Monday, February 09, 2015

How Many Share Your Birthday?

Economist Wolfgang Fengler had some fun on his birthday. He calculated the number of people worldwide who were celebrating the same exact birthday—day and year. Then he made the same calculation for other birthdays, and his results reveal not only the world's growing population but also shifting patterns of global growth.

For babies celebrating their first birthday, 368,000 others worldwide are celebrating the same birthday. The largest share of these "birthday buddies," as Fengler calls them, are from India, China, and Nigeria. For people celebrating their 90th birthday, only 11,000 others worldwide are celebrating the same birthday. The largest share are from China, the United States, and Japan.

To see results for other ages, check out How Your Birthday Reveals Global Demographic Shifts, on the Brookings Institution's Future Development blog.

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