City of Shanghai in 2065

¶ … Ah Cy, president and CEO of SAIC Motors, looked out the window of her executive office on the 210th floor of the newly constructed, multi-billion dollar Celestial Building overlooking the Huangpu River in Shanghai and was pleased with what she saw. In just 20 years, Shanghai had cleaned up its environment, virtually eliminated poverty and had provided modern housing and comprehensive social services for its more than 50 million residents, meaning that it was still the largest city in the world just as it had been in 2015. Indeed, Ms. Cy had good reason to be pleased since these were not insignificant accomplishments and reflected the city's ability to overcome the challenges it faced a half century before. In fact, it had only been in 2040 that scientists had cautioned the Chinese leadership that if actions were not taken immediately, it might be too late to reverse the environmental impact of the meteoric and largely unregulated growth of the Chinese economy over the previous two and a half decades.

To their credit, in response to these dire predictions, city leaders in Shanghai implemented a rigorous plan to reverse the environmental effects of centuries of relentless growth on the level of the Manhattan Project. More than $500 billion had been invested in the initial effort, and the total increased to more than $1 trillion by the time city leaders were satisfied with the results. Mandates had been issued to reduce the level of pollution by existing industries and new regulations were enacted to ensure that future enterprises were as green as possible in their operations. Waste management practices were improved to reuse and recycle nearly 100% of the city's waste, and water recycling programs were implemented to increase the amount of potable water that was available to the city.

The cumulative effects of these initiatives served to improve the regional quality of the environment surrounding Shanghai, but there were still national-level environmental issues that impacted the city and over which it had less control. Nevertheless, Ms. Cy was justifiably proud that her own company had been in the vanguard of those that implemented the new environmental regulations, even going so far as to exceed their requirements. Although the company's shareholders initially balked at the enormous expense involved in these initiatives, the need for drastic steps to address the fundamental environmental problems facing Shanghai took precedence and the company's investment in greener operating practices had actually paid major dividends over the years.

The city's achievement in reducing pollution levels in the region and improving the quality of the water from the Yangtze River and the Qingcaosha Reservoir in particular had been studied by numerous other countries seeking to duplicate their success. There had also been major additions to the Shanghai infrastructure over the past 40-year period that benefited all Shanghai residents, including the completion of the Lupu Bridge, the Fuxing Tunnel, and numerous additions to the city's metro lines (Shanghai specific issues, 2015). In addition, the deepwater Yangshan Port had been completed and the Shanghai Port had been fully modernized (Shanghai specific issues, 2015).

While these were spectacular accomplishments, Ms. Cy also recognized that the city's political and business leaders could not rest on their laurels because the city continued to experience rapid growth rates and city planners projected that Shanghai's population would soon reach untenable levels. After all, in 2013, the population of Shanghai was estimated at nearly 24 million, and the city experienced double-digit growth each year during the period from 1992 through 2014 with the sole exception of 2008-2009 following the global economic downturn (Shanghai population, 2015). In 2015, Shanghai was already the largest city in China as well as the entire world in terms of population with one of the highest population densities at 9,700 people per square mile (Shanghai population, 2015).

The median age of Chinese citizens in general had also changed in substantive ways over the past half century, with the median age of citizens increasing by around 4 years. For instance, in 2015, China's population demographics were broken down by gender and age as shown in Figure 1 below.

Figure 1. China's Population Pyramid: 2015

Source: CIA World Factbook at https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/graphics/population/CH_popgraph%202014.bmp

As can be seen in Figure 1 above, the median age for Chinese citizens in 2015 was around 42 years; by 2050, though, the median age of China's residents increased to 46 years and demographers report that the median age continued to increase to 2065 to 50 years.

Figure 2. Population Projections for 2050

Source: http://www.pewresearch.org/files/2014/01/PG_14.01.29_agingFacts_3_ medianAges.png

These demographic changes may appear modest on their face, but they indicate that an increasing percentage of the city's population is nearing retirement age. The traditional means of caring for retirees in China, though, had also changed in major ways over the past 50 years and fewer elderly parents were living with their children, resulting in the introduction of long-term care facilities in the city which were largely unknown in years past (Smart, 2009). These fundamental shifts in traditional values and norms did not have the earth-shattering consequences that many observers predicted, and because, like in 2015, Chinese people in Shanghai enjoyed the longest lifespans on earth, there was a growing number of great-grandparents and even great-great-grand parents in good health who were available for counsel and support despite living in separate accommodations. The fact that Shanghainese still embraced this aspect of Chinese culture heartened Ms. Cy because she was herself over 80 years old and expected to retire in another 10 or 15 years. In fact, it was not unusual for people to work well into their 90s and beyond, as long as their physical abilities allowed.