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Stephen J Shaw: The surprising truth about world fertility rates | The InnerView — Transcript

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0:00foreign
0:02population is more than 8 billion and
0:05Counting
0:08in some places it can seem like our
0:10growth is reaching a Breaking Point
0:13that is until you look at the data
0:16the truth is that Global fertility rates
0:18have halved in the past 70 years
0:22that means Humanity's population
0:23trajectory could be heading for a cliff
0:30some Nations have been taking steps in
0:32hopes of reversing the trend
0:35Business Leaders have warned a failure
0:37to do so will have serious consequences
0:40I think that the biggest problem the
0:43world will face in 20 years is
0:45population collapse
0:47I want to emphasize this the biggest
0:49issue in 20 years will be population
0:52collapse
0:55Stephen J Shaw is a data scientist and
0:57demographer
0:59after researching the fertility rate
1:01decline he decided to make a film about
1:03it
1:05what are we going to talk about today
1:07global population collapse what else
1:10fun topic
1:11birth cap tries to understand why more
1:14and more people are not becoming parents
1:17what this means for humankind
1:20his conclusions may surprise you
1:23I caught up with Shaw to learn more
1:25about his findings and to hear how they
1:28are being received by audiences around
1:30the world
1:32this is the interview
1:36[Music]
1:51Stephen J Shaw joins us now on the
1:54interview Stephen good to have you on
1:56the program joining us from thank you
1:58for having me you seem to be a reluctant
2:01prophet of Doom
2:03does that accurately describe it
2:07reluctant that's interesting I think
2:09you're possibly right because I wanna in
2:12some ways uh just let people know
2:14frankly the world is going to change
2:16population wise and many things are
2:18going to change I don't want to become a
2:20complete doom and despair person nor do
2:22I want others to be gloomy but there are
2:24fundamental changes we do need to become
2:27very aware of very aware of very quickly
2:29yeah having watched part one of your
2:32documentary The reason I say reluctant
2:34is because you didn't come into it with
2:37an agenda you didn't come into it with
2:38an ideological agenda you weren't
2:40pushing anything and a lot of a lot of
2:43the time when you were interacting with
2:44people you were saying well just this is
2:47these are the numbers
2:49this is the trajectory
2:51this is the data so
2:54when we think about that how did you how
2:58did you stumble upon this were you
3:00looking at the numbers and then you felt
3:02I need to tell people about this did you
3:04come across it by accident
3:07I guess by accident yes
3:09um and that's what shocked me most
3:11because I had assumed I would know about
3:13things like changing birth rates on a
3:16mass scale uh part of what I do
3:19historically I'm a data analyst and I
3:21did a scientist and I do forecasting and
3:23knowing population numbers for future is
3:25kind of important
3:27I'm a lifelong learner and I was taking
3:29a summer college level class in 2016.
