Implications Of Population Aging Research Articles

7.L. Practice session: Is there an investment case for health at older ages?

Abstract The global demographic landscape is undergoing significant transformation due to increases in longevity and declining birth rates. According to the United Nations, the world’s population aged 65 and over is projected to more than double, reaching over 1.5 billion by 2050, while global fertility rates are expected to decline to 2.4 births per woman by 2030 and continue decreasing to 2.2 births per woman by 2050. Ageing populations have frequently concerned decision-makers due to the potential implications of changes in population age-mix for labour markets and the economy, as well as for the sustainability of public programs and spending, particularly the health sector. For example, as the share of the population at older age increases, there are concerns over how to cope with the possible economic implications of having a smaller share of people at traditional working age (with potentially more people obtaining income security through both public and private pensions) and how to respond to greater health and long-term care needs. Without appropriate policy responses, there are worries that demographic changes will have inevitable consequences for households, public finances and possibly for economic growth and development. To support policy decisions related to population ageing it is important to have informative evidence and modelling tools that allow policymakers to better understand both the implications of population ageing as well as the consequences of policy action or inaction. To this end, this session presents three recently developed modelling tools that aim to address a number of policy relevant questions related to ageing: 1) How does ageing affect health financing and are health systems unsustainable? 2) How does ageing affect economic objectives and does health at older ages matter? 3) Can we develop economically relevant measures of health at older ages if older people do not have formal ties to the labour force? Using data and analyses from a range of European countries, we will demonstrate empirically that the way ageing affects health financing systems, economies, and societies more broadly reflects policy choices and is not an inevitable consequence of demographic changes. Key messages • Policymakers must prioritize informed policies to comprehensively understand the impact of aging on health financing and economies, facilitating the development of sustainable solutions. • Immediate action is imperative to address the implications of aging on labor markets and public spending, ensuring future economic stability and safeguarding societal well-being.

The implications of population ageing on economic growth: Evidence of nonlinearity

The purpose of this study is to investigate the influence of population ageing on economic growth, a topic that has received inconclusive results. The Fixed Effects Model is used to analyze 5-year non-overlapping growth regressions on a panel of 72 nations spanning three decades. Data is extracted from the World Bank database and Penn World Tables. Findings indicate that in the short-run, population ageing positively impacts economic growth; nevertheless, a nonlinear relationship is observed in the long-run, highlighting the existence of a threshold. The findings remain robust upon proxying the old-age dependency ratio for the share of the elderly. The study identifies the threshold below (above) at which ageing populations impact economic growth positively (negatively). Marginal Effects support our findings, establishing that the detrimental effect on growth intensifies as ageing deepens. The research also identifies a notable nonlinear relationship between economic growth and population ageing in developed economies. Policy implications such as promoting healthy ageing, longer working years, encouraging savings, enhancing productivity via capital investments, and contributions of experienced older workers to the knowledge economy will facilitate reaping the silver demographic dividend and will help nations cope with and minimize the adverse impact of population ageing on economic growth.

The implications of population ageing on savings rates

The implications of population ageing on savings rates

8.D. Workshop: Population ageing: societal triumph or end of the welfare state?

Abstract Longer, healthier lives are a triumph in human history, but their implications for health systems, economies, and societies are still up for debate. Many observers and policymakers, in fact, view societal ageing as a problem. For them, an ageing population entails higher health care costs, slower economic growth, and fewer tax revenues, all of which is compounded if people age in poor health. Taken together, many policymakers may conclude that the only solution is to clamp down on the welfare state. This belief in the inevitability of an age-related fiscal crisis often coincides with and contributes to intergenerational conflict, as generations struggle over public spending priorities. But are the adverse consequences of population ageing really inevitable, or is there scope for policy intervention? The purpose of this workshop is to present new evidence on the implications of population ageing for health and health systems and to consider policy options. Research indicates that the extent that population ageing creates difficulties for economies, public finances, and health systems is complex and, importantly, conditional on a host of modifiable factors. Indeed, while some consequences of ageing are unlikely to be very bad even without policy interventions, some genuine causes for concern can be better managed with effective interventions. Furthermore, a focus on intergenerational conflict distracts us from other, important, inequalities within generations, which is a much more urgent policy challenge to address. This workshop is based on findings from the European Observatory's “Economics of Healthy and Active Ageing” series which brings together research on why population ageing is often (erroneously) viewed negatively from a health financing perspective, and reviews relevant policies that may improve health system financial sustainability. The workshop will have 4 presentations followed by a brief debate on how to better use this type of evidence for policymaking. Presentation #1 sets out the main challenges and presents a new simulator tool for assessing the health financing sustainability gap attributable to population ageing. Presentation #2 explores in detail the role of proximity to death as a driver of health expenditures and considers policy options to improve and rationalize end-of-life care. Presentation #3 will use time use survey data to consider what it means to age in good health by reviewing the daily lives of older people and comparing those in good health to those in poor health. Lastly, Presentation #4 will consider what drives ageing-related policymaking and what is needed to get more lifecourse policies in place. A debate including audience members will be facilitated by an expert associated with the Observatory. Key messages The way societies address the challenges of ageing is a policy choice – there are a multitude of interventions to ensure that people age in good health without damaging fiscal sustainability. Beyond the intrinsic value of good health, there are a wide range of benefits of supporting healthy ageing over the life course.

