Demographic changes and international trade Demography is the study of the structure of human populations – their size, age composition, gender mix, growth and so on. Changes in the population, age and gender mix of the world’s major economies suggests that major changes are predicted for the world economy.
Owing to better health care, education and hygiene, major world economies now face the challenge of an ageing population (increase in the number of people aged 60 years and above). The population of major economic powers like USA, Germany, South Korea and Japan are predicted to get smaller and older over the next few years. According to the organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the old-age dependency ration will rise dramatically over the next few years. The old-age dependency ratio is the ratio of the number of people aged 65 and above to the number of people between the ages of 20 and 64.