3:33and I came across some numbers for
3:36following birth rates quite randomly for
3:38Germany and then Italy and Spain and
3:40Austria and I was just shocked to see
3:43for example Italy now there's half the
3:45number of newborns compared to those
3:47people age exactly 50. I mean the
3:49transformation was frightening and I I I
3:53was frozen at that singular moment in
3:55time and felt I had to tell the story in
3:57as succinct away as possible tell me
4:00what is the birth Gap
4:02yeah so birth gaps of term I use for the
4:05gap between the number of older people
4:06in a society that will need to be
4:08supported through the retirement and the
4:10number of younger people who will be
4:12moving into the workforce
4:14so it's a gap
4:17to me I think the focus really should be
4:19on the changing Gap that we're going to
4:23see in so many countries around the
4:24world rather than the finite number of
4:27people living we look at population
4:29totals but it's this opening Gap that's
4:31going to be the real problem is it
4:33because we are a victim of our own
4:36civilization
4:40I could not dispute that there's an
4:42element of that I think what we have
4:45done is focus societies for no good or
4:48bad reason perhaps on things like
4:51getting an education pursuing a career
4:53to a certain point and we've simply
4:55forgotten the reality that if people
4:57want to have children assuming they do
4:59if people want to have children that
5:01needs to be factored in two and there
5:03are time limitations and really no one
5:05has been talking about this so the
5:07number of heart broken stories I you
5:10know
5:11sat in people's homes with people
5:12shedding tears because they just didn't
5:15know that it gets harder and harder to
5:16have a child perhaps that's part of the
5:19civilization we've created but it's one
5:21that should be quite easy to change I
5:23feel simply by educating younger people
5:25so people think that they have time they
5:27think that they can do especially when
5:29it comes to women and of course where
5:30two men here talking about women's
5:32decisions here and that that should be
5:34noted but a lot of women feel they have
5:36time and they can defer having children
5:39if they want to to
5:41their mid to late 30s but what your
5:44documentary and the data seems to show
5:46that around the world that is far harder
5:49than is popularly
5:52believed to be so
5:54yes and I interviewed five fertility
5:56doctors around the world in this regard
5:58as well as people young women and men
6:01who'd gone through uh treatments some
6:03successful many not and the reality is
6:06though just focusing on the data side of
6:08things if you look at data for every
6:12country I've had access to
6:15um a woman turning 30
6:18without a child has no more than that 50
6:2150 chance of ever becoming a mother now
6:25most people I asked thought that would
6:26happen around age 40.
6:28and just to be clear the biggest reason
6:30is not the fertility challenge though
6:32that's a very big uh challenge the
6:35biggest reason often is either not
6:37having a partner or going through a
6:39breakup or a divorce at the wrong moment
6:43and then having to start again so these
6:47are factors that I think people assume
6:50that Society has in some way you know
6:53that
6:54we've engineered our society so that yes
6:57perfectly you can meet the right person
6:58in your 30s and of course you can have
7:00the two three children you you want but
7:03that's just not the reality for fifty
7:05percent of people who are childless at
7:0730. you were invited to speak at
7:10Cambridge University
7:12and then you got canceled
7:14tell me more about that
7:16well I was a surprise I was boarding my
7:19flight from Tokyo and I got a phone call
7:20from the organizer and I thought that
7:23was probably bad news because we we
7:24never you know we exchanged messages
7:27never phone calls and the the message
7:29was that the college decided to cancel
7:33the screen to 160 people mainly young
7:36students because of fears of protests
7:39and that the protests may cause
7:42disruption to students around exam time
7:45that other events have been arranged
7:47around that time the question is why
7:49anybody would want to uh protest this
7:52documentary it's a documentary primarily
7:54made by women every other key crew
7:57member on the team there were nine of us
7:59were women who were attracted to this
8:00project they just were so fascinated
8:03we interviewed 230 people around the
8:06world the majority of those were women
8:07so it's a story it's a woman's story
8:10really so why people would want to
8:12cancel this is is very confusing I I the
8:15one comment I heard was a medical
8:17student felt that young people young
