In 4 years, 2029, UK deaths will exceed births!

[TheMintCritic]

Just came across this and thought it was wild… according to the ONS, by 2029 the number of deaths in the UK is expected to outnumber the number of births for the first time in decades.

• Our fertility rate is only about 1.5 kids per woman, well below replacement.
• Meanwhile, the population is ageing — all those baby boomers are moving into their 70s and 80s.
• The result? The natural population growth turns negative, meaning any population increase will rely entirely on immigration.

It’s crazy to think that in just 4 years, births won’t even keep up with deaths. Makes you wonder what that’ll mean for schools, NHS, pensions, and housing.

Check this out!

BBC Radio 4 - Radical with Amol Rajan, Grey Britain: Do We Need To Have More Children? (Dr Paul Morland)

I have friends who want kids but just can’t afford it.

I would have liked another but going through the experience and trauma of labour, birth and postnatal in an NHS hospital just isn’t worth it for me!

It's not selfish to not have kids if you think their quality of life will be poor.

When did this switch of thinking happen? When we became more child centric? I really don't think my parent's generation thought about the quality of life their dc would have & their parents definitely didn't.

There's too many people on this planet. So, in that way, it's good. Besides, so many can't afford life - how would they be able to afford having children? It's not surprising.

I wouldn't say it's selfish to not have children. There are lots of ways of contributing to society without having children. There are people out there that have half a dozen children, never work a day in their life and contribute nothing. They're not having children for selfless reasons, for the benefit of the next generation.

The boomers didn't have too many kids, their parents did.

Seriously, it demonstrates why we desperately need immigration. We are already in a situation where the working population isn't producing enough to cover the costs of non-productive retired people, and that will only get worse if we stop immigration.

People wanting children or not obviously is a personal choice. However, as a society with an aging population and a decreasing working population we are already seeing the strain. We cannot afford the bill for pensions or the nhs (unless people actually understand this means tax rises and not penalise any political party that goes there). For some reason, those paying NI in this country seem to think it covers the cost of their NHS use and pension. Very few people actually pay in as much as they get back. So Cameron's austerity and ill thought out Brexit referendum just set the wheels in motion for the blame being placed elsewhere and causing huge division.

And look at us now as a nation. Worse off because a small proportion of the UK voted to leave the biggest free trade block in the UK. A load of ill-informed closet racists no longer needing to be in the closet and spouting on about 'illegals' (not actually illegal as asylum seekers) being the cause of NHS waiting lists, lack of council housing, etc etc despite the actual numbers being a tiny drop in the ocean. The UK voted in governments that cut funding to councils and public services by billions for several years whilst allowing private companies to profit

As an example, the pervious government privitised care provision for Children who are looked after via the back door. An average placement is 6000- 10 000 a week and we have to fight every other LA for a placement so they get away with it. A 12 000+ a week placement for a very traumatised teen is pretty common. So this is where a lot of council tax goes as it is the responsibility of local authorities. The sector makes such a profit there is a lot of overseas investment.

It was only five minutes ago that everyone was panicking about world overpopulation. Pretty rapid switcheroo in the narrative to world underpopulation. I wonder which of the two is true?

The demographic of Britain is changing. I think ethnic minorities will be something like 20-25% by 2050, not 7% that they were previously.

Bc that's what everyone thought they were supposed to do so nobody thought about whether they wanted it or could do it remotely well. Now everyone knows it's a perfectly valid and financially sensible choice to make and they are living the way that makes them happy, not everyone else. Good for them. Even if I cared about the future of humanity I would not have kids I don't want, why would I ruin my life for a society of people who are only going to continue to ruin the planet and its resources?

The only people who care about the future of the next few generations are the ones who have kids. They worry about their kids, not other people, at least don't pretend like you're worried about all of us, you worry for purely selfish reasons so why are my purely selfish reasons not to worry any diff?

Wasn't going for lovely, just honest.

