THE BABY BUST: Can China’s Baby Bust Be Reversed? Don’t Count On It. “Yet even if China somehow does defy past trends and manages to boost its national fertility rates substantially, it will take nearly two decades to pay off as babies born today finally enter the workforce. Meanwhile, its top-heavy ‘constrictive’ population pyramid thanks to a decades-long one-child policy—which was only abandoned in 2016—will mean increasing old age dependency and the social and economic costs that come with it.”