Demographics

The population structure of a country has strong implications for its economic future. As an example let us use my home country Germany (Table 1). Germany is an aging society. In the next 10 years the bulk of the boomer generation with 13 Mio people, who are between 56 and 65 years old today, will retire, while only 8 Mio young people will enter their working age years. That is, assuming no major change in migration and retirement age, the working age population will shrink by 5 Mio ≈ 10 % in the next 10 years.

**Table 1**: Age Structure of the German Population in 2025 (Source: destatis.de)
Age group	Size	Sub-group
Elderly: > 65 years	18 Mio
Working Age: 21 ... 65 years	49 Mio	(56 ... 65 years: 13 Mio)


Youth: < 21 years	16 Mio	(11 ... 20 years: 8 Mio)
	Total: 83 Mio (49% male, 51% female)	German citizens: 71 Mio Foreign citizens: 12 Mio

Let us further analyze the structure of the country's workforce (Table 2).

**Table 2**: Structure of the German Labor Force in 2025 (Source: Federal Employment Agency)
Type		Size	included Foreigners
Self-employed		3.7 Mio
Employees (subject to social security contributions)	Full time	24.1 Mio	5.7 Mio
Employees (subject to social security contributions)	Part time	10.8 Mio	5.7 Mio
Marginal jobs (< 600 € per month)		4.2 Mio
Registered unemployed		2.9 Mio (6.3%)	1.1 Mio
Total		45.7 Mio

Manufacturing industry 6.6 Mio, Construction industry ???

--- to be continued ---