Back in the early days of the 21st century, futurists made predictions about how the world would look come 2020. Among them was Ray Kurzweil, and recently USA Today’s Grace Hauck shared the hits and misses of twenty of his forecasts:
- Life expectancy would top 100… It currently stands at 78.6 in the U.S. and 72.6 globally.
- Computers will be invisible… Embedded just about everywhere, they pretty much are.
- Books will be dead… While print book sales have slipped, they still brought in $26 billion in 2018.
- Your every move will be tracked… Yes, even our televisions keep an eye on us.
- The world’s population will reach 8 billion… It currently stands at 7.7 billion.
- We’ll have self-driving cars… Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk expects to roll out such a car by year’s end.
- China will be the world’s largest economy… It’s, instead, #2, right behind the U.S.
- It will be normal to retire at 70… Not yet; nowadays, for men it’s 65 and for women 63.
- Americans will vote electronically from home… Too risky given the chances for foreign interference.
- China will be on a path to democracy… No way, given Its human rights abuses against pro-democracy protestors.
For details about these and the remaining ten predictions, click here.
With happiness and good health wishes going forward, Carol