Asia poised to be top globally

Asia is ready to top North America and Europe in global economic power, but there won't be any one, dominant force, a National Intelligence Council report said. "Global Trends 2030," the report assessing global trends to 2030, released Monday, said power of other non-Western or middle-tier countries also will rise. Rather than there being a hegemonic power in the future, the report said, power would shift to networks and coalitions. China's economy will be 140-percent larger than Japan's economy, while India's will be 16 times larger than Pakistan's, the report said. Technology, it said, would be an equalizer by shifting the balance of power toward multifaceted networks. The report also said the middle class would expand in most countries. As individuals ascend into the middle class, there will be a shift in values, including a possible strengthening of religious, ethnic and national identities. In addition, the report said 1 billion workers from developing countries would be added to the global labor pool, increasing pressure on low-skilled labor. The report said global life expectancy was expected to grow rapidly as deaths from communicable diseases are projected to drop by more than 40 percent. Some countries, such as those in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, will have younger populations, the report said. "Aging" countries, meanwhile, will face the possibility of decline in economic growth. The council said it based its projections on in-depth research, detailed modeling, and a variety of analytical tools drawn from public, private and academic sources. "As with the NIC's previous Global Trends reports, we do not seek to predict the future," the organization said in introducing the report, "but instead provide a framework for thinking about possible futures and their implications.