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Abstract:
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With the exception of the United States, fertility rates across the developed world have been below the replacement level of 2.1 children per woman since the 1970s. This phenomenon, coupled with increasing life spans, has caused the populations of developed countries to age considerably. With fewer children born, it is expected that the next ten to fifteen years will witness population declines and the beginning of labor shortages and declines in labor output in the developed world as the cohort of those aged 15-64 begins to shrink. Such consequences will cause Western governments great struggle in financing the pensions and health needs of a growing elderly population, and it is expected that real GDP and GDP per capita of developed nations will incur negative growth as a result. This thesis analyzes regressions on Japan, France, and Italy and attempts to support the hypothesis that declining fertility rates in those countries will have a negative effect on GDP per capita. The regression models also incorporate other social, demographic, and economic variables, based on available literature, to predict GDP per capita. Results indicated that identical regression models could not be used for all developed nations, but fertility rate was positively correlated with GDP per capita. |