It may look like it’s growing. It’s shrinking instead.
We’re top heavy with old folk, but young ones are few.
Adult diapers outsell baby ones in Japan.
Medical advances have increased the lifespan.
Soon the world’s elderly will surpass and outdo
Other groups in their numbers until they are dead…

…Which won’t happen as soon as it had long ago.
Overpopulation is a myth come and gone.
Until recently, birth rates continued to rise.
People aren’t making babies, thinking it’s more wise
To preserve their resources. The young are more drawn
To things other than breeding. They’re fine people though.

It’s an inverted demographic pyramid
Situation where age saturation occurs
At around sixty years. And as birth rates decline,
We may go on believing that everything’s fine,
But to replace this generation one prefers,
And that ain’t gonna happen, as time does forbid.

Populations diminishing of people who
Are producing wage earners who spend a lot more
Is the problem we face. Drastic change is needed
To reverse the condition, but looking ahead
Is a thing we don’t do well. What we are in for
Is severe yet not understood. What will we do?