Demographic change with a focus on the population who is aging is also the author of the super 8, how longer life spans are changing every thing we know about work life and learning. And david, also co founder and managing partner of economy for where he led to Business Development in asia and europe, and served at the a rp, the World Largest organization, dedicated to improving the lives of owner people. Were here with that actually the director of Global Partnership and engagement. Welcome, brad. The quite the resume that makes you an expert in this area. So i want to start off. Do you see a difference in what it, what has impacted major and Global Demographic shift from the past and what were seeing today. This is the 1st time in history. Were populations are aging as fast as they are. In fact, in many countries now, one and 5 people is over the age of 65. But aging is just the prelude to population contraction. It is actually happening in the number of the worlds biggest economies, including russia, china, and japan. So were dealing with a lot of dynamics right now that are really up ending what we considered to be normal, the normal world and a normal economy. And because of that, we have to shift our thinking about whos able to work when they can be consumers. How we engage people in society as a whole, and whether or not g d p is really the only measure for society success. So really it all comes down to the dollar always comes down to the dollar no matter what even in this day. Okay, so what do you find to be the most positive trent . Reason for a trend like this to happen and were going to start with the Positive Side is always positive. Its the 20th century is a success story. We extended Human Longevity during the 20th century and large part because we took care of kids at once. We were able to keep kids alive, they were able to reach adulthood. They were able to get to old age. We built these wonderful social welfare systems. The economy grew dramatically. These are all positive things. These are things we should harold, the successes of our society. The challenge is that we havent adjusted them to accommodate what we call the new longevity. The fact that the majority of people now will live into their sixties and seventies and a good number of people live in to the eightys now as well. Believe it or not, people over the age of 80 are the largest and Fastest Growing demographic in the world. Thats incredible. Compared to the pass on the side of exactly. Most people didnt get there and were not ready for it as you say. And what area do you feel like where the least prepared probably in the care sector, that seems to be the one that everyone focuses on right now because population change involves 2 things. One is the aging of the population, this longevity, dividend that were getting here. But also were having fewer babies and weve been having fewer babies now for about 25 years. Well, those children are now adults. Theyre working, and there are simply not enough of them to go around so, so whats happening in our economy more broadly . Is that the lack of work or is, or the inability for people to businesses to feel jobs is causing inflation to rise. The fewer people that we have mean fewer people to take care of those older adults that might be in need. So it is a bit of a challenge and were trying to muddle through it right now. No one has the right solution quite yet. Could we have been better prepared for this mean that we knew the people are going to get older . They were living longer, could we have actually done a better job of basically setting up the infrastructure beforehand to sure we could. But we have to remember that wed like to wait. Wed like to wait until there is an actual crisis at hand. Believe it or not, demographic change grew up with Climate Change, their siblings there by products of the industrial revolution. Could we have done something to mitigate Climate Change . 25 years ago . Yes. So did we know the same holds true for demographic change . We knew this was coming, its been coming now for 25 years, in fact, 1st grade. So ive been declining now for about 200 years, with the exception of the baby boom. These are a long term trends. We are well aware of them and we chose to do nothing. So there are many countries are experiencing an increase in the proportion. I guess i have older adults do to climb for to the rates and improved health care. What have felt to do you think this demographic shift not only poses to health care, but also the pensions and the social support system that these governments are going to be expected to take care of these people when the business, the private sector cant . Well, i think within the health care sector, were gonna look at radical transformation literally overnight, because everyone whos anyone whos throwing money into this right now because they know it needs to be fixed. We dont have enough bodies to take care of the people that are there with the economy more broadly. I think we have to look at a future thats much more inclusive. We talk through inclusive through the lens of diversity in terms of gender, race, sexual orientation, gender identity, but we rarely include older adults in this conversation. If we think about the fact that were not only living older and longer or also Living Health here, that means that we have extra years that we should be working, we should be contributing on. Thats an exciting thing. But we tend to shop people half of 65, why we start people off at 65 when they have at least you know, 101520 years of good, healthy years ahead of them. Its, its, its kind of ludicrous, were cutting out possible workers impossible consumers for the economy. Okay, so while the global age, as you mentioned, might be actually increasing. The fertility rates are also declining globally resulting and low birth rate, smaller family sizes. Do you think this could also be a good thing . You mentioned Climate Change and why do you think this is happening . You know, Climate Change, pete, theres theories, the Climate Change fits into this somehow lower sperm counts for men. For example. Theres also the reality that our life course has changed, and people used to have babies and their teens and their 20 smell. They have them in their thirties and theyre 40 is in fact women over the age of 40 are the Fastest Growing group of moms in the world right now. Thats pretty different. And when you start late, youre more likely to have your children to on. But what does this mean globally . Well, literally every country you go to today, i dont care what the geography is. The birth rate is in decline. Now its different from place to place in a country like niger, every woman on average is having 6. 