“Demographics is no longer a dusty concern of academics and eccentrics“, wrote columnist John Dizard in yesterday’s Financial Times.
“It’s not just state pension burdens and tax revenues that are shifting with European demographics. Corporate bond and equity issuers are also much more dependent on diverging demographic prospects.
“Before, say, 1934, nuclear physics was of interest to chalk-dusted academics. After that, the field started to grow into a vast and powerful industry. Demographic bombs take longer to detonate than the nuclear variety, but they are a serious threat to southern Europe, Japan, Korea and China.”
(From the Financial Times, 8 July)