Is the World Population Really About to Shrink? What the UN Data Shows

Описание: Is the world's population about to start shrinking? We check the claim against the UN and other published data, line by line.

Fertility has fallen in every country since 1950, and 63 countries and areas have already passed their population peak. But the UN's medium forecast still has world population growing until a peak of about 10.3 billion in the mid-2080s. We also look at what averages and forecasts can and cannot tell us.

Chapters
0:00 01 The Claim
0:29 02 What We Check
0:53 03 Why It Sticks
2:21 04 The Numbers
3:57 05 What We Measure
5:30 06 Where It Is Right
7:14 07 Verdict

Primary sources
UN DESA, World Population Prospects 2024, Summary of Results (July 2024)
https://www.un.org/development/desa/p...
GBD 2021 Fertility and Forecasting Collaborators, The Lancet (2024), 403(10440): 2057-2099
https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(24...
Pew Research Center, 5 facts about Africa's population growth (May 2026)
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-rea...