8:19women can decide for themselves if they
8:21want their children or not and
8:24um well yes of course but there are
8:26factors such as fertility and finding a
8:27part in other things I wanted these
8:29young people to listen to so it's it's a
8:32sad world I think when universities such
8:34as Cambridge uh want to close down
8:36something like this you said it's very
8:38confusing but I'm assuming it's not as
8:40consuming uh confusing now because
8:44people mentioned the fact that you
8:46appeared on Jordan Peterson's show or
8:48podcast there's the association with a
8:51sense of conservatism even though you
8:53don't come at this with any political
8:56agenda how do you feel that you have
9:00your data you have your warnings you
9:03have your forecasts and you're saying
9:04something's going on here around the
9:07world and others are pigeonholing you
9:09and latching onto it and projecting
9:12their own culture wars on it is it
9:15difficult to handle
9:18well to be honest with you I think they
9:20picked the wrong documentary to
9:21challenge because anybody who actually
9:23watches it will very quickly figure out
9:25all I'm doing is listening to voices
9:27from around the world there is no agenda
9:28but there isn't really rationality to
9:30most cancellations so I mean we know
9:33that don't we
9:34well that's a fair point look on the
9:36other side I I put it this way we
9:38actually ended up having a second
9:40successful screening a few weeks later
9:41it's very clandestine we um ended up
9:45with an extra 100
9:46000 people viewing a documentary in
9:48YouTube from the publicity of the
9:49cancellation cause so the canceling
9:52event for around 100 people generated
9:54interest of a hundred thousand but look
9:56more generally I would like to take the
9:58opportunity to say this it tends to be
10:00that more conservative leaning
10:03podcasters uh journalists are the ones
10:06who are contacting me but I will talk to
10:08anybody you know I am not in any way
10:10saying this is a problem that aligns
10:13with conservatism or anything else
10:14that's what others to decide
10:16so I do hope I get a broader opportunity
10:18okay now I watched it it was really
10:21compelling a lot of things sat with me I
10:24mean I I have children I know you have
10:26children as well uh but I mean you look
10:29at it not only from a personal
10:32individual
10:33uh point of view but you also think of
10:35the future of humanity right there's
10:36still a few things that sort of this is
10:39one of those things where it still seems
10:40a little counter-intuitive and maybe
10:42it's because we've been brought up with
10:43Paul Ehrlich the population bomb this
10:46idea that 8 billion and and Beyond
10:48they're not going to be enough resources
10:50on Earth and it's better if we have
10:52fewer babies right Prosperity means
10:55fewer babies these things still I still
10:57feel them in my bones which is why it's
10:59a bit weird that I'm agreeing with you
11:01while watching the documentary but
11:02something doesn't quite feel right so
11:04maybe we can go through some of these
11:06counter claims Paul ehrlich's population
11:09bomb
11:10saying we ran out of resources we're not
11:13run out of space we'll end up killing
11:15each other eating each other we'll have
11:16all sorts of problems why is that wrong
11:21well first of all I will come to that I
11:24do want to say we I get really bothered
11:26when people put these two conversations
11:28in inside the same framework uh they're
11:32related perhaps but I I do think we need
11:35to separate them polar like absolutely
11:37came out and said that the world was
11:38going to run out of food that the UK
11:40would no longer exist by the year 2000
11:43etc etc etc his words were used in some
11:46very menacing ways uh in terms of
11:49extreme antenatalism and I think that
11:52antenatalism is still there it's still
11:55taught in our schools it's in our
11:56textbooks
11:58um it's the general framework that we we
11:59jump to that oh there are too many
12:01people in the world
12:03um so I know you want to dissect early
12:06has since gone on to say no it's because
12:08of uh the environment and now I think
12:12the message is changing subtly again I
12:14know this it's about the patriarchy that
12:16you know the argument keeps changing
12:18there's always a reason not to have
12:20children we just have to accept there
12:22are some people who are pure
12:23anti-natalist they don't like people
12:24they don't see a future for Humanity and
12:26don't seem to care about the rest of us
12:28now they may say they care about the
12:30planet but I would catch them out by
12:31saying well wait a minute if that's true
12:33why are you not look at countries like
12:35Japan where I am and saying wait a
