European and American populations: previous forecasts and present reality

Abstract

In 1944 the Economic and Financial Department of the League of Nations published a comprehensive study on population prospects for the period 1940-70 for Europe and the Soviet Union. The study set out, clarified and commented on the results of the forecasts of population trends in the various countries and on their breakdown by sex and age. Twenty years after the preparation of these calculations, the present article compares between the prospects as they appeared at the time and the actual developments that took place. Glaring divergences are revealed which confirm the difficulty of making reliable long-term population forecasts and show the radical change in population trends in many European countries. The author brings out the extent and nature of this change which could hardly have been foreseen on the eve of the First World War and has been the subject of numerous studies.

JEL: Q56, R23, J11