Public Policy Towards the Elderly in Indonesia: Current Policy and Future Directions

Abstract

In the past decade, public policy towards the elderly has become an emerging policy issue for Indonesia. With one-third of all Indonesians are predicted to be elderly in the year 2050, millions of them are vulnerable from old age poverty, since many of them have little extra income (e.g., from savings or pension) to finance their livelihood in old age. At the same time, they could no longer depend exclusively on assistance from their children/other family members like in the past, since the number of newborns are getting smaller and family relations become more strained due to continued modernization and social change occurring in the country. Thus, it is increasingly recognized that a more formal and comprehensive old-age security policy is needed in Indonesia. This paper will attempt to review the development of such policy, looking at both past and current policies, and will critically analyze their impacts in providing adequate old-age security for Indonesians. Finally, the paper will conclude with some recommendations on what Indonesia could do to create a comprehensive aging policy that would protect its elderly population from old-age insecurity in the next decades.