On January 17, the CCP's National Bureau of Statistics released population data for 2024. Although this data has been carefully “doctored,” we can still cautiously use it to catch a glimpse of China's population crisis. This article offers two observations.
First, the Degree of China's Negative Population Growth Far Exceeds What the Statistics Show
When the authorities announced that the population had fallen by 850,000 in 2022 compared with the previous year—the first negative growth since the great famine of the 1960s—some people felt it was still too early to conclude that China had entered a phase of sustained negative population growth, since in other countries the transition from zero growth to negative growth has typically taken several years. However, once official data went on to show that the population decline widened to 2.08 million in 2023, and the population fell by another 1.39 million in 2024, few could still deny that China's entry into an era of negative population growth had become a settled fact.
Negative population growth will have an enormous, far-reaching impact on China's economy and society that is difficult to fully estimate. At the very least, it can be said that the recent instability in China's overall economy is directly related to this trend. Yet neither the authorities nor the public have made anywhere near adequate preparations. This is a massive “gray rhino.” The shadow of negative population growth will hang over China for a long time to come.
Why is the population declining? Because the number of births each year is now smaller than the number of deaths.
China's birth rate has been on an overall downward trend. When Xi Jinping came to power in 2012, 16.35 million babies were born; although the authorities have since adjusted policy to allow a second child and then a third, by 2024 the number of births had still fallen to just 9.52 million.
Two major factors have directly caused the decline in births. One is the continuous shrinking of the population of women of childbearing age. Women of childbearing age are generally defined as those between 15 and 49 years old. From 2016 to 2023, the number of such women fell by an average of more than 4 million per year. The other is the decline in fertility levels—China fell into the “low-fertility trap” long ago. Internationally, a total fertility rate below 1.5 is classified as “ultra-low fertility.”
China's fifth national census, in 2000, showed a total fertility rate of only 1.22. The sixth national census, in 2010, showed the rate had fallen further to 1.18. The seventh national census, in 2020, put China's total fertility rate at 1.3, still hovering at a low level. By 2023, China's total fertility rate stood at around 1.0, ranking second-lowest among the world's major economies, behind only South Korea (which, in June 2024, declared that the country had entered a “national demographic emergency”).
While births have been declining, deaths, on the other hand, have been rising. Official data shows that since 2000, the number of deaths in China has been on a slow upward trend. For example, in 2020, roughly 10.36 million people died in China, an increase of 2.19 million from 2000.
Generally speaking, mortality rates tend to be relatively stable. But this article must specifically point out that since the outbreak of the pandemic in 2020, the number of deaths in China has been enormous, and the CCP has kept this a closely guarded secret (it has even suppressed cremation figures from civil affairs statistics since the fourth quarter of 2022). As a result, the officially published death figures have essentially lost all practical meaning. (See the author's article “The CCP's Population Data Deliberately Conceals Mass Death” for details.)
In this author's view, the reason official data shows China's population entering negative growth since 2022 is nothing more than a backdoor admission that far too many people died during the pandemic. The authorities dared not abruptly disclose the true death toll, and instead sought to “spread it out” over several years in order to absorb this enormous number of deaths quietly, hoping to avoid triggering social shock.
Second, Three Major Crises in China's Population Age Structure
The authorities announced that, at the end of 2024, the population aged 0 to 15 nationwide stood at 239.99 million, or 17.1% of the total; the working-age population aged 16 to 59 stood at 857.98 million, or 60.9%; and the elderly population aged 60 and above stood at 310.31 million, or 22.0%, of which those aged 65 and above numbered 220.23 million, or 15.6%.
This age structure is a dangerous one, presenting at least three major crises.
(1) Severe below-replacement fertility (a “severe child shortage”). By demographic standards, a population aged 0-14 making up 20% to 23% of the total is considered normal; 18% to 20% indicates a mild child shortage; 15% to 18% indicates a severe child shortage; and below 15% indicates an extreme, “ultra-low” child shortage. China's seventh national census, in 2020, put the population aged 0-14 at 253,383,938, or 17.95% of the total; but by the end of 2024, the population aged 0 to 15 had fallen further to 239.99 million, or 17.1%—already falling into the category of severe child shortage. Even more alarming, the proportion of China's population aged 0-14 is projected to fall below 15% by 2030, pushing the country into the extreme, ultra-low category. In just a few short decades, the CCP's “family planning” policy has driven China from a state of severe overpopulation of children to severe child shortage, and now toward an extreme shortage, devastating the very demographic foundation of the Chinese nation.
(2) The working-age population continues to shrink. According to the CCP National Bureau of Statistics' own annual “Statistical Communiqué on National Economic and Social Development,” the share of the working-age population peaked in 2010, and the absolute number of the working-age population peaked in 2015. The population aged 16 to 59 fell from roughly 894 million in 2020, down more than 40 million from 2010, with its share of the total population dropping to 63.35%. By the end of 2024, it had fallen further, to 857.98 million, with its share dropping further still to 60.9%. This means the demographic dividend has become a thing of the past, bringing with it a range of severe economic problems—for instance, making a future slowdown in China's economic growth rate essentially unavoidable, and forcing the authorities to introduce a policy of “gradually raising the statutory retirement age” in 2024. More seriously, some research projects that China's working-age population will decline at an accelerating rate in the future, falling to 787 million by 2035, to 622 million by 2050, and to as low as 331 million by the end of this century. The economic impact of such a decline is almost too frightening to contemplate.
(3) Rapid aging. For earlier-developing countries, the transition from an “aging society” to a “super-aged society” typically took around 80 years. China's transition has been far faster. China's 2000 census confirmed that the population aged 60 and above had already exceeded 10% of the total, and the population aged 65 and above had exceeded 7%—meeting the United Nations' threshold for an “aging society.” By 2023, the population aged 65 and above had reached 14.2%, putting China into “moderately aged” status. By around 2034, the population aged 65 and above will exceed 21% of the total, pushing China into a “super-aged” society. At the same time, China already has the largest elderly population of any country in the world: at the end of 2024, the population aged 65 and above stood at 220.23 million, more than one-fifth of the world's total elderly population. Moreover, unlike developed countries such as Japan that entered aging after becoming wealthy, China is “growing old before growing rich.” The speed, scale, and low level of economic development accompanying China's aging are all sins of the CCP's own making.
Conclusion
Negative population growth has arrived five years earlier than the authorities themselves had projected, and preparations to cope with it have been severely inadequate. Even more alarming, the CCP's decades of coercive “family planning” policy have destroyed the normal structure of China's population, producing crisis after crisis. China has already entered an era of ultra-low fertility, with its age structure evolving dangerously toward an “inverted pyramid.” This poses an unprecedented threat to the survival and development of the Chinese nation in a time of peace. And all of it has been brought about single-handedly by the CCP. On this point alone, the CCP is the greatest danger the Chinese nation faces.