India Outpaces China as Most Populous Country

Thought Question: What are the benefits and drawbacks of a country having the world's highest population?

For over 72 years, China has had the most people in the world. But India will soon have more people than China. 

Both countries have around 1.4 billion residents. Experts think that India will have more people soon because China's population has slowed. That could happen in the next few months.    

Experts can't know exactly when this will happen. But they agree it will be soon. It could even have happened already. China and India are both big countries, and China doesn't always share information. So, it's hard for experts to know the exact number of people in each country. 

“There is some uncertainty, not only about India’s population, but also China’s population,” one expert told The Associated Press. 

One thing is sure: these two countries have over a third of the people around the globe. The world has 8 billion people. These two nations are powerful. They can affect money, health, and politics in many places.  

A few years ago, people thought India would have more people than China later in this decade. But fewer families in China are having kids. This is because of a long-time plan to slow down population growth. For China, this is causing a big problem. There are fewer young people to work, and too many older people are soon to retire.