89 children can you imagine, right . But if you go to south korea, which has the lowest birth rate in the world, theyre having point 78. 00 children per one. So its a radical difference in terms of where babies are being born and where populations will grow versus where populations will actually contract. What do you think is the impact on this, or why is this happening . I mean, is it because the economy . Because the economic systems are mentioned, can handle it. Lower Income Countries are having more, which basically puts on the backs of those that are of other countries. Perhaps, you know, what caused demographic change to happen . Well, we can look at a number of different variables. The 1st and foremost is probably organization and the industrial age, the idea of a family farm that you actually need children to work on, children were economic tools back then. They still should be by the why. I think you can find that in arkansas right now, as the governor is actually lowered the age for, for people to worked on to 14. Well, my grandfather entered the coal mines at the age of 14. I dont think were going in that direction. I would say this a good day because i mean there was a lot of or if there was a reason why we took the children out of the coal mines at 13 and 14 and put them in school. Exactly. We believed in investing in use because investing in youth was the future. Well, what we did with all of these interventions, getting kids out of factory is getting them off the fields, making sure they had a stable, stable of food supply, making sure theyre clean water. All of these contributed to children moving from a one and to chance of dying before the age of 18 as to a nearly 9095 percent chance of surviving into adults. These are all good things, but what that did during that period was explode the global population. We went from about 2000000000 people to 8000000000 people today. That is a disruptive change. Now as we go into this new era, were actually looking at a more historical norm for society, where well have slow growth in some nations, plateauing and others, and some decline in others to. We are still growing. Here. We are still growing here in the United States were growing cause our birth rate isnt to off did about 1. 7. It needs to be a 2 point one to keep population study. But we still havent regression here. Immigration is the story of america. And as long as people are coming in, the country continues to grow. Well, you mentioned that we do have immigration here, but these are coming from less well off countries that are still continuing to produce more than just the one child that they americans select that can hold. So are we kind of setting ourselves up on this railroad disaster because to certain extent, who we cant afford the reason why people are not having more children. I believe here in america or in the western countries, they cant afford to have more children. Its, its, its in part because they cant afford to do it. Thats what a lot of people focus their energies on is the cost of having a child and my god, it is expensive. But the reality is people have more choices now than they did a 100 years ago. Women are educated, women have the right to vote. Women have the right to work on that change. Its a dynamic we, we can have access to birth control. And yes, even abortion and preventative, preventative birds. So when you take all of these things together, women are more in the drivers seat, of their reproductive health. Choosing or not to choose to have children. Theyre also economically viable. Theyre not, theyre no longer dependent on demand. Theyre no longer the primary caregiver or the primary homemaker anymore. So because of that, the dynamic is simply turned around. And what does this mean for the future . Well, not much. Weve been on this trajectory for over 200 years of decline and birth rates. I dont see a turning around any time soon unless we go back to an Agrarian Society and in a society its very, as we say, traditional values where the man is the bread owner of the woman is in the house. And she takes care of the kids in the home. Its interesting that you bring that because this is a perfect transition because pose corner virus, we saw major exodus from the organization. You saw people moving out of the cities. Are we seeing a reverse that has been to happen because of Something Like a Global Pandemic . Yeah, we saw the reverse, but they were typically reverse is to nearby rural areas. So, district of columbia is a great example, because if you go out, maybe, as far as richmond down into this in southern virginia may be the, the, the tidewater region. You can get here by train. Same for new york city, people going up into the Hudson Valley perhaps on the long island its easy to get to. But in 3 quarters of our county is most of which are rural populations are in decline. Thats outpaced birds. So it is in a full reversal also, i think is people are coming back to the office and yes, they are despite what people want, they are getting pulled back into their office place. This is moving the needle back to people coming into the cities. You just have to look at housing prices and major markets to know that theres demand to live in these places. Okay, so lets tie this back into how we started the conversation to at the segment about the aging population. Knowing all of this, did we find that that Elderly Population that they moved into the cities as well, or did they stay where they were at and how are those communities handling . Its a mixed bag. Boomers are a very large population. Our happened historically 76000000 at one time. Now theyre down to about 69000000. 