1. How does the shape of the world population pyramid change from 1950 to 2100? What are the implications for the world’s age structure?
2. In 2022, what age cohort (e.g., 10-14) contains the greatest percentage of the population for Italy AND Niger respectively? What does this mean for the future population trends for each country?
3. Which continent (Australia, Africa, Asia, Europe, North America, or South America) has about 17.5% of the world’s population in 2022 but is projected to have 39% in 2100? Why do you think this could happen?
4. Do the populations of materially wealthy countries or materially poor countries grow faster (in any year)?
5. The world population growth rate from 1950 to 2020 steadily increased and the number of people more than doubled. How are the growth rate and population increase projected to change in the next 70 years?
6. What unusual feature is evident in the 2022 population pyramid of the Persian Gulf states of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Kuwait? What explains this?
7. The 1950 population pyramids of Germany, the Russian Federation, Ukraine, and Poland (as well as many other central European nations) have two unusual features as compared to their 2020 pyramids. What are these two features and what explains them?