WORLD BEING CRUSHED BY A LEFTY INTELLECTUAL FAD: Low Population in 2050 for $50 Trillion Economic Loss – Over Ten Times More Than Climate Change. “All of the developed countries except Israel have a total fertility rate below the replacement level of 2.1. Dropping total fertility from 1.5 to 1.8 down to 1.1 drops the working age population by 20-30%. Dropping total fertility from 1.1 down to 0.8 drops the working age population by another 10%.”

UPDATE: Eugene Volokh writes

Glenn: I looked at the linked article, and it seems to look at total decline in economic output, rather than per capita decline; indeed, its estimates of total decline seem to be entirely proportionate to the reduction in working age population: “If your economy has 30% fewer people and all the people had on average the same productivity then you would lose 30% of your economy.” (I appreciate that a reduction in working age population might not yield an exactly proportionate reduction in total population, given the possibly different numbers for retirees; but at the very least it would sharply reduce the total population, and thus largely offset the decline in economic output on a per capita basis.)

And it’s per capita output that’s important, right? I assume we wouldn’t say that a country with 100M people and an output of $1T per year is 5 times richer than a country with 10M people and an output of $200B per year – we’d probably say the latter country, with a per capita GNP of $20K is richer than the former, with a per capita GNP of $10K, right? Or am I missing something?

I’m not sure if per capita output is the only thing that’s important. I thought of that when I read the piece, but then I thought that China’s economy is relevant because it’s huge, not because its people are extraordinarily productive per capita. Anyway, it’s up to you whether you think this is significant, but here’s Eugene’s perspective.