12:37minute Japan you've done enough you've
12:39brought your population down so fast so
12:41quickly that's great now let's move on
12:43to the next country but they never
12:44changed their message not since Ehrlich
12:46in the 1960s
12:48um I you know I'm quite passionate about
12:51this I believe each human has the right
12:54to decide how many children they want to
12:56have and to raise those children in a
12:59way they
13:00a leafy fit and I'd like to think that
13:03involves in a great way and raising them
13:06sustainably but can I give you a piece
13:09of really positive news positive
13:10takeaway for me
13:12I had assumed before this project that
13:15the world's population was growing
13:16exponentially out of control almost it
13:18didn't matter what we did for the
13:20environment because there is going to be
13:21so many people you know 50 years 100
13:24years from now once I saw that the
13:26world's population is destined to
13:28maximize quite quickly and then quite
13:31quickly go down albeit we're going to be
13:34Aging for a time that gave me hope to
13:36say with me we know we're only going to
13:38have 10 to 11 billion that's it all we
13:41need to do is engineer our planet now
13:43for the 10 or 11 billion we can't change
13:45that it's baked in it's going to happen
13:48and I so I think there's a positivity
13:51here to say well let's just focus on
13:53solving the problems quickly and not
13:56telling other people not to have
13:58children which I just believe is wrong
14:00part of that good news came from Hans
14:01rosling who featured in your part one
14:04that I watched right eccentric late uh
14:07Hans rossling uh Swedish man brilliant
14:10character brilliant lots of beautiful
14:12videos of him on YouTube and so built
14:15into that he says okay it goes up and
14:17then it sort of plateaus right but built
14:19into a lot of his arguments he also
14:21shows you these amazing graphs where
14:23when women get educated and they have
14:25access to contraceptives and they have
14:30access to proper health care and so on
14:31and so forth the prosperity of a Nation
14:34goes up and they are having fewer babies
14:38at that point in time which leads me to
14:41my next question
14:42we know this isn't an East and West
14:44issue because Japan South Korea Italy
14:47Germany all of them are you know
14:49experiencing the birth Gap but is it a
14:51rich country problem only and are poorer
14:56countries on on the trajectory of
14:58building themselves up while they're
15:00sort of still having more babies
15:03so this is fascinating it's easy to
15:06assume it's linked to Prosperity
15:08um but it's not quite as simple as that
15:10so so let me just make a statement we
15:13have to assume that every country in the
15:15planet is going through this trend just
15:17at different phases
15:19um I liken it to a large roller coaster
15:21and Japan Italy Germany or at the front
15:23UK and us are a little bit further
15:25behind turkey's a little bit further
15:27behind but not that not far but
15:29countries in Africa of course they're at
15:31the rear but they're going through the
15:33same Trends in terms of rapidly falling
15:35birth rates that Europe
15:38um much of the developed world today saw
15:40a few decades ago so we're on the same
15:42path now if you look at areas of
15:46Southern India for example
15:48you will find states there with as low
15:51birth rates as Europe like 1.4 1.5 if
15:55you look at much of Latin America you're
15:58already far below birth rates and the
16:00real conservative countries like Brazil
16:02as professors I interview in part three
16:04of the documentary of their state you
16:06know Brazil is not yet a rich country
16:08and yet it's going to become an old
16:10country before it becomes wealthy
16:12meaning the challenge to support its
16:15older people is going to be harder and
16:16harder
16:17so I actually have great fears for
16:20countries that are on the same path
16:21India became the world's most populous
16:23nation recently but I'm concerned
16:25because the actual total number of
16:28births has fallen by about 15 within 10
16:30years in India I can see in 50 years
16:32time it will be the next Japan Why Can't
16:35This be fixed by mass immigration just
16:38up the numbers open open the gates allow
16:41more young people to come in from
16:43elsewhere and the economy is revived so
16:46you don't have a small sliver of the
16:48population
16:49carrying the weight of an older
16:52population why isn't immigration the
16:54answer
16:55well that's a carousel uh policy because
16:58it can never end you can never bring in
16:59immigrants and say okay that's it we're
17:02stable now immigrants get old too they
17:04have to be supported into later life so
