Population projections in Germany
Abstract
Purposeful social and economic policy is unthinkable without any idea of the future development of the population and its structure. The gradual changes of demographic processes allow us to make population projections, which serve as a kind of compass. Their results show how population size and structure will change given certain hypotheses concerning the development of fertility, mortality and migration. The impact of these demographic processes on the population manifests itself in full only after a few decades. Therefore, projections with a long-term horizon are of particular interest.
This article presents the official population projections provided by the German Federal Statistical Office. These projections are based on the widely used cohort-component method and deterministic approach, yet possess a number of distinctive features: Both the interpretation of the goals and results, as well as some details of the methodology and design of the scenarios as a system of equivalent future options, are different from those currently accepted in Russia. Using fertility assumptions of the 13th population projection as an example, the article introduces one of the possible approaches to modeling hypotheses. It focuses on the justification of assumptions based on the cohort analysis and the characteristics of reproductive behavior of women cohorts. In conclusion, the hypotheses about completed fertility based on data until 2013 are critically analyzed, taking into account the rise in fertility in recent years in Germany. An analysis of the factors that accompany this recovery allows us to assess their potential for the future development of cohort fertility.
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References
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