China’s elderly now outnumber children for the first time

The country’s old-age dependency ratio, which measures the number of people 65 and older as a share of the working-age population, rose to 23.1% last year, overtaking the child dependency ratio of 22%, according to data released last week by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) and reported by Yicai.

More than 223 million people in China are 65 or older, compared with roughly 213 million children aged 14 and under, according to government data. 

“The costs of an ageing population fall more heavily on pensions, healthcare and long-term care,” Stuart Gietel-Basten, a professor of social science and public policy at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, says.

China’s state pension fund risks running out of money by 2035, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences warned in 2019.

The country’s population fell for a fourth consecutive year in 2025, dropping by 3.4 million people to 1.405 billion. The birth rate slid to 5.63 births per 1,000 people, its lowest level since the People’s Republic of China was founded in 1949.

“What matters most for China’s economy is not the ratio itself but how many people work, how productive they are, and how long they stay healthy,” Gietel-Basten says.

China’s demographic decline could affect the country’s long-term economic health. A smaller workforce must fund pensions and care for a population that is aging faster than those of most developed economies.

The birth rate has declined for decades amid rapid urbanization and the one-child policy, which Beijing enforced from 1980 to 2015 to curb population growth. The government provided financial incentives to families that complied, while those that broke the rules faced fines. 

China allowed families to have two children from 2016, then allowed families up to three children in 2021 and removed the penalties. Yet many Chinese couples are choosing not to have children, often citing the high cost of housing, education, and childcare.

To encourage couples to have children, China announced last year that it would offer parents a subsidy of 3,600 yuan ($540) a year for each child under three. The government is also gradually raising the retirement age to 63 for men, to 58 for women in white-collar jobs, and to 55 for women in blue-collar jobs

China’s aging population is creating a market for the “silver economy” or goods and services designed to meet the needs of older consumers. Beijing expects the sector to grow to 30 trillion yuan ($4.5 trillion) by 2035.

“Looking ahead, as China’s workforce continues to shrink and its population ages, investing more in education and training, along with using new technologies such as artificial intelligence and automation, will become increasingly important to help workers produce more and keep China’s economy growing,” Xiujian Peng, a senior research fellow at Victoria University’s Center of Policy Studies, says.