When I picked up Demographic Deception by Dustin Whitney, I had a sense of unease. The title led me to expect a book in the “popular demography” genre; a genre to which unfortunately few trained demographers contribute and which has frequently been a platform for authors proffering “simple” demographic solutions to global ills, with sometimes far-reaching appeal and dangerous consequences.

However, it would be a mistake to judge this book by its title. Whitney (“a curious businessman with a particular interest in the future”) may be writing from outside of academic demography and in a popular style but his reading of the field is well-referenced and carefully navigated. He explores big demographic issues and their intersections with other global forces in an even-handed, restrained, and thoughtful way. The general argument of the book is that rather than being concerned about population growth (the eponymous “deception” in the title), we should rather focus more on depopulation and aging as we move further into the twenty-first century. The first few chapters consider population growth and its associated panic, then discuss how the population is modeled followed by the story of how the “population bomb” was diffused. Then follows a balanced comparison between the “good and bad news” about population decline and the typical responses which are proposed, namely raising fertility, engaging older persons, and immigration.

Unlike many other protagonists writing in the field, Whitney does not seem to be grounded in any strong political or cultural ideology but rather takes a fairly centrist view. This, in itself, is quite encouraging. The chapter on raising fertility is excellent on the downsides of pronatalism and ultimately lands on a rights-based approach. The approach is epitomized by the quote by Shepherd and Li that “While having a child should be everyone's right, it isn't anyone's responsibility.” The chapter on enabling work in older ages is a wide-ranging consideration of the barriers to work as part of older age and what can be done to remove them such as tackling agism head-on, embracing gerontechnology, adapting work systems, and so on. While many writers with more nationalistic tendencies bristle at the idea of immigration as potentially mitigating some of the effects of population aging, Whitney is more open to maximizing the potential role of immigration in offsetting some of the economic and social challenges of population aging and decline, embracing the idea of a kind of global HR firm which ‘recruits, prepares, places, protects’ migrant workers. I really appreciated the chapter on the role of business, too; this is an often-overlooked aspect in popular discussions of falling birth rates which usually lay all of the blame (and responsibility for change) on either governments or families. Business, Whitney argues, has to get better at accommodating older workers, supporting working parents, making better use of technology, and rejecting corporate short-termism in the face of a longer-term structural, demographic change.

While not as comprehensive as, say, Vegard Skirbekk’s Decline and Prosper! Changing Global Birth Rates and the Advantages of Fewer Children, the book is well-researched and scientifically sound. For example, academic demographers might want to see more than a few pages on different population projections and their underlying methodologies. However, the fact that these divergent futures are presented at all and are being made accessible to a general audience is to be highly commended. As such, what it might lack in comprehensiveness and detail compared to Decline and Prosper! it makes up for in accessibility and also, I think, a sense of urgency. Both the book (and its underlying arguments) could be strengthened by further broadening the evidence base to include concepts such as National Transfer Accounts, prospective aging as well as an exploration of fertility preferences.

What I liked about it most, however, was the constructive, rationally optimistic tone throughout the whole book. In the conclusion, Whitney reflects on the natural tendency to become pessimistic when staring down “big problems”: “That's why so many people look to the future with such a profound sense of gloom…They believe our problems are unsolvable, that all our good days are behind us, that things can only get worse.” Worse still we can panic. And panic, as Whitney cites Wang Feng, “can lead to hasty policy and human tragedy.”

“Adopting this stance,” however, “will not help us avert the problems associated with aging and declining populations.” Indeed, as he continues, “We've solved countless big problems, for the whole of our history…. There's no reason to believe we can't solve—or better yet, avert—problems associated with aging societies and population decline too.” He recognizes, though, that it will be hard—not least in a world of political polarization.

The title does not do the book justice, and some technical issues are, perhaps, oversimplified. However, this is not a text primarily designed for academic demographers. Indeed, that is the very point of the book. Whitney is doing academic demography a favor by distilling and communicating our arguments effectively. Perhaps more of us should step up to do the same.

