Jun 3rd 2023

The baby-bust economy: How declining birth rates will change the world

The world this week

Leaders

Loch mess

Scotland has been on a ten-year holiday from reality

Populism can unravel quickly. But its effects are long-lasting

The baby-bust economy

Global fertility has collapsed, with profound economic consequences

What might change the world’s dire demographic trajectory?

Erdogain

How to make the re-election of Recep Tayyip Erdogan less bad news

There is a chance for a partial reset

Soldiers, go home

Pakistan’s perma-crisis

Imran Khan, Pakistan’s most popular politician, must be free to contest timely elections

Nvincible?

The AI boom has turbocharged Nvidia’s fortunes. Can it hold its position?

Competition and regulation may pose a threat—but only eventually

Letters

On Congress and China, the WHO and covid, Martin Luther King, English nationalism, building homes, artificial intelligence, Vegemite, Dutch

Letters to the editor

By Invitation

Russia’s army

Dara Massicot believes that Russia faces twin personnel crises in its armed forces

Briefing

The old and the zestless

It’s not just a fiscal fiasco: greying economies also innovate less

That compounds the problems of shrinking workforces and rising bills for health care and pensions

United States

Debt ceiling

America avoids financial Armageddon but stays in fiscal hell

Forgive and forget

The moratorium on repaying student loans in America was a bad idea

Where the neon signs are pretty

Can downtown densification rescue Cleveland?

The prodigal son

House Republicans are no closer to tying Hunter Biden’s activities to Joe

Now showing in local theatres

America’s states are pursuing their own foreign policies

The red and the black

Conservative Americans are building a parallel economy

Lexington

Nikki Haley, like other long shots, sees a path to victory

The Americas

Grand plans, poor execution

Lula cosies up to Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s autocrat

Latin America’s stream of soft power

Bad Bunny, a superstar rapper, is good business

Asia

Taiwan’s elections

Who will be Taiwan’s next president?

India’s new parliament building

Narendra Modi is rebuilding New Delhi

A military defeat

Imran Khan loses his battle with Pakistan’s army

In hot water

Japan’s hot-spring resorts are blocking geothermal energy plants

Banyan

The strange tale of a prominent North Korean defector

China

The job search goes on

China’s young want to work. For the government

Stuck in the trap

New research helps explain why China’s low birth rates are stuck

Surfing the second wave

China goes from zero-covid to zero restrictions

Bunny power

A famous brand of Chinese sweets reinvents itself again

Middle East & Africa

Nearly nuclear

Iran puts its nuclear programme beyond the reach of American bombs

Gimme my whack!

Business families in the Gulf need modern laws of inheritance

The worse of two bad men

What next for Sudan’s most notorious rebel leader, known as Hemedti?

Africa’s persecuted gays

Uganda’s harsh anti-gay bill is now law

Europe

Five more years

Recep Tayyip Erdogan is re-elected as Turkey’s president

Going for broke

Spain’s prime minister gambles on a snap general election

Better late than never

Ukraine gets its F-16s

Polarising Poland

Poland’s government may seek to bar opponents from politics

Grain water

Ukraine’s Danube ports have become a lifeline

Charlemagne

Bakhmut and the spirit of Verdun

Britain

Up in the air

After a decade of SNP dominance, Scotland’s politics is suddenly in flux

Decline and pall

Sad little boys: the backlash against Britain’s boarding schools

Old standard

Britain is falling behind in clinical trials of medicines

Trial and error

How should Britain reform rape-trial laws?

With a little kelp from my friends

Can British seaweed farms bloom?

Bagehot

Britain’s new political sorcerer: the Reform Fairy

International

#Freespeech

The speech police are coming for social media

Business

There’s AI in them thar hills

Nvidia is not the only firm cashing in on the AI gold rush

ChatBoss

Chief executives cannot shut up about AI

A tale of three tie-ups

Dealmaking has slowed—except among dealmakers

Bankruptcy in India

Go First’s insolvency tests India’s bankruptcy regime

Champagne lifestyle

Is the luxury sector recession-proof?

Bartleby

How to beat desk rage

Schumpeter

Australia and Canada are one economy—with one set of flaws

Finance & economics

Exodus

A new wave of mass migration has begun

Crude problems

The world’s oil-price benchmark is being radically reformed

A pricey shot

America will struggle to pay for ultra-expensive gene therapies

Monetary madness

Turkey’s bizarre economic experiment enters a new phase

Tiny toolbox

Why China’s government might struggle to revive its economy

Buttonwood

Investors go back into battle with rising interest rates

Free exchange

What does the perfect carbon price look like?

Science & technology

Fish out of water

The future of fish farming is on land

This will only hurt a little

Mosquitoes, wasps and parasitic worms could help make injections less painful

The climate in 2100

Temperatures of 50°C will become much more common around the Mediterranean

The language of the law

Why legal writing is so awful

David vs Goliath

There is more than one way to make green steel

Culture

South Africa after apartheid

Winnie Madikizela-Mandela has been subject to historical revisionism

An affair to remember

Jenny Erpenbeck’s new novel follows lovers in crumbling East Germany

World in a dish

Immigrants are changing Central Texas barbecue for the better

Look on my works

Ramesses the Great was a superb self-promoter

Culture and the Holocaust

Aleksander Kulisiewicz preserved the music of the Nazi camps

Back Story

The comic opera of England

The Economist reads

The anti-imperialists strike back

What to read to understand imperialism and colonialism

Economic & financial indicators

Indicators

Economic data, commodities and markets

Graphic detail

Low-hanging fruit

Cheap vaccines could prevent millions of deaths from cervical cancer

The Economist explains

The Economist explains

How Hong Kong is snuffing out memories of Tiananmen Square

The Economist explains

What does “de-risking” trade with China mean?

Obituary

Shine, no matter what