Questions about Population

Here's some questions you guys have raised regarding population

1. What do other countries with ageing population do to solve their problems? Do they do the same as Singapore?

ST's answer: The solutions by the different countries revolves around the similar ideas of : Having more babies, postponing retirement age, increasing number of foreign workers. However in some countries, there are instances whereby they reduce the pensions of the elderly to reduce the drain of resources (pensions : an arrangement to provide people with an income when they are no longer earning a regular income from employment - from wiki). Note that Singapore do not have pension schemes. Hence majority of the ageing policies are similar, but there are still some slightly different ones. If you are really keen on this topic, how about researching on ageing countries such as Japan and parts of Europe (UK, France, Italy etc)


2. Does countries like Canada have low birth rate? Why?

ST's answer: Yes. Similar reasons to Singapore and other ageing countries
1. Increasing women working before starting a family
2. Preferencce for 1 child : Hard to juggle between work and family
3. Prefer not to have children : Lost of freedom, do not need children to take care of them when old

Check this out :http://www.statcan.gc.ca/daily-quotidien/040419/dq040419b-eng.htm














3. How come LDCs have HIGH BR and DR? Why isnt it HIGH BR and LOW DR?

ST's answer: Less developed countries are economically less developed, hence medical care and services are more backward. Problems such as lack of medical aid, malnutrition, overcrowding etc will lead to high BR and high DR. Death Rate remains HIGH because these medical and food issues affects them as well. Low DR = Improved healthcare and longer life expectancy, hence numbers of people dying would be lesser. (If this confuse you, can u check with me in class, and i'll explain again)


4. Ageing population is a problem but wont the population with lotsa kids have problems too? What if the working people have not enough to work for them? Who to teach them?

ST's answer: Basically there are problems in both the LDC and DC. In LDC, the problems of high birth rate strains the countries resources on the basic necessities eg food/shelter(refer to notes). However in a DC, ageing population will of course has its issues such as lack of workers for jobs, manpower shortage, straining resources on elderly health care etc( refer to notes).

So basically what we are studying is how the different countries have the different issues, and the solutions to it. There is no perfect scenario as the government will always be making changes according to the problems they have. Try not to confuse yourself and stray to think that there should only be 1 'best' population type.


5. Which country has the lowest population and what is the country?

Vatican City (Italy)
Population size - 920
Size: 1 sq km,
Population density - 920 sq km
Land area - 0.44 sq miles

Can anyone find any other smaller population that this??