Political Discourse and Aging in a Neoliberal Singapore: Models of Citizenship, Older Adults and Policy Initiatives

ABSTRACT Singapore now faces one of the fastest aging populations in the world, leading the country’s political leaders to fear the implications of population aging for the country’s economic viability. We analyzed National Day Rally speeches from 2011 to 2015 by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong to examine how policymakers conceptualized the challenges related to its aging population. Findings point to the government’s manifest and latent emphasis on its economic viability when developing social policies to address the well-being of its aging population. Its approaches to welfare provision are informed by a neoliberalist agenda that requires its citizens to exercise personal responsibility and self-reliance, and to rely on their family and community for mutual assistance. Despite its highly interventionist approach, the government is clear about its residual role in the provision of safety nets. A neoliberalist reconceptualization of citizenship serves to restrict older citizen’s claims to basic social assistance.

Trends, Determinants and the Implications of Population Aging in Iran

Fertility and mortality decline are major drivers of Iran’s population aging. A rapid and sharp fall in fertility rates over the past three decades as well as a substantial rise in life expectancy are causing rapid aging of Iran’s population. The present paper uses the 2015 United Nations Population Division data to discuss the trends, determinants and the implications of population aging in Iran. According to the medium fertility variant, people age 60 and older will represent 31% (almost 29 million people) of Iran’s population by 2050. The population age 65 and older is projected to be 22% (more than 20 million) and that of aged 80 and older 3.8% (around 3.5 million) in 2050, that are almost four-times higher than the corresponding figures in 2015. Data on the speed of population aging show that Iran is the second fastest aging country in the world in terms of the percentage point increase in the population age 60 and over between 2015 and 2050; Iran is second only to South Korea, by less than .01%. The rapid population aging of Iran has significant implications for all societal institutions and decision makers that have to be addressed by the Iranian society. Gender-related issues and socio-economic security in old age are two key issues resulting from such a fast population aging. As with many rapidly aging populations, Iran needs a strategy for social and economic supports for an aging population that will not promote views of aging people as a burden.

Firms' (non)responses: The role of ambivalence in the case of population aging in Japan

The literature supports and recommends that firms be responsive to external environments for prosperity and survival. However, many firms do not seem to heed this advice when it comes to important but uncontrollable environmental forces such as population aging. We investigate firms' (non)responses to population aging, one of the grand challenges of our time. While theoretical explanations for firms' responses to external environments abound, surprisingly, we lack concrete empirical evidence about why some companies do not respond to population aging while others do. Building on the cognition–response framework and utilizing a sample of 545 Japanese corporations, we investigate the magnitude and extent of organizations' corporate-level responses to population aging in Japan, the world's most aged society. While controlling for the firms' resource dependence and slack resources, we find robust, positive effects of perceived state certainty on organizational responses. Specifically, we find that perceived state certainty takes both direct and indirect routes (Daft and Weick 1984) to increasing firm response to population aging. We also find that firms' self-perceived controllability has a direct effect on firm response. Most intriguingly, the organization's ambivalence toward the implications of population aging on their business does not directly reduce firm response. Instead, it is found to be a quasi-moderator that interacts with perceived state certainty and negatively affects the responses to population aging. Ambivalence is an important factor that has been largely overlooked and warrants more research attention to address not only this particular grand challenge but also others (e.g., climate change).

The Nordic Model of Economic Development: Shocks, Reforms and Future Prospects

The aim of this research is to provide novel evidence regarding the functioning of the Nordic model of economic development and the robustness of its institutions. At first, the paper defines a conceptual analytical framework identifying the key features of the model for the Nordic economies (Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden), by synthesizing relevant background literature. Secondly, this framework is used to interpret a set of shocks, reforms and ongoing trends: the effect of resource revenues on the labor market and income inequality in Norway compared to the other Nordic countries; the design of a novel minimum income scheme in Finland and its effects on preferences for social insurance; and the implications of population ageing and increased automation for indicators of sustainability for the Nordic welfare states.

