UK has had more deaths than births

[Gingernaut]

The population has officially shrunk.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57600757

The last time deaths outnumbered births was 1976

@Gingernaut

The population has officially shrunk.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57600757

The last time deaths outnumbered births was 1976

Despite Boris' best efforts.

@SamusIsAGirl

Perhaps it's time to consign the Hostile Atmosphere policy to immigration to the dustbin where it should have never emerged.

Seems the current Tory party is for people who want to be the richest corpse in the graveyard. The most you can hope for is that react, not act.

And who will look after those immigrants when they get old? Sounds like a Ponzi scheme.

Its not as straightforward as saying we need fewer people when the driver of population growth has for a long time been people living longer. Older people have complex health and social care needs and require a younger generation to support them.

I think ideally we need a reasonable amount of immigration to keep our economy stable, of course certain politicians have invested so much energy telling us that lowering immigration is desirable and blaming all sorts of problems on migration. I really think that Brexit is going to leave us with so many problems.

Surely to rely on ever increasing population makes it a Ponzi scheme and cannot carry on like this.

This is really interesting. It has really made me think a lot. I don’t know as much about this kind of thing as others seem to but I knew birth rates were falling, I work in healthcare and it’s very obvious. Women have so many more choices now to prevent pregnancy or delay it, there is also the concern of relationships breaking down and women left to do it alone, with little help from the father. I have teenage girls and one of them said to me this puts her off having children 😐

What if our population does fall and we have too many houses. I can’t believe how much building is going on in the south east.

Surely to rely on ever increasing population makes it a Ponzi scheme and cannot carry on like this.

Population is not ever increasing because of children. It's more old people living longer

And who will look after those immigrants when they get old? Sounds like a Ponzi scheme.

Why does anyone need to look after them, We'll just kick them out. As we have already started with people who have worked their entire lives here.

Politicians love immigrants. They can't vote. Have to pay taxes which they won't benefit from and can be deported whenever to public can be bothered to re-elect another Tory government. As an added bonus their very existence in the country means you can simultaneously shit on your own home grown working classes just because you can.

What's not to like ?

@MrsPear

All the people who says fabulous do you understand how national insurance or income tax work? If we don’t have a good size working population to cover the retired folk then quite frankly we are screwed.

The vast majority of the UK’s population, including people who work, pay no tax or very little tax at all. Less people will mean less money needed for housing benefits, nhs, child benefit, tax credits, schooling etc. All of this extra will easily cover the pension payments.

@MrsPear

All the people who says fabulous do you understand how national insurance or income tax work? If we don’t have a good size working population to cover the retired folk then quite frankly we are screwed.

Oh no, I'm far too stupid to understand that.

You do realise that people can believe something is better overall, even if it is not better for them individually? A reduced human population is better for the earth, for our future generations, even if my old age is screwed.

The vast majority of the UK’s population, including people who work, pay no tax or very little tax at all. Less people will mean less money needed for housing benefits, nhs, child benefit, tax credits, schooling etc. All of this extra will easily cover the pension payments.

I'm not sure that makes sense. More old people won't result in more taxes & more money to spend on the NHS. The state pension costs are about 100m vs 11m of child benefit or 26m housing benefit.

@wowhie

I do think people should pay for their care & prescriptions should be mean tested not just automatically free for older people but the electorate won't go for that. Nonetheless if I was young I would still bugger off as there is way too much generational inequality here & it's only going to get harder.

No longer uni, work one career and then retire

I don't think that is the model today is it? I'm in my 30s & have switched careers as have many people I know.

Should’ve been more clear - wasn’t wholly referring to people changing career because their current one had no prospects or doesn’t satisfy them enough. I meant more of the expectation of working until older. The expectation currently is still to retire ASAP after kids have been raised . People moan about having to work past 65. However it should be the norm to work until at least 75. This is going to be an issue however because you’re going to become a very expensive employee if you’re at the same level after 30!years... there’s a limit to how much more you can pay people. At the same time having experienced people compete with younger people for ‘entry’ level roles is unfair because the latter definitely has more skills thanks to life experience, given the same qualifications. Also older people might have to take direction from someone younger. The circulation of talent has to be managed carefully so that there’s somewhat of a natural transition and nobody misses out.

Well my state pension age is 68 & I'm sure it will rise. I don't think any of my peers expect to retire before 70 as we need to keep working to pay off houses, dc, private pensions etc.

I agree though that employees will have to change their mindset.

@Whoarethewho

Good too many people anyway. We need a managed reduction.

Are you volunteering yourself and your family?

Managed reduction through education and widened access to birth control, yes. Fascist eugenics, no.

Perhaps we should stop encouraging people to give up smoking and junk food - because 'it will shorten your life'. It's a win win. People enjoy their treat/stress relief of free choice. And net gain for the taxpayer, particularly with smoking (taxes paid in, less paid out on social care and pensions).

