The U.S. labor market will soon experience a shock coming from three merging demographic forces: an increase in life expectancy, a decrease in fertility rates, and the retirement of baby boomers. Until recently, the baby boomers' movement through the work force hid the long-term impact of the first two changes. But the population structure in the future will be very different from the one we have today. Population growth will slow down significantly, and by 2030 it is expected to be 30 percent lower than today.