The futures of Polish population, 2004-2054

Marek Kupiszewski, Central European Forum for Migration and Population Research (CEFMR)
Jakub Bijak, University of Southampton

The paper presents a multivariant 50 years population and labour force forecast for Poland. The main features of population dynamics in Poland are: negative net migration, low fertility, well below the replacement level, decreasing mortality, and negative natural change. The paper gives an insight into the impact of these demographic characteristics on the future population and its structures. It is clear that the direction of changes of components of growth have led to a total population decline and ageing, which are most likely going to intensify in the future. Another important phenomenon, consequent to population decline and ageing processes, is a decrease and ageing of the labour force, which may lead to labour shortages, unless there are substantial changes in labour demand. Variants of the forecast are design to show the consequences of different possible migration scenarios and therefore can be used to determine the sensitivity of the population development to the migration flows.