And (obviously with strict safeguards against coercion) we should, instead of cheering the often unpleasant death of Covid, legalise assisted suicide and euthanasia. Painless peaceful planned

Perhaps humans should agree to let our species die out naturally. The robots can care for the final cohort of elderly humans.

How to you plan to persuade the human race to do that?

Th robots will take care of that. Terminator, without John or Sarah.

@DGRossetti you’re wrong. Immigrants can vote - if you’re from a Commonwealth country which a lot of us are. Why do you think there are so many Indians and Pakistanis here...?

@wowhie

The vast majority of the UK’s population, including people who work, pay no tax or very little tax at all. Less people will mean less money needed for housing benefits, nhs, child benefit, tax credits, schooling etc. All of this extra will easily cover the pension payments.

I'm not sure that makes sense. More old people won't result in more taxes & more money to spend on the NHS. The state pension costs are about 100m vs 11m of child benefit or 26m housing benefit.

Your figures are way off. Government spending is in billions, not millions. The biggest cost at around 176 billion is welfare, health is 164 billion, state pensions 98 billion and education 92 billion.

The costs of supporting a typical 2 parent 2 child family who pay minimal tax with housing benefit, tax credits, family allowance, education, healthcare etc is obviously going to be way more than paying a measly £137.60 per week to a pensioner.

[quote CastawayQueen]@DGRossetti you’re wrong. Immigrants can vote - if you’re from a Commonwealth country which a lot of us are. Why do you think there are so many Indians and Pakistanis here...?[/quote]
Some immigrants

so I'm only partly wrong ....

As is often the case on MN there are a lot of ageist views being expressed here. It;'s all very well saying that people should be working into their 70s - but wait until you get there and see how you feel about that. It would be fine in many jobs, but in some it expecting a 70 plus year old person to keep going is untenable.

Brexit isn't looking too clever now. I can take a walk down my high street (declining fast as it is) and see adverts looking for workers in many shops). Lots of vacancies in the service sector with no one either willing or able to fill them. This is a problem that is going to get worse. I also know of farms where they are desperate for workers but cannot get them.

Your figures are way off. Government spending is in billions, not millions. The biggest cost at around 176 billion is welfare, health is 164 billion, state pensions 98 billion and education 92 billion.

It's all fluffybucks anyway. You really think the UK has upwards of £530 billion in gold squirrelled away behind a sofa somewhere ?

Your figures are way off. Government spending is in billions, not millions. The biggest cost at around 176 billion is welfare, health is 164 billion, state pensions 98 billion and education 92 billion.

The figures aren't way off but auto correct must have changed it to m. State pension is approx 100b & housing benefit is 26b. Either way I'm not sure how more old people and less tax payers help fitting the bill.

The costs of supporting a typical 2 parent 2 child family who pay minimal tax with housing benefit, tax credits, family allowance, education, healthcare etc is obviously going to be way more than paying a measly £137.60 per week to a pensioner.

Surely it depends on the number of 2 parent 2 child families vs the number of pensioners. For one the birth rate is less than 2 & the average age of the population is already 40. Plus are 2 parent 2 child families who receive housing benefits & tax credits the actual norm for that demographic? And if you are going to include healthcare costs for families surely you need to allow for that in the cost of pensioners as opposed to just the cost of the state pension or do they not use healthcare?

That is a very good thing.

I’d imagine the plummeting fertility rates also have something to do with this....which could be rather worrying.

Sperm counts have gone down by over 50% over the past decades and no one really knows why although it’s pretty clear out lifestyles of junk and toxins aren’t doing us any good

For those glad about it....I’m not sure you understand the consequences of what you are cheering for

Whilst it may be a good thing for the planet for overall birth rates to go down it really is not good for any country in the future when deaths are overtaking births. I will be ok - I am already near pension age, but my children will not be. Anyone below the age of 45 ish will need to work for far longer in order to support a rapidly aging population. Pension ages will rise and rise, and so will taxes. Health and social care will be cut back so that only those who can afford to pay to go private will have the full access they will need.

Short sighted Brexit and immigration policies will have a very serious consequence of the UK. Look at Germany if you need evidence of how vital immigration is to supporting a country with falling birth rates.

On the whole though people are leaving it later and later to have children so of course fertility rates are falling.
Go back 100 years and neither men nor women were having lots of children in their 40s. Even those with big families did not carry on having lots of children in their 40s.
It is however generally frowned upon for a teenage couple to have a child never mind children. You can't have it both ways.

Sperm counts have gone down by over 50% over the past decades and no one really knows why

Darwin in action. Evolution. Speaking for myself, the "why" isn't really anything that needs much time analysing. Not when a much better use of precious resources would be to work out how not to trash the planet in order to continue as a species.

No one really knows why gravity works. But we manage all the same ...