The Northern Triangle Countries Are NOT Falling Off a Demographic Cliff

Thanks to my son and co-author Greg Weeks for pointing me to a recent online commentary from the Center for Global Development, a "think-and-do-tank" in Washington, DC. Michael Clemens and Jimmy Graham posted "Three Facts You Haven't Heard Much About Are Keys to Better Policy Toward Central America." The first one they discuss is that "Central America is falling off a demographic cliff—so migration will slow." They argue that UN demographic data show that the youthful populations in the Northern Triangle countries of El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala are about to decline dramatically and that will slow down migration from those countries, just as it has from Mexico--as a result of declining fertility--as I discuss in the forthcoming 13th Edition of my text.

The problem with their analysis is that the data simply don't show what they say. The United Nations demographers' medium projections show that the youthful, migration-age populations in Guatemala and Honduras will continue to increase in number for at least another decade, and after that we will see only a gradual slowdown. It is true that the number of youths in El Salvador will be a bit smaller in 2030 than now, but the change is not dramatic. There is no current evidence that any of the three Northern Triangle countries are falling off a demographic cliff. As much as I would have liked for their story to be true, the data simply don't paint the picture they have put out there.