THE MOST ENDANGERED COUNTRIES IN THE WORLD

The publication Science Alert called European, Asian and other countries of the world, which are most prone to demographic bombs delayed action due to the decline in fertility and increasing the proportion of older people. These include the USA, Spain, Italy, South Korea, as well as Japan and China.

A demographic time bomb is a situation where there is a decrease in the working share of the population. To avoid this, 2.2 children per woman must be born, but the fertility rate in many developed countries has fallen below two. The effects could be mitigated by the influx of migrant workers, but those measures could not stop the crisis entirely if a large number of citizens went to work in other countries.

The USA fertility rate is reported to have fallen to a record low of 1.76, and life expectancy has reached 78.7 years. In some States, the cost of child care per year is up to ten thousand dollars, which is the reason for the refusal to give birth to children. The share of pensioners is growing, but the demographic bomb is slowed down by a large flow of migrants.

In Spain, the birth rate is 1.5 and the death rate is higher than the birth rate. The increase in the population occurs only at the expense of newcomers, and some villages almost completely extinct. Similar trends are observed in Italy, where people abandon a large number of children due to financial difficulties. The population of Bulgaria with an index of 1.46 is reduced from a record high a speed and it is expected that by 2050, it will reach 5.4 million people. In Latvia by that time there will be only 1.52 million people.

In Japan, the coefficient reaches 1.44, and in South Korea-1.26. In China, families are allowed to have two children instead of one, but even so, by 2030, a quarter of the population will be 60 years old (in 2010, only about 13 per cent of the population was old). Singapore has one of the lowest fertility rates (0.83), but the authorities plan to slow down the demographic bomb through immigration.