17:06then you need more immigrants and more
17:08immigrants and more agreements that's a
17:09zerosome game because the countries that
17:11people are being taken from more and
17:14more well from communities I've seen
17:15them where young men particularly are
17:18leaving and you have the communities in
17:20rural Nepal where I went who were just
17:22devastated because the young man who
17:25should be building those local economies
17:26have gone
17:28so immigration can be part of a solution
17:31but it's not the solution to this
17:33problem at all
17:35um I think we're just trying to cover
17:37um you know our put our hands over eyes
17:38to think well for a few years we're okay
17:40now it it never will end in terms of the
17:44need from some Scandinavian countries
17:46not only have they
17:47tried to bring in more immigrants but
17:49they've also try to stimulate their
17:52people uh via
17:55campaigns to make more babies
17:57incentivize making more babies tax
17:59breaks you know longer time off from
18:02work uh but both for for mothers and
18:06fathers
18:07why shouldn't that be given more of a
18:10shot across the world what was the
18:13problem with it
18:14well it really is been given more of a
18:16shot here in Japan the government
18:18announced 25 billion dollar extra
18:20investment recently as as to to try and
18:23incentivize young people to have
18:24children and the reality is having
18:27looked at more than 50 years of attempts
18:29to do this it just simply doesn't work
18:31through isolated cases they're very
18:33isolated ones and when you dive down
18:35into the data usually you find there's
18:36other reasons so for example in
18:38Scandinavia what has happened in the
18:40past you incentivize parents people who
18:42would have had children anyway decide to
18:44have them sooner but then they've
18:46already had the children they're going
18:47to have and then there's that drop in
18:49birth rates below where it was already
18:51the reality is just more generally
18:54mothers in particular once they have a
18:56first child are having pretty much the
18:58family size that they want which is a
19:00good thing the biggest challenge that we
19:02need to focus is those people who had
19:05plenty of children
19:06who don't have a partner left it too
19:09late those are the those are the people
19:11well women are men let's not forget men
19:14who any incentivization should focus on
19:17and even then I'm not sure exactly what
19:19it should be so unplanned childlessness
19:22you coined that as well
19:24um yes so it's people who wanted
19:25children right but they ran out of time
19:28they don't have the perfect conditions
19:30for it
19:31something that was interesting in your
19:33documentary was the distinction that you
19:36made which
19:37countered the assumption that people are
19:40just generally having fewer babies it's
19:42that the people who
19:44would normally have kids are still
19:47having kids at roughly the same size
19:49right and you can correct me at any
19:51point if I'm wrong so if people were
19:53going to have two kids three kids one
19:54kid
19:55but it's the greater proportion of
19:57people who are not having kids at all
19:59which is causing this this plummeting
20:02graph
20:03that's right so there's a transition
20:05it's been known for a while by
20:07demographers as a second demographic
20:09transition but what we didn't know
20:10before this was it was it's triggered by
20:13almost exclusively childlessness on plan
20:16childlessness in most cases so if we
20:18look at family structure and Japan's a
20:20great example if we go back to 50 years
20:23the percentage of mothers in Japan
20:25having four or more children with six
20:27percent 50 years later that number is
20:30exactly the same in the US in recent
20:32decades the family size for mothers has
20:34been going up from about 2.3 2.4 2.59
20:38maybe 2.6 so the fall in birth rates at
20:42such low levels the is driven
20:45effectively entirely by a huge increase
20:49of child this is to levels of 35 40
20:51percent in many many nations can you
20:53spell out what the actual fear is are
20:56there any microcosms of what this looks
20:58like down the line whether in cities or
21:01communities Etc so of course I mean in
21:03we can talk about it as a concept we can
21:06say young people needing to carry the
21:09burden of looking after a lot of old
21:11people and not enough young people to
21:13work and so on what does it actually
21:14look like how fundamentally does it
21:16impact or change of society
21:20yeah I think we're looking at the
21:21desolate societies we're looking at
21:23dereliction we're looking at towns that
21:25were built for maybe 100 000 people or a
21:27million people or a thousand people