And to be clear, I do care about the future of the planet in the ways that I can. I have no kids, I work remotely, I drive an electric car, use public transport, I've been a vegetarian all of my life and vegan for the last 8 years and I donate a lot of money on a monthly basis to animal charities. Come to think of it, the last time I saw an innocent vegan post on here the poor woman was berrated by you all. You all claim to care so much about the future of the planet but treat vegan people like shit, the one group of people who actually do the most to make a difference. The hypocrisy is astounding.

Where are all the jobs going to come from for this required increase in population? The increase in AI is predicted to replace a lot of jobs. China has the monopoly on producing things and we don't seem capable of competing anymore.

I was simply responding to a comment about not wanting a large elderly population evwn for those who supported a declining population. I was just stating that a population can only reduce by people getting old and dying, one has to come before the other.

My husband and I both have private insurance and I haven't used the NHS in the 9 years I've lived in the country. No, I don't think the NHS will exist in a few years, it's a mess though, so eh.

AI might replace menial and repetitive jobs but not all jobs or professional jobs, not any time soon. Quantum computing though, that will do some damage. Investing in quantum computing now would be wise, hopefully it will offset the losses soon to come from the same bc that will affect every sector.

It's all mapped out with my dnr. Plus, if someone really wants to off themselves there are plenty of relatively pain free ways to do it.

Plenty of jobs need filling, we just don't have the skills and have to bring in people from other countries. Coding is one, nursing another. People either aren't trained in these things or can't afford to be or simply see the jobs as beneath them or too dangerous maybe (nursing having a huge rise in physical abuse on the job for eg)

Boomers didn't have too many kids it was the boomers parents after the war

theres a lot of catastrophising about this tbh yes things will be difficult for a few years but eventually the bulge generation will pass away and things will rebalance. I'm pretty sure the population now is twice what it was fifty years ago and we were fine then. We've been through worse (wars, plague etc) some always say the answer is mass immigration from countries with high birth rates( like Afghanistan) as if completely changing the makeup of this country is a good solution to something that will correct itself in a few decades. Yeah I know they'll call me racist for disagreeing

Boomers didn't have too many kids it was the boomers parents after the war

Did they though?

perhaps house prices will fall

No not really- birth rate in 2060 was only 2.54 so not crazy high. And that followed 1930 and 1940 which were low due to the impact of the wars. The increase in population in late 20th century UK has been caused more by increase in life expectancy than excess births. That’s now running out of steam ( and actually we’re realising that keeping people alive for decades in poor health might not be such a great idea even if it’s medically possible).

Also re births, the evidence suggests that births wouldn’t be that much higher if people felt better off- Sweden ( MN utopian state) has a lower birth rate than the Uk despite having a huge welfare state. In the uk it’s a combination of people choosing not to have any kids at all and those who do having fewer. The theory I think fits best is that parenting is now expected to be so intense and all consuming ( and lifelong) that people ( particularly women) just don’t have the inclination to do it for multiple kids and who can blame them? I’m not saying finances don’t play a part but I don’t think it would mean someone who desperately wants a kid would have no kids - it would be more a factor in someone not going from 1 to 2 or 2 to 3, but 3 kids is a lot of kids given expected intensity of parenthood, especially if you start later so don’t have time to space them out.

This is good news!

AI means there will be fewer jobs.

Fewer people means there will be less pressure on housing, resources, services etc.

We don't need "more workers to pay tax to fund pensioners". Pensioners pay exactly the same taxes as everyone else - apart from NI. Easy win for any government - combine income tax and NI into a single tax levy and then make everyone pay it.

I'm delighted that more and more women are able to choose how many children they have.

Classes were 31 and 32 when I was at school in the 70s with no teaching assistants.

whats changed is that they no longer are able to teach. It’s statistics and crowd control. The behaviour in schools is awful. A lot of parenting is simply non existent. As a Boomer, we get blamed for everything (yawn) but we worked bloody hard and we parented. My. Adult children do the same thank god.

And I don’t have life on a silver platter. Was left as a single mum in the 90s and never recovered financially (he did) so I’ll work till I die.

I feel you. I earn just under 100k (made sure of that!) but as a currently single income household it’s a huge weight on me. Without all the discounts it’d be £2k for me