(Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images) May 24, 2021 3:42 PM ET Font Size: An “avalanche” of “expanding and accelerating” demographic forces is driving birth rates down, demographers warned The New York Times. The publication described ghost cities in northeastern China, South Korean universities scrambling for students, hundreds of thousands of razed properties in Germany and shut down maternity wards in Italy. Demographers predicted to the Times that by the second half of the century — or earlier — the global population will enter a sustained decline. “A paradigm shift is necessary,” German demographer Frank Swiacznyn told the Times. “Countries need to learn to live with and adapt to decline.”