Aging Societies
Fewer births and longer lives shift the ratio of workers to older people: pensions, care and growth come under pressure.
Open in the interactive tree →The global fertility rate fell from 3.3 (1990) to about 2.25 (2024), and in more than half of all countries it lies below the replacement level of 2.1. The share of people aged 65 and over rose from 5.5% (1974) to 10.3% (2024) and is projected to reach 20.7% by 2074 (UN World Population Prospects 2024).
As of October 2026
South Korea's fertility rate was 0.80 in 2025 (0.75 in 2024, low of 0.72 in 2023) with 254,300 births, up 6.7%; in the first half of 2026 births reached 145,804, with year-on-year increases for 24 months in a row. China recorded about 7.92 million births against 11.31 million deaths in 2025, a decline of 3.39 million to about 1.405 billion people (National Bureau of Statistics). A review of family policies (IZA World of Labor) finds only modest effects on fertility and no case of a return to replacement level through policy alone.
What is missing
- Proven measures that connect desired and actual family size (housing, childcare, working time)
- Pension systems that stay viable without ever more contributors (funding mix, labor participation, retirement age)
- Care workforce and care technology (robotics, assistance) at scale
- Extending healthy years of life, not just lifespan
- Politically sustainable immigration and integration models
Becomes possible once solved
- Stable pensions and care
- Higher labor participation of older people
- Growth through productivity instead of population growth
Open steps
- Desired vs actual family size Medium AI leverageIdentify which factors (housing, childcare cost, working time, partnership) most widen the gap between desired and actual children, with causal evidence.
- Sustainable pension and care financing Medium AI leverageCompare funding mixes, retirement-age rules and labor-participation policies for solvency and fairness under shrinking cohorts, using microsimulation.
- Care technology at scale Medium AI leverageShow in controlled trials which assistive robots, monitoring systems and documentation tools reduce workload and improve outcomes in elder care.
- Extending healthy years Medium AI leverageDevelop and validate interventions and biomarkers that extend years in good health, not just lifespan, and show it in human trials.
Where AI could help
Medium AI leverage. AI can help care technology, healthy-ageing research and pension modelling; birth rates, migration and funding remain political choices.
- Automate documentation, scheduling and logistics to offset a shrinking workforce
- Assistive technology and companion robots to reduce loneliness and ease care for older adults
- AI-assisted drug and diagnostics research aimed at healthy ageing
- Better forecasts of population, pension and care demand for planners
Shown so far
- In August 2023 a one-year New York State Office for the Aging pilot of the ElliQ AI companion with over 800 older adults reported a 95% drop in loneliness, according to the pilot's own data. source
Prerequisites
- Economics1776
- Social Insurance1883