Page - (000039) - in Disrupted Development and the Future of Inequality in the Age of Automation

3 DEINDUSTRIALIZATION AND TERTIARIZATION IN THE DEVELOPING … 29 sectors are also significant, certainly in contrast to other regions where productivity has grown less or even fallen over the period.5 In terms of factors of production—labor in particular—demographic change is important. If we take the UN World Population Prospects (medium variant) we have estimates of the dependency ratio (the nonwork- ing age population/working age population); the working age population (15–64 years) as a proportion of total population; and absolute changes (millions of people) in working age population. We find that the depend- ency ratio is falling in all regions and the working age population peaking in all regions with an exception to both in the case of sub-Saharan Africa. The sub-Saharan Africa curve lags somewhat, in that the trough of the dependency ratio curve will be experienced in all other regions by 2030– 2050. In contrast, East Asia and Pacific, as well as Latin America and the Caribbean will face a shrinking labor force as sub-Saharan Africa is peaking. Finally, integrative ST: Figs. 3.5 and 3.6 show the composition of exports and the trade balance. Over the period, East Asia’s exports show dramatic change over time. There are large declines in shares of agricul- tural raw material exports and food exports, and very rapid rises in shares of manufacturing exports and shares of high-tech exports. However, the plateauing of shares of manufacturing exports, and the peak and subse- quent fall of shares of high-tech exports is cause for some alarm, given the importance of such exports to the region’s economic development. The trends are consistent with a deindustrialization pattern. Perhaps sur- prisingly, despite economic development, the import shares show that East Asia still has a high proportion of import shares in manufactures, although this has fallen from a peak of 80% to approximately 60%. This is related to the phenomenon of manufacturing exports with correspond- ing high import content. If one looks across the overall trade position, only in East Asia is there a surplus for virtually the entire period. Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa both fluctuate from surpluses to deficits and back, and South Asia has a persistent trade deficit over the period. 3.2 the chArActeristics of contemporAry economic development In sum, over the period since the 1960s we can outline three stylized facts as follows: First, in all developing regions agriculture shares of GDP and employment have been falling substantially, though—surprisingly— employment shares in agriculture can persist at 40% of total employment