21:29having half the number of occupants
21:31means uh taxes for those towns won't be
21:35able to support the infrastructure the
21:36streets the roads it means I believe
21:39that young people will be driven away
21:41from these places to live somewhere uh
21:44nicer but that tram will never stop it
21:46will just continually uh go on and on
21:49and on we're talking of intense
21:51loneliness uh loneliness is hard to
21:53detect loneliness mainly happens in
21:55people's homes
21:56and you know we can't walk around and
21:59just witness you know people in states
22:01of Despair and loneliness but the
22:02documentary I want to discover that side
22:05and it's it's harrowing so I I don't
22:07think it's a very pleasant World
22:09irrespective of the financial side the
22:11social side actually worries me more
22:12what underpins the problem that we have
22:15now is it a global
22:18cultural approach to living
22:23well I would put more directly the
22:26approach where we prioritize first
22:29education intense education
22:33or training as far as we can go and
22:36having completed you know our
22:37educational training probably early 20s
22:39there's a need to work
22:41to get established because if you don't
22:43you're going to be left behind and
22:45you're going to want to keep working to
22:46a certain point where you feel it safe
22:48particularly for women to take a little
22:50bit of either time off or
22:52re-prioritizing family versus purely
22:55work
22:56what we haven't factored in is how to do
23:00all of those things and allow people to
23:02have children at the same time at the
23:04moment the assumption is that will come
23:06you know third priority after everything
23:09else and probably we will have
23:11encouraged people to
23:13buy a car or bike or you know rent a
23:17home accumulate some wealth in some way
23:20we need to re-prioritize having children
23:23for those who want children not everyone
23:25does but for those who want and it's
23:27what I'm seeing is through educating
23:29younger people actually the fertility
23:30woman the fertility window closes very
23:34very quickly and it's prioritization
23:38therefore in my mind so there are a lot
23:40of very successful women who at some
23:42point in time usually after their
23:44education or a couple of years in the
23:47workplace they pop out of the workplace
23:51build their families and then they slide
23:54back in and of course it's it's more
23:55difficult in some place depending on
23:58work culture depending on employability
24:01so would that be the best way to to
24:04actually do it for for women who want to
24:06be educated be successful in the
24:09workplace but also have families
24:11I actually don't think so because what
24:13you're doing again is prioritizing
24:15having family to be the the final part
24:18of that you know that everything else
24:20has to reach a certain Target first what
24:23I think is for those who want and many
24:25many do to Magic to little people to
24:28continue in education and have a family
24:31and start a career without threat to
24:34losing that career uh position uh and if
24:37I could just say one thing I mean we're
24:39going to be retiring pretty late you
24:41know the young people today retirement
24:43age is going to look something like 75
24:4680 or even later so starting a career
24:49later after with another thing should be
24:52more of an option for those who want it
24:54um
24:56what changed
24:58for you in any way if indeed anything
25:02did change
25:03during the process of making this
25:05documentary did you change your views
25:07your thoughts on anything what surprised
25:08you
25:11what surprised me most was a film in 24
25:15countries
25:16including South America India several
25:20countries in Africa much of the
25:22developed world and what surprised me is
25:25how we're all the same
25:26okay our material wealth may vary a
25:28little bit
25:29but but in some cases not that much
25:31everyone's got a mobile phone it seems
25:33they are I must do but we're all driven
25:35by the same things and education is a
25:37big part of that so it didn't matter if
25:40you're in a a a slum in Mumbai or a
25:43wealthy home in Chile or you know in the
25:47suburbs of La wherever you were people
25:50were telling the same stories about
25:52their Ambitions for their future life
25:54I'm guessing you're looking forward to
25:57hopefully having grandchildren
26:00well I am
26:02that would be a very nice thing indeed I
26:04don't think my kids are prepared to have
26:06that conversation with me yet but yeah
26:07fingers crossed Stephen J Shaw pleasure
26:10talking to you thank you so much for
26:11joining us on the interview
26:14thank you for your time

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