Once upon a time, the world was neatly divided into prosperous and backward economies. Babies were plentiful, workers outnumbered retirees and people aspiring towards the middle class yearned to own homes and cars. Companies didn''t need to see any further than Europe and the United States to do well. We grew up learning how to ‘play the game’, and we expected the rules to remain the same throughout our lifetimes. That world – and those rules – are over. By 2030, a new reality will take hold, and before you know it there will be more grandparents than grandchildren. The global economy will be driven by the non-Western consumer for the first time in modern history and there will be more global wealth owned by women than men. There will be more robots than workers and more currencies than countries. All these trends, currently underway, will change everything you know about culture, the economy and the world. 2030 is both a remarkable guide to the coming changes and an exercise in the power of ‘lateral thinking’, thereby revolutionising the way you think about cataclysmic change and its consequences.
