How China Miscalculated Its Way to a Baby Bust

China however can drive over-arching visions for the future more organized than most countries can (due to the nature of the party there, the abilities to coordinate, set policy, give incentives, but also because of millenia old ideas of Confucianism).

So they could perhaps pull a 'national drive' for more babies, if they get serious about it. Doesn't have to be very different from western programs (like in Europe) to promote families having more children with tax cuts, incentives, and such. Just more effective.

>A Moscow-trained missile scientist led the push for China’s policy, based on tables of calculations that applied mathematical models used to calculate rocket trajectories to population growth.

When you read about such bullshit, you kind of get right away that it was the most basic and naive interpolation.

>growing up under the one-child policy were raised in line with Beijing’s goals of a smaller but what it called “higher-quality” population: well-educated, savvy and independent.

The same idiotic idea is offered as consulation for westerm populations plummeting. "Why create more people? We get to consume and party more as child-less couples or individuals, and it's quality that matters, not quantity".

Then you get a society with 50% above the age of 40 or more, a huge percentage of older population that there's nobody to catter for, and measures like "let's bring in more immigrants to baby sit them and be the driving force for the economy".

The basic cohort component model has been well known for at least 100 years. Changes to the behavior of cohorts is hard to predict over generations, but usually somewhat mean reverting despite the exponential nature of the process. Predicting a future population of 400m is every bit as unrealistic as 4b.