00 in total. There was a move of older adults boomers in particular back into cities. But the largest percentage of boomers are still living in the suburbs. And this is problem attic because a lot of time people want to stay in their home. The suburbs typically dont have the right infrastructure in place to take care of an aging population. They dont have the right transportation services. They dont have the right social services. All these things are missing from the equation in a city though, where you live in a 15 minute neighborhood. I live just north of here in logan circle and i can get to 3 Grocery Stores within 3 blocks. These are a Central Services that neighborhoods need in order for people to live and age. Well. Okay, so now we look at these boomers as theyre leaving these homes kind of in a suburb or suburbs to think that theyre going into retirement homes. Where, where are they going . Everyone will enter most likely will enter nursing care. At some point. There isnt a preponderance of people going into care settings. If they dont have to, people tend to go into care settings when theyre forced to, they have a fall or a major health of and perhaps they lose the spouse and become somewhat isolated and move 4 on to base that in some way. But the reality is, if you can stay at home, you want to stay at home. And most people want to do that. The good news is there are minor interventions that people can make in their own homes to make them level for longer periods of time. Where you can actually build that runway for your independence for longer periods of time. And these are minor modifications and actually look really nice. You could hide them in the design of the kitchen or bathroom, improving the lighting schemes, making sure basic things like the corners of carpets and rugs are taped down. So theres no trip potential there. Um, but eventually we all have to deal with the reality or most of us have to deal with the reality that we need care. We will need care at some point at the end of our lives. And is this happening . Were talking about trans, but global trans, are you not only seeing this in western countries like the United States, u. K, what youre saying is in other countries, are they having following the same sort of line that the west, is there something that we can all actually agree on is happening . Yeah, its a pretty universal thing. But again, because aging and long ever, they are tied to industrialization, talking about modern economies. Obviously, if you go into economies that are still developing primarily those in sub saharan africa, for example, or perhaps live in america, people are still living in multi generational housing. Theyre living with their grandparents, which means theyre better off. Theyre kind of going back to what youre encouraging people to do is to keep at home, believe it or not, its happening here in the United States to all be very slowly and just underneath the surface from the, from about 1971 till today. There has been a trend to go back into multi generational living with in one house. It eases the care burden on all parts of the family. A grand parents can take care of grandkids, Adult Children can take care of their parents. It really gets us back to a more harmonious way of living, but also a more traditional way of living too. Because prior to the 20th century, thats all everybody left, right. Okay, so then youre talking about that, what is the future . Do you feel about were talking about blue or is leaving their hope a homes open . Do you feel like this is going to have an impact on millennials . They might give them a better chance to own homes for the 1st time it does. It gives them a big chance. In fact, boomers hold about 40 percent of assets in real estate. They own about 40 percent of the Real Estate Market in this country. When they start exiting the Real Estate Market, those homes will become available to more people that might have been tapped out of the marketplace. This is a good thing for millennials and so you didnt even better thing for gen z. The short term thing thats happening right now is something we call the great wealth transfer, the great wealth transfer as the move of assets from bloomers to their project to the children. These are typically late gen xers like myself and early millennials. And what thats doing is its giving this extra influx of cash in the marketplace that wouldnt exist otherwise, think of it like a private sector stimulus, right . So all of a sudden these Adult Children that are millennials and boomers that got these gifts from their parents, are buying real estate, pushing up prices even further. So in the next, lets say, 10 to 20 years, were going to see some of these stabilizing in the Real Estate Market. Perhaps not in major cities, but certainly in rural counties. And certainly are in smaller cities across the country to unless of course theres a really route, transformative piece of technology that allows that actually to work from home 24 hours a day. Thank you. Bradley sherman. Because after the break, were going to actually continue this discussion discussion is its fast. So look at whether it was some World Governments or actually manipulating demographic trends for their own benefit, at the detriment of others staging the high acceptance. And im here to plan with you whatever you do. Do not watch my new show. Seriously. Why watch something thats so different. Whitelisted opinions that he wont get anywhere else. Welcome to please or do you have the state department c i a weapons, bankers, multi 1000000000 dollar corporations. Choose your fax for you. Go ahead. Change and whatever you do. Dont want myself to