COIOS
COIOS

Which population projection assumptions are being rewritten, migration most of all

Population projections are being revised more often and by more, and migration is the assumption doing most of the work. The ONS's 2022-based projections raised the long-run net migration assumption substantially over the previous round; the UN lowered its long-run fertility path and its peak population; Eurostat, Japan and Korea have all revised toward older, smaller populations. Migration is the least stable assumption because it is the least predictable: it responds to policy, conflict and labour demand within a year, where fertility and mortality move over decades. Statistical offices know this and are responding differently — some publishing variants, some moving toward probabilistic ranges, some holding a single central assumption because users want one number. The evidence that the assumptions are being rewritten is clear; what has not been done systematically is the comparison of each vintage with what followed, which would show which assumptions have historically been wrong by most.

Status
building
Direction
strengthening
Would change our view
A national office replacing point assumptions with probabilistic projections as its main output, or an ex-post evaluation across vintages showing that fertility rather than migration has dominated the errors.
Trackers
Gaps
A systematic comparison of projection vintages against outturns across countries; offices that publish assumptions without their rationale.