当我拿起达斯汀·惠特尼的《人口统计欺骗》时，我有一种不安的感觉。这本书的标题让我期待一本“流行人口统计学”类型的书。不幸的是，这种类型很少有受过训练的人口统计学家做出贡献，而且它经常成为作者为全球弊病提供“简单”人口解决方案的平台，有时会产生深远的吸引力和危险的后果。

然而，仅凭书名来判断这本书是错误的。惠特尼（“一位对未来特别感兴趣的好奇商人”）可能是在学术人口统计学之外以流行的风格写作，但他对该领域的阅读有充分的参考文献和仔细的导航。他以一种公平、克制和深思熟虑的方式探讨了重大的人口问题及其与其他全球力量的交叉点。这本书的总体论点是，随着我们进入二十一世纪，我们不应该关注人口增长（标题中的同名“欺骗”），而应该更多地关注人口减少和老龄化。前几章考虑了人口增长及其相关的恐慌，然后讨论了如何对人口进行建模，然后讲述“人口炸弹”如何扩散的故事。然后对人口下降的“好消息和坏消息”与所提出的典型应对措施（即提高生育率、吸引老年人和移民）进行平衡比较。

与该领域的许多其他主角不同，惠特尼似乎并没有任何强烈的政治或文化意识形态，而是采取了相当中间派的观点。这本身就非常令人鼓舞。关于提高生育率的章节很好地阐述了生育主义的缺点，并最终采取了基于权利的方法。 Shepherd 和 Li 的一句话概括了这种方法：“虽然生孩子应该是每个人的权利，但这不是任何人的责任。”关于促进老年工作的章节广泛考虑了老年工作的障碍，以及可以采取哪些措施消除这些障碍，例如正面解决无性别歧视、拥抱老年技术、调整工作系统等。 。虽然许多具有更多民族主义倾向的作家对移民可能减轻人口老龄化的一些影响的想法感到愤怒，但惠特尼更愿意最大限度地发挥移民在抵消人口老龄化和下降带来的一些经济和社会挑战方面的潜在作用，拥抱一种“招募、准备、安置和保护”移民工人的全球人力资源公司的理念。我也非常欣赏关于商业角色的章节。这是关于出生率下降的流行讨论中经常被忽视的一个方面，通常将所有责任（以及变革的责任）归咎于政府或家庭。惠特尼认为，面对长期的结构性人口变化，企业必须更好地适应老年工人、支持工作父母、更好地利用技术以及拒绝企业短期主义。

虽然不如Vegard Skirbekk的《衰落与繁荣》那么全面！ 《不断变化的全球出生率和少生孩子的优势》这本书经过深入研究，科学合理。例如，学术人口统计学家可能希望看到更多有关不同人口预测及其基本方法的页面。然而，这些不同的未来被呈现出来并被普通观众所接受，这一事实值得高度赞扬。因此，与衰落与繁荣相比，它可能缺乏全面性和细节！它弥补了可访问性，而且我认为还弥补了紧迫感。这两本书（及其基本论点）都可以通过进一步扩大证据基础来加强，包括国民转移账户、预期老龄化以及对生育偏好的探索等概念。

然而，我最喜欢的是整本书的建设性、理性乐观的基调。在结论中，惠特尼反思了当盯着“大问题”时变得悲观的自然倾向：“这就是为什么这么多人以如此深刻的悲观情绪展望未来……他们认为我们的问题是无法解决的，我们所有的好处都没有。”日子已经过去了，事情只会变得更糟。”更糟糕的是，我们可能会感到恐慌。正如惠特尼引用王峰的话，恐慌“可能导致草率的政策和人类悲剧。”

然而，“采取这种立场”“无助于我们避免与老龄化和人口减少相关的问题。”事实上，正如他继续说道的那样，“在我们的整个历史中，我们已经解决了无数的大问题......没有理由相信我们无法解决——或者更好的是避免——与老龄化社会和人口下降相关的问题。”不过，他承认这会很困难——尤其是在一个政治两极分化的世界里。

书名并没有体现出这本书的公正性，而且一些技术问题也许过于简单化了。然而，这并不是一本主要为学术人口统计学家设计的文本。事实上，这正是这本书的要点。惠特尼通过有效地提炼和传达我们的论点，为学术人口统计学提供了帮助。也许我们更多的人应该站出来做同样的事情。