The long term (but while we are still alive) outlook for China, & its demand for Australian commodities is BAD.
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China has the worst demographic outlook of any country. The 'one child' policy potentially will see China become a failed state due to the lack of workers to care for the elderly. At one stage (post 1950s) there were about 4 to 5 workers per over 65 yr old. It is now down to 1.something and due to head below 1 in the years ahead.
A second issue, from the 'one child' era is that the (normally males in the urban areas, with female babies often dying unexpectedly shortly after birth, coincidentally so the family name continues...) boys became known as 'Little Emperors'. Generalisations to follow...
They never had to lift a finger at home, waited on and lavished with whatever the parents could afford. Resulted in several generations who make BAD workers. Low to no work ethic, won't follow instructions, etc etc.
In early 2000s doing some in depth research on China I found that there was a worker shortage. The ideal factory worker was an unmarried, female, from the country & aged under 25. They were in very short supply, to the extent that they were being offered effective sign-on bonuses as well as 'anniversary bonuses'. Traditionally many rural Chinese would work for the factory that was started (long ago) by someone originally from their village. The factory was not in their village though, and required the workers to live on-site in dormitories.
This started back when perhaps 80% of the population lived rurally.
With the shrinking rural population, the worker supply used to hard work has fallen drastically as well just as at the same time the % of Little Emperors began to sky rocket. Perhaps this is also why an increasing proportion of young woman choose NOT to marry or have children...
All-in-all China is in the thralls of a vicious cycle.
Meanwhile China has no health safety net. If you cannot pay then you do not get treated, potentially going blind, organ failure, die etc. Similarly there is no Retirement Care system (vs in Australia). Traditionally the rest of the family looked after the aged parents (of which many did not live that long).
Today parents & grand parents are not getting killed off by famines etc so their population % has ballooned, again just as the available family to look after them has fallen.
At the same time, the proportion of Chinese fresh water that is so polluted (poisoned by industrial waste going straight into the rivers thanks to paying off the local CCP officials) is upwards of 70 to 80% - hence the spread to Africa & South America for agricutural produce.
