Demographic suicide

By 2100, Malta is projected to lose 48% of its population. Out of all the 27 EU member states only Italy (52%) and Spain (49%) will be worse hit. But, as early as 2026, when the EU’s population is expected to peak at around 453 million, Eurostat projects that the EU’s population will decline by 9% by 2050 and fall by 34% by 2100.

In 2018, the Robert Schumann Foundation warned that the European Union faced negative consequences through its ‘demographic suicide’, with its declining birth rate and ageing population. In all 27 EU countries, women are having fewer than two children.

This brings population decline, which results in a smaller workforce, labour and skills shortages. There are fewer young people available to join the military. An ageing population means a heavier burden on pension systems, higher taxes and increased healthcare costs at a time when EU leaders have decided to divert money from welfare to warfare.

The EU’s global geopolitical influence is becoming weaker and weaker.

The EU will lose a million workers annually in the coming 25 years and up to 55 million workers by 2100. A Bruegel Report (March 27), ‘The demographic divide: inequalities in ageing across the European Union’, demonstrates that, over the next 25 years, working-age populations will decline in 22 out of 27 EU countries, “while the share of those aged 85+ in the EU as a whole will more than double. The shift will strain healthcare, pension and long-term care systems across the continent. Eastern and southern EU countries will face more severe ageing and workforce shrinkages, which will undermine their competitiveness and potentially contributing to increasing inequality.”

But the impact of demographic decline is already being felt. There are currently over 3.9 million job vacancies across the EU. The countries with the highest job vacancy rates are the Netherlands, Belgium and Austria. In real terms, countries with the highest number of vacancies are Germany (over one million) and France (504,000).

The EU is suffering from a skills shortage, especially, in these sectors: information and communication technology, healthcare (nurses and doctors), construction and transportation. The EU is unable to fill vacancies for two million graduates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

The European Commission has identified 42 occupations that face skills shortages across the EU. These shortages are widespread, with 63% of EU small and medium-sized businesses reporting that they cannot find the talent they need. The EU’s military industrial complex is also struggling to find workers with the skills required to match its needs.

The Centre for European Policy Analysis reported (September 19, 2024) that European NATO members already facing a shortage of soldiers are struggling to recruit new ones as many young people feel let down by the same leaders who want to send them to war. Generation Z are anti-military and a Gallup Poll last year showed that only 32% of European young people are ready to consider a career in the military.

Old continent

Even if the EU acts vigorously to formulate and implement policies to influence demographic trends, it will take decades to produce results. Short-termism is structurally embedded in the EU’s political system as parliamentary terms lasting only up to five years condition political parties to focus on the next election and not to plan ahead to the 2050s and beyond.

In ‘Markets, migrants, microchips: European power in a world of demographic change’ (June 4), Alberto Rizzi, of the European Council on Foreign Relations, argues that “natalist” policies like tax breaks or cash handouts for couples who have more children are extremely costly and appear to be ineffective. Where they have been applied, birth rates have barely shifted.

This leaves the EU two main sources from where to acquire more citizens and people: enlargement and migration. Integrating Albania, North Macedonia, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine by 2035 would bring a further 48 million inhabitants into the EU. But a recent Carnegie Endowment report by Stefan Lehne and colleagues concluded that “the candidate countries, like much of central and eastern Europe, face population decline and labour shortages”.

This means that the only credible option the EU has to tackle its demographic decline is to welcome migrants from the rest of the world.

In its report (March 27) ‘The demographic divide: inequalities in ageing across the European Union’, the Bruegel policy institute recommends that: “Eastern EU countries should focus on retaining talent, attracting migrants in sectors with labour shortages and increasing labour-force participation by women and older workers. Southern countries should strengthen family-friendly and youth-employment policies, while improving migrant integration and regional infrastructure.

“Western and northern countries must prioritise migrant integration, rural development and gradual labour- market reforms for ageing populations. A coordinated EU plan for these different trends would support EU countries in addressing the challenges they will face. Integration of migrants into labour markets and societies will be especially important.”

Gerard Araud, a former French ambassador to the US (August 25, 2023), is not at all optimistic that the EU can address its demographic existential challenge seriously: “Europeans will fight over the question of immigration. The experts are very clear in their assessment: given the weak effectiveness of ‘natalist’ policies designed to increase birth rates, there is no alternative to overcoming demographic decline in Europe other than immigration.

“In today’s Europe, it is a euphemism to say that this solution won’t be generally welcomed. When a French minister recently hinted that we may have to accept a limi­ted number of immigrants to deal with shortages of personnel in some sectors, there was such an outcry that he immediately back pedalled.”

Referring to Germany, Araud said: “Indeed, such a well-needed influx of workers in a rapidly-ageing country would surely be impossible to renew given the rise of the far-right party, the AfD.”

And, looking towards the future, he concludes: “Every signal is pointing towards an inward-looking Europe. ‘Un continent de vieux’. The future of humankind will definitely be decided elsewhere.”

Evarist Bartolo is a former Labour foreign and education minister.