Quoted:
Why is depopulation viewed as "bad"?
View Quote
If you're a government (read: not you and I), depopulation is very, very bad because it drops a nuke on your economy (unless you are very lucky, and able to transition to an economic model that doesn't need as many workers) and government services (a rapidly-shrinking population of working-age adults means there's not enough of a taxbase to pay for the benefits the already-retired people were promised*).
The USA might slide though to the other side, due to automation....but places like China, which doesn't have enough runway to change away from a "cheap labor/many hands" model, are going down in flames.
Hell, we're about to see a real decline in the availability of Credit in the US (unless we get a lot of Capital flight to us, due to crunching economies in Europe and Asia), as the Boomers are finally being forced into retirement and are cashing out their investments to fund their lives.
*-and, TBF, it's not a case of "tighten your belt, Grandpa!", but more that people will starve/die when things like SS, VA retirement, and Medicare have to be cut.