Elon Musk recently raised alarm about the global population decline, calling it one of humanity’s biggest looming crises. Sharing a graph from the Tesla Owners Silicon Valley account on X (formerly Twitter), he highlighted projected population changes for major countries between 2018 and 2100. Musk’s retweet of the statement “Population collapse is humanity’s greatest threat” and his simple agreement, “Yes,” sparked widespread discussion.
While the issue has been discussed for years, there is still debate over how fast this decline will happen and which nations will feel it most. The primary drivers of population decline include plummeting fertility rates, rising emigration, and aging populations. Many countries now see fewer than 2.1 children per woman, the threshold needed for stable population growth.
In the UK, the average number of children per woman dropped to a record low of 1.44 in 2023. Globally, fertility rates have seen a sharp decline from 5.3 in 1963 to less than half that today. A 2020 study forecasted a dramatic shift, with India’s population set to shrink by 400 million by 2100, while China’s is expected to plummet by 731 million, leaving Nigeria to become the second most populous nation by century’s end.
Countries like the US, Canada, and Australia will maintain relatively stable populations due to migration. Meanwhile, nations such as Indonesia and Pakistan will see moderate declines, while countries like Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo are poised for growth, potentially overtaking many others.
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