b44cf
According to the German Army leaked study. When the oil shortages hit, Wall street will crash, the public will lose all faith/trust in their institutions, and the global economy and world governments will collapse..
http://www.energybulletin.net/sites/default/files/Peak%20Oil_Study%20EN.pdf
Shortend on Wed, 23rd May 2018 7:19 pm
That’s why Prince Williams wife just had a child….obviously not too many royals!
No better than yeast