Forecasting labour supply and population : an integrated stochastic model

This paper presents a stochastic integrated model to forecast the German population and labour supply until 2060. Within a cohort-component approach, the population forecast applies principal components to birth, mortality, emigration and immigration rates. The labour force participation rates are estimated by means of an econometric time series approach. All time series are forecast by bootstrapping. This allows fully integrated simulations and the possibility to illustrate the uncertainties in the form of confidence intervals. Our new forecast confirms the results from former studies. We conclude that even rising birth rates and high levels of immigration cannot break the basic demographic trend in the long run.