Why our ageing world could accelerate progress in AI and robotics

MUCH is made of intergenerational conflicts, with boomers pitted against millennials or Gen Zers. But however these competing needs are resolved today, in the future, younger people will become an increasingly prized resource, because there will be fewer of them.

Populations are slowly being skewed older than ever before by two seemingly unstoppable demographic forces. One is that, as countries become more prosperous, there is a decline in the number of children that people have. When that figure drops below the population replacement level of 2.1 children per woman – unless offset by immigration – the head count shrinks, as…