Growth Tremors in Europe

Once more, in the news this morning, gloom and doom (as if we didn’t have enough of that already). The reason for this is that, in Europe, German (-0.6%), French (-0.1), and Italian (-0.8) Gross Domestic Product numbers came in negative for the second quarter compared with the first. The change in Europe’s total GDP was a positive 0.2 percent, but in our day and age positive growth at such low levels is viewed with alarm.

In our times nobody asks how much growth is necessary in our economies. In other words: What is the underlying measure? The underlying measure, it seems to me, is population growth. Whenever GDP growth exceeds population growth—and the more it does so the more true this is—we are engaged in unnecessary overconsumption.

Just to check this out, I looked to see where European population growth now stands. “Now” in this context is 2012, the last year for which UN statistics are available. That year the growth stood at roughly 0.18 or 0.19 (I’m taking data from a graph). Therefore the Q2 GDP growth in Europe is just a shade higher than actual population growth. The two, in other words, are in equilibrium. I am showing the population graphic below; I found it here; the data for it come from this UN report (link).

Sooner or later, and all over the world, we will have to adjust to GDP growth rates that match population growth rates pretty closely rather than diverging sharply—as in the graphic that I’m reproducing from a previous post:

Why? Because the Age of Oil is drawing to a close and we shall be obliged to adjust to the “new normal” eventually. This reasonable projection is simply never seriously pondered by our media which are still convinced that nothing is changing at the basic levels of the world economy. But things are changing. Europe may be ahead of its time and Angela Merkel wise rather than foolhardy in insisting on austerity.

A Cultural View of Demographics?

The U.S. Bureau of the Census published its annual population estimates for the United States yesterday. Almost obscured in the original table released (here), is the fact that in the fiscal year under examination (July 1, 2011 to July 1, 2012), the demographic category labeled White Alone, Not Hispanic, experienced more deaths in the period than it had births. The difference, in favor of deaths, was 12,419. Nevertheless, “White Alone” gained 175,965 people—all due to immigration; total immigration was 188,384. That number was also “White Alone” immigration. That number, less the 12,419 above, yielded a positive gain in “White Alone” numbers, a minimal up-tic of 0.1 percent over 2011. All other groupings increased by higher percentiles: Asians by 2.9 percent, mostly from immigration, Hispanics (of any race) by 2.2, and Blacks by 1.1 percent.

What the Census Bureau emphasized in its headline was the gain in Asian population. What the media picked up was that “White deaths outnumber White births.” Now, it so happens, that 88.2 percent of the 53 million Hispanics are racially White. Indeed, when White Hispanics are included with other Whites, Whites gained 0.5 percent in population. That’s still the lowest performance, but a little better.

The upshot is that both the Bureau’s special segregation of “White Alone, Not Hispanic” as a category—and the media’s focus on that category—indicates a cultural factor running rampant in the handling of our demographic statistics.

Tribal concerns are never far from human interests no matter how secular and enlightened we think ourselves to be…

Population by Age Groups

The Wall Street Journal carries a story on its front page today titled “Consumer Spending Is Losing Its Vigor.” That got me thinking—because, what with the years piling up, well, so am I: losing my vigor. Which then, logically—because the active mind does not lose its vigor—I got to wondering about a subject usually labeled “the aging population.” I found some useful data on that subject in the 2012 Statistical Abstract (link, select Table 6). Using those data I am here showing some graphics about that “aging.”

This is a quite revealing chart, isn’t it? It shows the shares of total population by age groups in some detail by decades, drawn from the ten-year census of the population. Notice particularly those “humps,” let’s call them, of which the first was quite high—the biggest age group in each year. In 1980 it was formed by those aged 15 through 29, in 1990 25 through 39, in 2000 30 through 44, in 2010 40 through 54. Meanwhile, the 65 through 74 age group, which forms a peak of its own, has essentially remained unchanged. It was 7 percent of the population in 2010, peaked in 1990 at 7.3 percent, and was 6.9 percent in 1980. Peak is the appropriate word, although in this period, it remains a secondary peak. After that comes a steep drop down the, ah, Aging Cliff. No shortage of cliffs these days.

Consumer spending is losing its vigor? Well, it might be due to the population losing its vigor. As we approach that second peak and the cliff, the less incline are we to do the boys-toys or the girls-wardrobe thing. And the more of us are in that group…

In this second graphic, I’ve compressed the age groups more in order to show the pattern more clearly. In the aggregate, the 15-44 group, the darling of all advertisers, remains the largest—but notice that it is decreasing. Meanwhile the less vigorous age groups are all growing apace—not least the 85 and older.

Around our place we’ve long had a saying—the consequence of much trend-contemplation—that “Demography Rules!” Oh, if only Congress could make us younger by the 2013 Age Reversal and Rejuvenation Act. President Obama would surely sign it into law. But there are limits to everything—not least the power of Congress. If it had the moxy, we’d all be aged between 15 and 44.

Equilibrium and Growth

Our stumbling, tottering economy once more brought an old question to mind. Is our economic model sustainable in the long haul? And by long haul I mean centuries. Is the concept of sustained and, ideally, continuously increasing growth a fundamental mistake? To be sure, the current troubles may go away, the Dow shall rise again, and so on. Perhaps we haven’t as yet reached the breaking point when growth has finally piled enough straw on us so that the last one breaks the camel’s back. But eventually, as I keep harping here, oil will run out. One way or the other, our accustomed ways will come to an end. And in that context the “current troubles” may be a Godsend if we read the signals right.

