U.S. economy shrank at a 1.4% annual rate in the first quarter
It’s always good to remind people that:<p>GDP ~= Population * Productivity<p>If your population growth flat-lines (which it did last year), productivity has to compensate.<p>Can productivity compensate if the average age is getting older (people tend to be less productive after a certain median age)?<p>One reason investing in index funds makes sense is the underlying assumption that global population growth keeps increasing (GDP for ‘free’).<p>I’m super interested in what investing looks like in 50-100 years as the population starts collapsing, because it might collapse faster than productivity can possibly compensate for, which means unstoppable GDP decline.<p>GDP has to be at certain levels to support different types of economic activity. E.g. at some point, GDP might be low enough that new semiconductor research isn’t affordable (because all the workers are used up caring for the elderly for example).