Demographic security

Don’t Worry About Fertility Falling Because Immigration and A.I. Will Replace the Unborn, Says Academic

An academic has hailed mass migration and the coming artificial intelligence revolution as reasons not to fear plummeting fertility rates in Western countries, wherein most it has long stood below replacement rate.

Oxford University academic Sarah Harper’s views that falling fertility should be a “cause for celebration” were profiled by British left-wing newspaper The Guardian, which reported that changes in society meant Western countries no longer had to worry about growing or even sustaining their populations.

The former Royal Institution director said nations wishing to sustain themselves was “really old thinking”, and praised German Chancellor Angela Merkel as a world leader who had found a way to grow their country without having to resort to citizens having their own children.

...While Harper’s views are widely accepted in many Western nations — including in the UK where the continued rise in population is mostly down to immigration — some European nations are rejecting the notion that mass migration can be the answer to all problems.