Falling fertility, debt and AI: is the US headed toward a population crisis?
Americans having less kids plus an ageing population could be a recipe for disaster that further erodes social stabilityRemember environmentalist Paul Ehrlich’s 1960s-vintage prediction about how overpopulation would deplete the Earth’s resources and condemn millions to starvation? His Malthusian condemnation…
By · April 19, 2026 · 1 min read
This article was originally published by
The Guardian World
and is republished here under license.
Americans having less kids plus an ageing population could be a recipe for disaster that further erodes social stability
Remember environmentalist Paul Ehrlich’s 1960s-vintage prediction about how overpopulation would deplete the Earth’s resources and condemn millions to starvation? His Malthusian condemnation of humanity’s voracious appetite has kept a grip on the debate over the future of the planet, even scaring the young out of having children.
Ehrlich was wrong. Yet as we have come around to the thought that overpopulation won’t kill us all, we are being walloped by another demographic emergency: we are not having too many kids, we are having too few. This problem is real.
Throughout Russia, internet usage has become seriously restricted. Citizens are drawing comparison to Soviet censorship and today's digital blackouts.…
Leave a Reply