OPINION: Adaptation is imperative for Alaskans in a changing world

What’s at the root of our political and social malaise? I believe it is a deep and profound sense of disorientation. Things seem out of balance. Out of control.

“I’ve got the feeling that something ain’t right.” That’s a lyric from “Stuck in the Middle With You,” the Stealers Wheel hit from the 1970s.

For younger folks, it’s also the theme song for “Gracie and Frankie,” the popular Netflix comedy series with Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin. Grace Potter sang that version.

So what “ain’t right?” What’s causing the discomfort: the pandemic? Climate change?

Both of those and more. But at the bottom of everything is demographics, I believe. Things are changing in America. Some people don’t like it.

The white, Christian people who ran America since 1776 won’t run things much longer. People of color are moving into the majority, or at least people of mixed-race heritage.

There are some who are fighting this, hoping to stem the tide. The growth of white supremacist groups is one ugly manifestation. So is the effort to limit voting rights in ways that suppress voting by minorities.

I remember when Barack Obama was first elected president in 2008. Many of us were thrilled, thinking that having our first Black president would show how our country was becoming more culturally diverse and tolerant.

How wrong we were. The opposite happened. We are more culturally diverse, but we’re now less tolerant as the shrinking status quo tries to cling to power.

We see this reflected in anti-immigrant feelings, or at least immigrants of a different color (although things like that have a long history in America, sadly).

Of course, fear of the unknown “other,” and of losing control, is deeply rooted in our psychology. Throughout history, we’ve fought tribal wars against others who don’t look like us or who speak different languages or have different customs. What we have now is just new tribal warfare.

But sorry, white supremacists. You’re losing the fight. The tide is irreversible.

UAA Professor Ralph Townsend talked about some of this in his recent webinar on Alaska demographic change, presented by the university’s Institute of Social and Economic Research.

Townsend talked mostly about Alaska and how our working-age population has been declining and will shrink further. Alaska’s working-age adult population is shrinking, creating problems for employers.

Townsend also said that the pool of working-age adults is a national trend, which means shortages of workers is not just Alaska’s problem.

Demographics are driving this. More and more educated women of child-bearing age are choosing to defer having children and having fewer of them. We see the same trend across most of Europe and advanced Asian nations like Japan. It will soon happen in China, too.

Not enough children — future workers — are being born in these countries to sustain economic prosperity.

In his talk, Townsend said European nations and Canada see a solution to this in encouraging immigration. America can’t seem to do this — there’s too much gridlock.

We’re so busy in tribal warfare that we can’t execute an intelligent immigration system to offset the decline of our workers.

Here’s where polarized politics joins economic decline: If new American-born children are too few to replace retiring American workers and we can’t import new talent for our economy because of politics, our country will decline. Period.

Some think labor-saving automation and artificial intelligence (think robots) will offset this, but most believe the changes are too broad and sweeping.

We certainly can’t import skilled workers from other, mostly white, industrialized nations because their birth rates are plummeting below replacement rates. In Russia, birth rates have fallen off the cliff and even Vladimir Putin can’t order Russian women to have more babies.

The talent pool that is available is among developing nations, particularly Latin America, South Asia or Africa. In other words, people of color.

The unfortunate truth for the white supremacist crowd is that the only way to keep our economy stable, replacing retiring workers, is through immigration. Since most of those will be people of color, the changes in American society will accelerate.

That may exacerbate the political tensions as the shrinking minority tries to cling to power, but it’s a reality we must deal with.

Townsend, by the way, had good suggestions on easing Alaska’s own worker shortage, such as improving child care and improving education. I would add creating economic development here, so young Alaskans have a reason to stick around.

As for the big picture, no one across the developed world has figured out a way to convince women to have more babies.

But there may be something else at work that’s even more scary. Some scientists also see signs that widespread declining fertility in western industrial societies is linked to environmental contamination by toxins.

Erin Brockovich of the Guardian wrote about this last year in her review of a provocative new book, Count Down, by Shanna Swan, an environmental and reproductive epidemiologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York

Brockovich cites research by Swan that sperm counts have dropped almost 60% since 1973.

“Following the trajectory we are on, Swan’s research suggests sperm counts could reach zero by 2045. Zero. Let that sink in. That would mean no babies. No reproduction. No more humans,” Brockovich wrote in the Guardian.

So we need not worry about climate change. We’ll end the human race by poisoning the planet in other ways.

Tim Bradner is publisher of the Alaska Economic Report and Alaska Legislative Digest.

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