Artificial Intelligence and Demographic Changes: A Vision for 2050

Abstract

There has been a lot of talk about AI in recent years, but mostly from two perspectives. First, there is significant interest in the issue of the relationship between AI and the political environment, which raises numerous questions regarding the temptation of dictatorships, as well as the far from innocent methods used to conduct electoral campaigns. The second major area of interest in AI research is related to the labour market, specifically how it is influenced and changed in real time, implicitly considering the situation of jobs lost or newly created. There is one aspect that influences both the labour market and a country's political choices, and that is demography. Obviously, it is not the only factor and cannot be analysed without considering its determinants: the economy, legislation, healthcare systems, etc. Since countries do not have the same population nor the same birth rates, it is important to try to understand "something" about the effects that new technology will bring to this area of interest, because from this we can make certain forecasts about the development of some countries, the decline of others, and – under certain conditions – even about changes to the borders of some countries. At this moment, it seems that governments (no matter their economic development level) are not fully aware of the changes that AI will bring regarding interpersonal relationships. If they are only interested in the political aspect, they will see that the demographic future of their own countries could also be influenced by AI devices, which become so integrated into the life of the average person and can completely change their outlook on life visions for having children, at least. As a result of these changes of children visions, however, it is possible that we will see countries seeking, including, unification with countries that are demographically stronger, because the population decline as an effect of AI will impact public budgets so much that they will become unsustainable, forcing the governments to search for a form of "saving the passive" through unification with other countries.