WILL U.S. POPULATION DECLINE THIS CENTURY ?

Grey River Argus, 17 April 1948, Page 7

WILL U.S. POPULATION DECLINE THIS CENTURY ?

The United States population will increase from just over’ 145,000,000 now to about 166,000,000 in 1975, the Census Bureau estimates. It will get still- larger after that, but the rate of growth will be dropping fast and the total population probably will be declining before the year 2000, the bureau adds. The biggest certainty of all, as seen in a new series of population forecasts, is that the number of “elders”—those 65 or more—will climb sharply. So will their proportion in the population. As 1975 draws near, if the estimates prove right, business will be better for those selling crutches and wheel-chairs, poorer for makers of baby carriages and high chairs. The new estimates were given in a report prepared by P. L. Whelpton, Hope Eldridge and Jacob S. Siegel. Whelpton is associate director of the Scripps Foundation for Research in Population Problems. ,The others are Census Bureau analysts. The 166,000,000 person population for 1975 was described as a “medium forecast.” The report said the population possibly could go as high as 185.000,000 or as low as 151,000,000 in 1975. The medium forecast assumed that there will be “medium decreases in birth and death-rates,” and that immigration will add 100,000 persons a year to the population. Whelpton viewed the prospective gradual slowing in United States population growth as “desirable.” In his opinion, it would postpone the exhaustion oj- national resources, contribute to economic stability, lessen the likelihood of- deterioration of the quality of the population, and help to raise the level of living. But he acknowledged it “may lead to a demand for a government programme to increase the .number of births.” like those adopted in Canada, France, and Sweden. That ,is a worry for the future, however. Last year the record number almost 4,000,00 babies was born in the United States compared with 2,500,000 in pre-war 1939