What would it be like if 2/3rds of the worlds population died?

might get some peace and quiet for once.

politically it’s hard to think that any resemblance to our current structure would remain for the most part. but whether it would turn the world into a more peaceful existence or something more similar to isolated warring gangs and such can’t really be said, all depends on who survives really.

I’d have a place to park in the mornings.

Not that it would matter because I probably wouldn’t have a job any more. Also, I imagine we’d be thrown back to the prehistoric times before electricity.

Probably similar to what Alan Weisman wrote in The World Without Us

I imagine that the remnants of each remaining group/country/ethnicity would blame the other for the catastrophe (thinking it was a covert act of aggression.

Combine that with the emotional stress the survivors would be under, and it’d be a short trip to world war III.

Just thinking about clearing up all those corpses makes the mind boggle

We’d see a significant reduction in all kinds of production and transportation of goods and great increases in price. There’d be a much bigger demand for manual laborers to pick up the slack of those lost. There are tons of things that maintain our daily lives: the energy grid, garbage disposal, street repair, water maintenance, etc. Things would be quite devastating for a good long time and everyone would have to learn to do more things with their hands.

@syz There was a documentary that was similar to that book on TV about a year ago that I never got to see, if anyone could link me I would be very grateful, although that deals with a world with no more humans at all.

If ⅔ dies many more would follow as we need a certain amount of people to sustain our life styles.
Edit: I will be back to give more detail or the time will run out.

If ⅔ of the population died within the next month, a lot of residual deaths would come from that. Children left without parents, elderly left with no one to care for them, people who get sick or injured but can’t find a doctor, people who need medication and can’t get it, people who die of exposure once the power is out or access to food is cut off, etc.

I’d imagine that for a long time, there would be chaos and fighting that would lead to even more deaths. Eventually some sort of order would prevail, but it might be longer coming because of all the things just left behind, unguarded, that others could pick up (weapons).

Depends whether or not I get to pick who dies.

I’d almost have this house to myself!

@RareDenver
“Just thinking about clearing up all those corpses makes the mind boggle”
Are you one of them people who would say after I had head trauma “Look at that blood, that will never come out”?

Last time it happened there was a renaissance and everyone got all artsy.

I might be in demand to help re-populate the Earth.

There would be ⅓ left with new and different issues.

@mrentropy You get the east coast, I got the west coast?

So the assumption is that there would simply be fewer people everywhere?
It would be quite a good thing, at least short-term. Most big cities have the infrastructure to host large numbers of people, usually not as large as their current population, but certainly more than ⅓ of it. Small villages on the other hand are being emptied all the time, so losing another ⅔ suddenly would see the death of many of them. Overall though, there would be a large number of resources to be split among ⅓ of the people, so this means that in certain respects we’d all be 300% richer. Whoever has a house could have 3, whoever has a car could have 3, and there’d be 3 parking spaces and 3 lanes for our one car (while the other two were in the garage). There’d generally be more space and more food to go around.

However, it would be only a matter of time before the world reajusted itself to the new situation. The 3-lane roads need 3 workers to maintain them, and since 2 would be dead, we’d have to change them into 1-lane roads, especially since there’d only be 1 car and not 3 driving on them. Similarly, we’d let 2 of our 3 houses fall apart, as we wouldn’t be able to afford the rennovation costs (what with ⅔ of the workforce dead and labour costs skyrocketing). And we would also let 2 of our 3 cars rot, and move closer together, and there’d be job cuts since there’d be no people to fill the jobs, and eventually there would even be unemployment again.

It is an interesting idea. Overpopulation has seriously changed the world from the 1950s until today in ways that most people only born in the 80s or 90s simply cannot relate.

a heck of a lot easier to get your dream job

It’s going to stink, literally. What are we going to do with all those bodies?

Of course, in this scenario I’m one of the unlucky lucky survivors

The world would only be a third as shitty as it is now.

The biggest thing would be how to dispose of all the bodies. That would be a major undertaking.

