Demographics drive more societal change than anything else.  Or should we say everything else.  And demographics are extremely predictable.  Yet we tend to ignore demographics because there’s little we can do to change them.  In this podcast we explain how to use demographcis to make better decisions.

For 40 years America, and most of the developed world, has moved jobs to China – helping build a strong economy with extensive infrastructure, military and global presence.  But China undertook a draconian birthrate decline which now threatens its ability to grow. Meanwhile India’s birthrate exceeds the sustainability rate, which assures its population dominance for decades to come.  A third of all people on the planet are Chinese or Indian; and this will have a big impact on world events in 2023 and for the next 4 decades.

Rest of World - Simultaneously, despite being considered one of the “Big 3” dominant countries, Russia has fallen well out of the top population countries.  As have all the European countries (France, Germany, Spain, Italy – and even non-European England.)  The countries with high birthrates are largely developing countries (Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria) that cannot support their own populations. And investment in the poor countries is now dominated by China, which needs more people, in a not-so-hidden effort at economic annexation.  This is destabilizing on the status quo, and sure to cause changes in immigration and international trade policy, as well as likely military conflicts.

While developed (and wealthy) countries are struggling with worker shortages, poorer countries are desperate for aid and ability to emigrate people.  The “world order” is shifting.  America can be caught in the middle. Unless business leaders are thinking about how to change their plans to encourage immigration and undertake training.  And how to move work to lower cost locations, including work from home, so people can work asynchronously, be mobile and use more AI tools to successfully manage work.  Are you thinking about how you can manage your supply chains, and business models, to succeed in the new demographics of the 2020’s?

Thinking points:

• Do you know how susceptible your supply chain is to threats created by changing world demographics?
• How active are you in planning directly for training of your workforce?
• Are you ready to employ a lot more immigrants to grow your business?
• Do you have an effective plan for expansion that includes lower cost locations using a more remote workforce?

‍