Implications of population ageing for the Chinese productivity

Since 2000 when China entered the ‘ageing society’, the pace of ageing has speeded up. At the same time, traditional growth engines of the Chinese economy (i.e. export and investment) are losing momentum. Against this background, to what extent the expected demographic transformation would affect growth trajectory of the Chinese economy is of great interest. Among new growth engines, productivity has been receiving increasing attention among China’s top policy makers. In this paper, we try to identify both micro and macro effects of ageing on China’s productivity. In general, our research supports the hypothesis that more working experience and/or elder contributes to higher wage growth and total factor productivity, although with a reversed U-shaped pattern.

Endogenous Growth and Intellectual Property Rights: A North–South Modelling Proposal with Population Ageing

This paper studies the effect of intellectual property rights (IPR) on economic growth, in the light of population ageing, i.e., in a more realistic context. The analysis is motivated by the implications of population ageing on economic growth. Moreover, this study analyses this relationship in a north–south framework where there is a healthcare sector. We conclude that population ageing has no impact on the sign of the IPR effect on economic growth. However, it positively affects the steady‐state growth rate. Finally, under some conditions, the presence of the healthcare sector also increases the steady‐state growth rate.

Modeling the Cost of Population Aging in Iran

<p><strong>BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVE:</strong><strong> </strong>The decline in fertility rates and the increase in life expectancy have changed the demographic structure of many countries substantially and entail long-term economic implications too. Population aging has adverse effects on countries’ economies, especially with respect to the social security system and the welfare structure.</p><p><strong>METHODS:</strong><em> </em>Given the importance of the phenomenon of population aging and the increased longevity in recent decades, the present study was conducted to address the welfare implications of population aging in Iran during a span of 150 years using the Overlapping Generations (OLG) model.</p><p><strong>RESULTS:</strong> Examining the effect of reduced population growth or population aging on economic welfare, labor supply, capital assets and government expenditure during the span of 150 years suggested a decline in economic welfare in the early years; however, the rate of decline slowed down toward the end of the period; the same finding also applies to labor supply. Overall, population aging had the greatest impact on capital assets.</p><p><strong>CONCLUSION:</strong><strong> </strong>Population aging can cause a drastic transition in consumption and saving behaviors. Labor markets can also undergo similar transitions in their labor supply and have implications for labor productivity. The combination of these changes affects economic growth and welfare. The results of the study suggest that supporting the workforce and employing the immigrant population in the labor market can help reduce the adverse consequences of the phenomenon of population aging.</p>

Population ageing and the growth of income and consumption tax revenue

This paper investigates the implications of population ageing and changes in labour force participation rates for projections of revenue obtained from personal income taxation and a consumption tax (in the form of a broad-based goods and services tax). A projection model is presented, involving changing age–income profiles over time for males and females. The model is estimated and applied to New Zealand over the period 2011–2062.

A spatial informatics for aged care.

Population ageing is the demographic process that characterises the first half of the twenty-first century. Australia's population is already ageing and the states and territories are ageing at different rates. Our understanding of the dementias remains limited and diagnosis in primary care settings is poor. Locating where older people with dementia are and how they are coping is an emerging need in health information management. In this paper we discuss how a spatially informed health information management system could support population ageing and the disconnected systems that address ageing. We illustrate this with examples from our work to show how spatial informatics can advance our understanding of and response to the implications of population ageing.

A young EU member’s ageing: budgetary and macroeconomic consequences of Slovenia’s demographic prospects

In this paper, we simulate a macroeconometric model of Slovenia over the period 2012–2060, using the projected demographic development as input, and determine time paths for budgetary and macroeconomic variables under alternative assumptions about Slovenian policy instruments so as to limit budgetary pressures stemming from population ageing. The main macroeconomic indicators (growth, employment, price stability, sustainable public finances) are shown to depend on the assumed long-run policy options followed. It is demonstrated that the ageing of the Slovenian population projected in the demographic forecast leads to severe budgetary problems unless increases of the retirement age, rising social security contributions or reductions of state financed pensions are implemented. A reduction of the pension replacement rate turns out to be the most effective measure to cope with the budgetary implications of population ageing. However, none of the analysed policy measures is sufficient to stabilise the debt ratio.

