Brandon Donnelly
Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
Brandon Donnelly
Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
The National Center of Health Statistics just released this update on births and birth rates for the United States in 2017. The provisional number of births last year was 3,853,472, which represents a 2% reduction from 2016 and the lowest number in 30 years. The general fertility rate was 60.2 births per 1,000 women aged 15-44, which represents a 3% reduction from 2016. Also a record low.
Here is a chart from the report showing birth rates for selected age ranges from 1990 to 2016 (the 2017 numbers are provisional):
Many of the age ranges have remained stable. Notable are the decline in the teenage (15-19) birth rate and the increase in births to women aged 40-44. The teenage birth rate declined 7% from 2016 and has averaged a decline of nearly 8% a year since 2007. And the birth rate for women aged 40-44 has generally been rising since 1982.
I am sure that you can all think of many explanations for the above phenomena without even diving into the report. I find all of this relevant because demographics obviously impact the real estate business and how we build cities.
I still have every passport that I have ever owned. The older ones are far more interesting because I was younger and always looking for creative ways to travel around the world. The older I get the less interesting my passports get. Now I find it difficult to travel away from my desk at lunch.
Passports are highly symbolic to me. It equals a particular kind of freedom. But I suppose that’s because I have a pretty good passport.
According to the 2018 Henley Passport Index, the Canadian passport is tied for 5th – along with Switzerland, Ireland, and the United States – in terms of the number of countries you can access without a visa. 176 countries in total.
The highest ranking countries this year are Japan and Singapore. With those passports you have visa-free access to 180 countries. The last place country, at 105th, is Afghanistan. You get 24 countries.
Switching to design – because that matters – I think you would be hard-pressed to find better looking ones than the new Norwegian passport (pictured above and set to be put into circulation later this year) and the Swiss passport. The Swiss passport is allegedly the first to be professionally designed.
How does your passport fare on the Passport Index?
Image: Dezeen
The World Economic Forum recently posted the below chart showing that 1/5 of all grocery purchases in South Korea are done online. The calculation is e-commerce revenue as a percentage of total fast moving consumer goods revenue in the country.
The explanation they give for this high percentage is that South Korea has some of the fastest and most ubiquitous internet access in the world.
The National Center of Health Statistics just released this update on births and birth rates for the United States in 2017. The provisional number of births last year was 3,853,472, which represents a 2% reduction from 2016 and the lowest number in 30 years. The general fertility rate was 60.2 births per 1,000 women aged 15-44, which represents a 3% reduction from 2016. Also a record low.
Here is a chart from the report showing birth rates for selected age ranges from 1990 to 2016 (the 2017 numbers are provisional):
Many of the age ranges have remained stable. Notable are the decline in the teenage (15-19) birth rate and the increase in births to women aged 40-44. The teenage birth rate declined 7% from 2016 and has averaged a decline of nearly 8% a year since 2007. And the birth rate for women aged 40-44 has generally been rising since 1982.
I am sure that you can all think of many explanations for the above phenomena without even diving into the report. I find all of this relevant because demographics obviously impact the real estate business and how we build cities.
I still have every passport that I have ever owned. The older ones are far more interesting because I was younger and always looking for creative ways to travel around the world. The older I get the less interesting my passports get. Now I find it difficult to travel away from my desk at lunch.
Passports are highly symbolic to me. It equals a particular kind of freedom. But I suppose that’s because I have a pretty good passport.
According to the 2018 Henley Passport Index, the Canadian passport is tied for 5th – along with Switzerland, Ireland, and the United States – in terms of the number of countries you can access without a visa. 176 countries in total.
The highest ranking countries this year are Japan and Singapore. With those passports you have visa-free access to 180 countries. The last place country, at 105th, is Afghanistan. You get 24 countries.
Switching to design – because that matters – I think you would be hard-pressed to find better looking ones than the new Norwegian passport (pictured above and set to be put into circulation later this year) and the Swiss passport. The Swiss passport is allegedly the first to be professionally designed.
How does your passport fare on the Passport Index?
Image: Dezeen
The World Economic Forum recently posted the below chart showing that 1/5 of all grocery purchases in South Korea are done online. The calculation is e-commerce revenue as a percentage of total fast moving consumer goods revenue in the country.
The explanation they give for this high percentage is that South Korea has some of the fastest and most ubiquitous internet access in the world.
But as soon as I read this I thought to myself: This can’t be the only reason. When was the last time you really wanted to order groceries online but your internet connection was too slow?
Also, if you look at all online shopping (not just FMCG), South Korea no longer shows up as such an outlier. So what’s happening with grocery?
Without actually knowing the market, I would imagine that there are companies in South Korea who have simply figured out how to offer a great online grocery shopping experience.
South Korea is also one of the denser countries in the world at about 513 people per km2. That would help with distribution.
But then again, the Netherlands is also quite dense (414 people per km2). Why are they only at 2.6%? (For comparison, the US is about 33 people per km2.)
If any of you are familiar with the South Korea market I would love to hear from you in the comments. If they really are at 20%, I am surprised more people aren’t talking about this.
But as soon as I read this I thought to myself: This can’t be the only reason. When was the last time you really wanted to order groceries online but your internet connection was too slow?
Also, if you look at all online shopping (not just FMCG), South Korea no longer shows up as such an outlier. So what’s happening with grocery?
Without actually knowing the market, I would imagine that there are companies in South Korea who have simply figured out how to offer a great online grocery shopping experience.
South Korea is also one of the denser countries in the world at about 513 people per km2. That would help with distribution.
But then again, the Netherlands is also quite dense (414 people per km2). Why are they only at 2.6%? (For comparison, the US is about 33 people per km2.)
If any of you are familiar with the South Korea market I would love to hear from you in the comments. If they really are at 20%, I am surprised more people aren’t talking about this.
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