Herewith I present a comparison of GDP and Population growth, side by side, each indexed at 100 for the year 1995—as if the modern age had just begun that year.

The GDP curve is based on chained-dollars, meaning constant dollars adjusted for inflation. The population data are from the U.S. Bureau of the Census. The uptick in population between 1999 and 2000 represents a correction, as it were, introduced by the full 2000 census. It suggests that annual intercensal estimates in the 1990s had been understating the actual population increase.

What this shows us is that GDP consistently grows at a rate well above that of the population. In this 15-year sampling, population increased at the rate of 1.08 and GDP at 2.46 percent a year. Population grew every year, as might be expected; the GDP dipped in 2008 and 2009—the Great Recession. The divergence of these curves really spell over-consumption, thus consumption significantly exceeding what we genuinely need. To be sure, today we need a great deal more than we needed in 1900. But if we just consumed, in 2010, what we did in 1995 (not exactly primitive times), the GDP growth rate would closely paralleling the population increase.

This sort of thing strikes the modern mind as naïve, at minimum, plain ignorant at max. After all our life style must improve, every year. Haven’t you heard? What doesn’t grow, declines. Equilibrium, however, is the real sign of sustainability. That also applies, to be sure, to population. And there we see the genuine paradox of growth. Our way of life is unsustainable even if our economy only grew at the population rate.

A good sci-fi novel comes to mind. It was Stand on Zanzibar, by John Brunner, 1968. Back then there was the tongue-in-cheek suggestion that all of the world’s population could fit on the Isle of Wight in England (147 square miles) if they were standing up. Brunner projected his tale to 2010 and figured that the then 7 billion, as he projected world population, would have to “stand on Zanzibar,” off Africa, 600 square miles. We’re getting there. We’re getting there…

A Hundred Years of Multitude

As the year runs its course, I thought it might be time for a bit of reflection on the longer term. A maxim around here is that demography is fate, therefore this Malthusian reflection. This was the year of various “springs,” beginning with the Arab one. To this have been added others, more or less energetic, including our own Occupy movements, the early signs of exuberance in Russia, and even a village-sized eruption in China. Barely noticed—because, around here, Africa is barely noticed—have been the altogether obscenely violent upheavals on that continent. They don’t look like springs, but, in this humble opinion, they are of the same root and branch.

I bring here world population figures from 1950 through 2050: a hundred years of population growth. These data are the series published by our own Census Bureau (link), which is the most complete and, in its projections, closely matches other people’s. My graph is by decades so that I can display interesting decade-to-decade changes. For the record, the 2011 data say that world population is 6.946 billion, representing an increase of 77.5 million since this time last year, prominently shown on the graphic.

I note here that world population increased nearly three-fold (precisely 2.7 fold) 1950-2010. In the next fifty years we’ll add more than 2.5 billion more people. In recent decades we have been adding three-quarters of a billion per decade. The add-odds, based on these projections, will diminish.

Malthus was ahead of his time. It has pleased technology hawks to belittle his projections as they glowed in the heat of oil, approval, and prosperity. But the future, it seems, will manifest another reality: unbelievable masses of humanity engaged in celebrating the joys of a Global Spring beneath a few pathetic windmills with blades frozen for lack of maintenance.

But there is a silver lining here, however hard to see. If the purpose of being human is something other than grabbing all the gusto that we can, what this great demographic thunderstorm predicts is a return, in time, to the fundamentals.

Pet Population Statistics

The closest thing to a Census Bureau in the world of pets is the American Pet Products Association, a trade group. APPA has been conducting a household survey since 1988. The survey itself, of greatest use to member companies, is expensive. It costs members of the association $795. That figure indirectly tells us data mavens what we ought to know: it costs real money to produce goods stats. With some effort, however, I was able to find some highlights free. APPA’s home page is here; a page showing household counts and animal numbers for 2008 is available here.

APPA tells me that 62 percent of all U.S. households keep a pet; with some 117.5 million households in 2010, that would be 72.9 million households. Among the four-legged variety, cats  outnumber dogs 93.6 million to 77.5 million. The pet with the biggest share of households, however, is freshwater fish—171.5 million. Physically the largest pet also has the lowest population count: 13.3 million horses. Birds are also in relatively low numbers: 15 million.

Looking around some more (trust but verify), I also found another gatekeeper, the American Veterinary Medical Association (link). They publish U.S. Pet Ownership & Demographics Sourcebook, available here for $279 for non-members. The AVMA data are for 2006.

The Census Bureau’s Statistical Abstract of the United States: 2011 reproduces data from this AVMA report in its own Table 1240, accessible here. The table, unfortunately, as it stands, doesn’t tell us what the numbers mean. I bothered to go to the source and therefore I am able to tell you that the first line of that table, showing animal populations, is in millions. Here they are: Dogs - 72.1, Cats - 81.7, Birds - 11.2, and Horses 7.3 million. Again, that’s for 2006. So we are in the ballpark, you might say.

You’ve often wondered, haven’t you? How many wonderful dogs like Katie the Beagle are there in the United States—statistically speaking, of course. There is only one Katie! And how many Mitzis are there? (Mitzi was my Mother’s generic name for every cat she kept. That seemed a bit cavalier to me. With a family of my own, I once offered the name Total Cheese for a new kitty that we’d acquired. The family did not agree—but the name stuck anyway.) Well, you’ve wondered. We all have. As usually, LaMarotte to the rescue!

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Silhouettes from Wikipedia Commons here.