Believe it or not the population of the US was about ⅔ it’s current size in 1920. After the initial period of clean up and recovery, there would be a major downsizing of the largest cities. For example NYC probably would be able to support a population of no more than a million people. There were 5 X that many in 1920 but the surrounding areas CT, NJ, PA etc were still food producers and not just urban sprawl. So the largest cities will decrease by 90% as producing and distributing food will take the place of financial speculation.

The 50–100,000 population cities will become regional hubs as manufacturing becomes local again. Most 20th-21st century skyscrapers will be abandoned as impractical and eventually become dangerous as they fall into decay.

The politics will become more regional as local problems become more important than national or international concerns. At best we will maintain a federal system that works to facilitate the interaction and coordination of states and regions. Most likely we will see the rise of some demagogues seeking power by destroying the Union.

Transportation will devolve to truck and train because in a back to basics world air travel will be too expensive. We will see fewer long distance mega trucks because super highways will be a lower priority than the maintenance of regional roads.

On the other hand electronics will become even more vital. As the cities become smaller and face to face communication becomes geographically limited we will see a new age of electronics inventions will occur. All sorts of activities will go interactive. I can imagine communication walls in every home that allow for online education tailored for each individual. I don’t mean in an isolating way but in realtime groups w/teacher that gives the appearance or being in a classroom for younger kids who can be grouped according to need without the stigma of identifiable groups. For secondary and post-secondary students lecture and research could be accessed at the students; convenience while there will be virtual seminars for discussion.

Think about going to a virtual party at grandma’s house where you have a virtual roomsize display but then your siblings could click into a private room to discuss aboui grandma needing more help and arranging viritual visits. The chronically ill and elderly could be monitored electronically and when necessary visually and a neighborhood care assistant. Local hospitals could tap into medical resources across the country

How we spend our time both work and play will be altered. Smaller cities mean people live, work and play in netghborhoods. When we know our neighbots there is both real and perceived safety.

Of course, I could be totally wrong and life on earth could go totally to hell.

Simpler. Probably we would be more appreciative of each other and once again yearn for the common touch, the wave or nod of acknowledgement, and the respect of life. Plus a lot less Wall Street bankers, traders and self-help gurus with few “Secrets”. It thus may improve dramatically.

Expect at least a generation or more of social chaos and change. Consider the Black Death.

There’s gonna be a 66% chance I won’t be here anymore.

On the plus side, California would be able to resume stuffing people into prisons! Hoorah!!

Chaos in the civilized world. Nothing for the aboriginal people in the Amazon. For us no electricity, no water, empty grocery stores, crowded hospitals, looting, fires…

Judging by the response to the Plague in the second half of the 1300’s, there would be efforts to gain retribution on whoever or whatever was the cause of the sudden depopulation. Conspiracy theories would abound, and people would lash out at targets that may or may not have caused the problem.

The world would be in shock, of course, and it would be difficult to reorganize society for a while. People wouldn’t really trust each other, and would fall back on their family groupings. Most people would be extremely defensive for a bit.

On the other hand, it could also be like what happens during severe weather, when people band together to help each other. Cooperation would increase, and people would take on a “we’re all in this together” attitude. The differences between nations might diminish.

The average wealth would dramatically increase, as living people took over the assets of the dead, such as remained. If it were a war that caused the decline in population, there might not be resources left. So a lot of what happens after the decline would depend on what caused the decline. A war leads to one set of consequences, and a comet strike to another. A plague of runaway nano-technology or a zombie invasion or the rise of a very virulent disease would cause still other reactions.

People would be crippled by lack of confidence and depression for a generation or three. People might lose the will to try, and suicides could also be a reason why the population was diminished so much.

The people who remained would probably be stronger than those who were killed off. I don’t know what their strengths would be—it would again depend on what killed the others. Those strengths would be what keeps them going, and they would be traits passed on to succeeding generations. Life would be both easier and harder.

I wouldn’t like to live through such a scenario. I don’t think I’d take a survivalist attitude and run off to an isolated piece of country and start living only on what I could do for myself. I would be one of those ones who banded together with others to cooperatively seek to assure our survival.

it would be pleasant.

According to some experts, the maximum human population of the planet should not exceed 500,000 so ⅔ dying off would be a good start.