AEI
Date: January 24, 2018
By: Michael Mazza

Trends in Chinese military modernization and the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) apparent turn towards a more chauvinistic foreign policy should have Taiwan and its friends worried. Yet, a quieter threat looms, one that is already complicating the island’s efforts to maintain a balance of power conducive to its own security. Taiwan’s population has been aging for some time and will soon begin shrinking. Both trends will constrain manpower resources to the detriment of Taiwan’s national security. In 2011, the Ministry of National Defense described demographic changes as “a secret worry of our national defense.”

According to Taiwan’s National Development Council, the total fertility rate has not been at replacement level since the early 1980s and has evinced a downward trajectory since. Total births have dropped as well.

The island’s population will peak between 2021 and 2025 at nearly 24 million people, and thereafter drop to between 17.3 million and 19.7 million by 2060. The working age population (people aged 15-64) peaked in 2012, and the old-age population (≥65) was projected to surpass the young population (0-14) this past year. Between 2016 and 2060, the size of the young and working-age cohorts is expected to shrink by 43.4percent and 44.2percent, respectively, with the elderly population growing by 131 percent. Taiwan’s median age is expected to grow from 39.9 in 2015 to 57 in 2060. Finally, the dependency ratio—the number of children and elderly per 100 working-age persons—is growing. In 2016, the dependency ratio was 36.2 percent. In 2060, it will rise to 92.9 percent.    [FULL  STORY]