Work till you drop? A note on the potential and limits of employment adjustment to demographic change

PurposeHow will labour markets adapt to population ageing? The demographic shift to be experienced over coming decades requires some sort of adjustment in working lives to balance increased longevity. But where in the lifecycle should this adjustment take place? It often seems to be assumed that ever‐longer working lives are the only answer: the purpose of this article is to query this assumption and to suggest that there should be a balance of employment and other uses of time across the entire lifecycle.Design/methodology/approachThe article analyses the impact of increased economic activity on the dependency ratio and it identifies plausible upper bounds to employment objectives by age and gender using international comparative data.FindingsIncreased employment for over‐65s is likely to have limited impact on age dependency ratio: bigger impacts would be expected from the 55‐65 age group and younger women.Originality/valueThe article brings comparative evidence to bear on labour market implications of population ageing.

Michele Gragnolati, Ole Hagen Jorgensen, Romero Rocha, and Anna Fruttero, Growing Old in an Older Brazil: Implications of Population Aging on Growth, Poverty, Public Finance, and Service Delivery

Population and Development ReviewVolume 38, Issue 2 p. 375-377 Free Access Michele Gragnolati, Ole Hagen Jorgensen, Romero Rocha, and Anna Fruttero, Growing Old in an Older Brazil: Implications of Population Aging on Growth, Poverty, Public Finance, and Service Delivery Cassio M. Turra, Cassio M. Turra Department of Demography, Cedeplar, Universidade Federal de Minas GeraisSearch for more papers by this author Cassio M. Turra, Cassio M. Turra Department of Demography, Cedeplar, Universidade Federal de Minas GeraisSearch for more papers by this author First published: 27 June 2012 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1728-4457.2012.00499.xAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL No abstract is available for this article. Reference Lee, Ronald and Andrew Mason. 2011. Population Aging and the Generational Economy: A Global Perspective. Cheltenham , UK : Edward Elgar. Volume38, Issue2June 2012Pages 375-377 ReferencesRelatedInformation

Implications of population ageing on the labor market and productivity in Taiwan

Population ageing has become a major global issue and challenge in recent years. Taiwan is one of the rapidly ageing countries and is expected to enter the stage “aged society” by 2017. However, insufficient attention has been paid to challenges of population ageing in Taiwan. As a result, it is important for the Taiwanese government to take timely actions to adapt to population ageing. The objective of this article is to analyze the effects and implications of population ageing on the labor market and productivity in Taiwan. In this study, the long-term trend and characteristics in population ageing and its implications and impacts on the productivity will be discussed, and the current existing policies will be provided. Finally, some policy recommendations will be proposed aiming at a more sustainable economy and a better society.

日本における少子高齢化と住宅市場

日本における少子高齢化と住宅市場

The Conundrum of Demographic Aging and Policy Challenges: A Comparative Case Study of Canada, Japan and Korea

Some analysts lean toward comparative analyses of population aging, then draw potential policy implications. Others lean in the direction of attention to differences in policy regimes and then consider implications of population aging. Key differences among advanced societies may not emanate from demographic aging but from differences in how markets, states, and families work to redistribute societal benefits. In this paper, three countries with contrasting configurations of markets, states, and families, and at different stages of demographic aging, are compared and contrasted: Canada, Japan, and Korea. The paper has three objectives: 1) to outline key changes in population, family, and work in the three countries; 2) to consider how knowledge about these changes, their dynamics and interrelationships, is framed with respect to policy options; and 3) to compare Canada, Japan, and Korea in terms of the framing of policy challenges related to demographic aging. It is found that Canada is joining the longstanding pattern of Japan and Korea of late home-leaving by youth, meaning less effective time in the paid labour force. Little deep connection exists between population aging and economic productivity or labour force shortages. Differential labour market participation of women mediates the effects of population aging.

Global ageing in comparative perspective: a critical discussion

PurposeThe aims of this paper are to summarise the rapid expansion in the proportion of the elderly across the globe and to highlight the main factors causing this. Specific areas of the globe will be focused on in more detail before the authors discuss some of the key challenges and consequences of global ageing for global society.Design/methodology/approachThe paper is a literature review of major trends and implications of population ageing across the globe.FindingsAs a consequence of the global demographics of ageing, societies are being confronted with profound issues relating to illness and health care, access to housing and economic resources including pension provision. We have witnessed an unprecedented stretching of the human life span. This ageing of the global population is without parallel in human history. If these demographic trends continue to escalate, by 2050 the number of older people globally will exceed the number of young for the first time since formal records began, raising questions of the power of the nation state in the context of global ageing and of the changing nature of the global society that is emerging.Originality/valueThis is an original paper that aims at reviewing the major population trends across the Americas, Asia, Europe and Africa. The implications of demographic change are grounded in context of global changes that highlight social, economic and political implications of global ageing.