Given UK age demographics that is going to happen over the next few decades anyway, putting all efforts into increasing supply could lead to the opposite problem in the not too far future.
The amount of children we’d need to become next generation workers and support our generation are exponential and cannot be sustained. I suspect that as for the last decade or two, old age benefits will keep shrinking and shrinking anyway because there is no way we can keep having, feeding, and sustaining the exponential numbers required.
Surely this is a good thing? We (as a species) have been growing exponentially in an unsustainable manner. It'll be tough as we transition into looking after more elderly with less of a young population to support them - but in the long run it's for the best.
That shows a bit of a pig-in-the-python situation where you can see the 2 biggest groups today are just 2 large group from 30 years ago moving through life.
Over the next 2 decades, almost all of that 32.1% supply in the 65+ group will become available.
Isn't the trend that developed nations are starting to plateau, and global population is expected to peak in the next few decades? I'm actually more worried about the opposite problem in the short term. With birth rates so low, the folks being born now are going to be supporting a disproportionately large elderly population.
Yes. This will definitely happen (more than it already is), because developed countries aren't producing enough children to take care of their aging local population.
But surely as societies enter the later parts of the demographic transition phases (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_transition) something like that is bound to happen - you cannot have infinitely growing populations and eventually mortality will decrease (due to healthcare improvements and increased living standards) to a point where a non-insignificant part of your population will be of an advanced age.
So in a sense, that's inevitable, isn't it?
The alternative would be to ensure that birth rates are such that the population distribution across ages is always vaguely balanced, but due to the changing socioeconomic conditions, I doubt that's viable. So all that can be done for the most part is just to have social safety nets and support for the older people in the forms of affordable housing, discounts, pensions and other such systems.
Here in Latvia a certain part of each salary is put towards our retirement funds, be it through a privately managed set of funds (typically through one of the banks) or otherwise. The sizes of pensions and living expenses are still a hotly debated topic, given that those still aren't always sufficient for a comfortable lifestyle, but the idea of accumulating enough money for when you age seems like a sane approach to the problem at hand.
That's a bad thing. You will then have a large generation of elderly people who ought to be supported by a much smaller generation of working people. And the economy caves in; old people die of lack of care, everybody loses.
Stable population might be a good thing, but rapid declining is very problematic. And that's where some countries are headed.
I’m hoping this was said in jest but this is definitely not great news for you, and will only make the demographic cliff even steeper.
Assuming you at some point want to be alive when no longer young this is something to be alarmed by, as there simply aren’t going to be enough work-capable people around to keep the machinery of society functioning while still supporting those who have aged-out of the working aged population, unless your plan is to Logan’s Run anyone that shows signs of senescence (which probably isn’t anyone’s idea of a good time).
This is something I hadn't considered, and bears thinking about. In about 50 years, we're going to be top heavy by a long way. Most people on the planet will be over 60, with a small population of people working to support them.
Politicians will be pandering to this old (majority) demographic, whilst the needs of the young who are actually running society can be unheard. I'll be one of the (very) old ones if I'm still around, and I'm not looking forward to this development.
The point about it being an aging population is that the proportion of consumers to producers will change. The demand for goods might shrink as an absolute value, but the demand for labour should increase more, as a higher proportion of the population just can't work. In addition, part of the demand which increases will be for forms of labour that we currently don't have an automation plan for.
To balance out the automation question, it's just as likely that technical advances will improve the ability of older people to do economically useful work that they want to do. There's a lot of mental horsepower, life experience, and will there, if you can work around physical and metabolic limitations.
Given the larger trends in the demographics of every developed country, I highly doubt it. Nearly every population is now skewed towards the older generations as becoming a larger and larger demographic due to longer lifespans and much lower birthrates. I do not feel that HN is safe from this trend
Huh? An aging population is actually one of the things that will force it. More retirees will take more of the surplus from the productive population and reduce the surplus left for export.
Sooner than later, a growing population of older individuals who are living longer and no longer in the workforce becomes unsustainable for a country whose workforce primarily comprises younger individuals.
Not likely. There are several problems with an aging population. The two big ones in regards to innovation is a shrinking economy and a lack of energy. Both being driven by the young.
Or at least, many fewer people. If we get to a point where we're extending the average lifespan by a year every 7 or 8 years, up to an average ceiling of around 100, that has big implications. Demographic trends can probably predict birth rates decently, but probably not the overall population 50 years into the future.
This will change if technology is developed which greatly extends human lifespans. Such technology is going to become necessary soon because of plummeting birth rates.
declining population doesn't mean there will be no young people at all, just slow decline with less and less people including less old people not replaced by anyone
pensions don't need young population at all, you can save your own money for retirement without anyone's contribution towards your pension
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