American demographers and I are among millions of others worried about our nation’s declining birth rate, and we should be. Women in the United States are having babies at a rate of 1.6 babies for women of childbearing age, well below the replacement rate of 2.1. What growth we have is coming largely from immigration, which is also declining through political actions. Demographers speculate that the number of Americans will begin declining in the 2050s.
Clearly, our overall baby population is statistically waning, even if you have a little one hollering in your household who loudly disputes that.
Not so at the other end of the age spectrum.
Baby Boomers, Americans born between 1946 and 1964, are swelling the ranks at the other end of the demographic snake.
Writing in The Dispatch, Eli Kronenberg cites statistics outlining the imbalance between old and young. Almost a third of Americans are now over 55 years old, with the median now almost 40, up from 35 in 2001. Life expectancy has increased slightly, up from 78 to 79, but our national birthrate has fallen a full 22-percent over the same period, 2007-2024. By 2031, all Boomers will have reached official retirement age of 67, becoming eligible for Medicare and Social Security, our nation’s large entitlement funds.
I know. There are a lot of numbers to digest, but their implications are stark.
Our nation spends tremendous resources on our senior citizens, far more than we do on families and young children. With declining numbers of children and young people and seniors edging out of their productive years and into entitlements, it will become more and more difficult for fewer working people to provide Social Security and Medicare to growing numbers of seniors.
Economists have long forecasted slowing economic growth because of this growing imbalance.
Hard questions loom in the coming years.
Do we shift our nation’s resources to younger Americans even if it means reducing entitlements to seniors? Are childcare, paid parental leave, public education and other services for young families more or less important than senior entitlements? Should entitlements for wealthier seniors be reduced even though they have paid into entitlement programs? Should the retirement age be raised as Americans live longer? Should wealthy Americans be taxed at higher rates to support both young families and aging seniors?
All of these are both legitimate questions with no clear answers and questions that are often addressed in opposite ways by Democrats and Republicans, historically resulting in sustained stalemates and increasing disparities. Americans on both sides of the political spectrum should be encouraging our representatives to begin tackling this situation not based on political ideologies but on pragmatic and quantifiable needs. Yes, young families need help with childcare and other services so parents can be productive workers. And, yes, seniors have been productive workers and paid into entitlement programs and deserve support in their retirement years, though some means testing may be necessary.
The only clear truth here is that fixing this imbalance in our national economics is a burning imperative getting hotter by the year.
It is not going to be an easy fix, but we cannot move forward without trying.