Expenditure on Pensions

[najaB]

If TFR stabilises around 2.1 then the number of old people per young person will stabilise.

Which is why the solution to the demographic time bomb is to bear the pain while we wait for the baby boomers/Gen X to die off, rather than trying to increase birth rates.

 

[HSTEd]

Which is why the solution to the demographic time bomb is to bear the pain while we wait for the baby boomers/Gen X to die off, rather than trying to increase birth rates.

Why would boomers and GEn X dying help?

This can only get worse unless birth rates increase!

Sure the generation after Gen X is smaller, but there will be even fewer people to look after them.
The number of old people is not the problem, the problem is the number of old people per young person.

 

[najaB]

This can only get worse unless birth rates increase!

Globally, birth rates are in excess of 2.1.

 

[HSTEd]

Globally, birth rates are significantly in excess of 2.1.

They are right now, but are cratering rapidly.
They probably won't be by 2050 (page 25/52 of PDF). Central estimate is about 2.1, with 95% probability range 1.88-2.42. Worth noting that this estimate gets lower at every revision of the stats, and long before that the supply of migrants from the rest of the world will start to dry up.

The current strategy of UK politicians of simply importing ever-increasing number of migrants is not sustainable even in the medium term.

 

[Merle Haggard]

If TFR stabilises around 2.1 then the number of old people per young person will stabilise.

IN the current situation, the number of old people per young person will keep climbing all the way to human extinction.
If you think intergenerational issues are bad now, just wait until all the young have to look forward to is working ridiculous hours for a terrible standard of living because of the necessity to prop up care homes full of unproductive retireees.

My bold; but doesn't life expectancy and age of women at which they have children come into it? It's a more complex concept that it first appears, but wouldn't the result of a) a women who has children before she's 20 and b) one who doesn't have children until late 30's make a difference? I'm thinking that a) will result in thewoman still being alive whilst after her great grand children are born whereas b) it's much less likely. The first case means more people alive at points in time than the latter, but I'm not sure whether this affects the young/old ratio. Similarly, if people only enjoy short lives, then that will reduce the population at a subsequent point in time compared to if they had long ones.

 

[The Ham]

Clearly both extremes (for either immigration or extra children to support older People) ends up with bad outcomes, however currently we could benefit from a little more immigration.

Between 1991 and 2016 the number of working age people as a ratio changed from from 1:4 (based on +65 vs 16 to 64) to 1:3.5
By 2041 it will have changed to 1:2.4 this is more than twice the number of old people vs working age than it was in 1966 when the ratio was 1:5.1.

That's a huge shift, even getting it to stop at around 3.6 workers for each person in retirement would be a huge improvement.

Clearly aiming for the 1966 level of 1:5 would be foolish for the reasons outlined. However, likewise letting it get close to 1:2 would also be foolish.

Yes automation will help, but it's not going to help enough.

 

[birchesgreen]

Some talk above in earlier posts about getting the reproduction rate higher, how do folks plan to achieve this? And if the measures fail how are they going to respond?

 

[ainsworth74]

Some talk above in earlier posts about getting the reproduction rate higher, how do folks plan to achieve this?

Outlaw birth control and abortion for women aged under-45 or those with fewer than four children? The old Communist Romanian approach, which had no negative consequences at all...

 

[birchesgreen]

Outlaw birth control and abortion for women aged under-45 or those with fewer than four children? The old Communist Romanian approach, which had no negative consequences at all...

Yes if the carrot doesn't work (and there is evidence in many countries that it doesn't) then yu have the stick and we are in very dark territory indeed.

 

[Wynd]

Outlaw birth control and abortion for women aged under-45 or those with fewer than four children? The old Communist Romanian approach, which had no negative consequences at all...

Tonge firmly out of cheek, the other side of this equation is young people working and paying the taxes.

Fertility is low in the UK, because wages have been stagnant, and childcare costs make having children look like financial suicide to a demographic who are in their 3rd or 4th economic crisis before thier first decade in meaningful employment.

Blame must be laid at the door of those who have detereed young people from starting familes.

That trend is now well entrenched, and will only compound the issue of pension unaffordability going forwards.

 

[Magdalia]

There are some interesting statistics reported by the BBC here:

Japan population: One in 10 people now aged 80 or older

The world's oldest country has long struggled with how to provide for its ageing population.

www.bbc.co.uk

For the first time ever, more than one in 10 people in Japan are now aged 80 or older.
National data also shows 29.1% of the 125 million population is aged 65 or older- a record.
Japan has one of the lowest birth-rates in the world and has long struggled with how to provide for its ageing population.
It has the world's oldest population, measured by the proportion of people aged 65 or up, the United Nations says.

 

[eldomtom2]

Some talk above in earlier posts about getting the reproduction rate higher, how do folks plan to achieve this?

There are plenty of carrots that have not been seriously tried. Identifying the actual causes of low birth rates and working to address them instead of shrugging and saying "it's inherent to being a rich country" would be a start.

 

[Wynd]

How to discourage young folk from starting familes.

1. Make Childcare unaffordable.
2. Increase the cost of living.
3. Refuse to build more houses, and disicentivise people to downsize.
4. Remove in work benefits, or tax credits.
5. Flatline wages for 15 years through no productivity growth and reduce access to markets.
6. Create narritives and tax policies that benefit pensioners and punsih young people.
7. Load young people who want teritiary education up with as much debt as possible, and then charge them interest.
8. Create an unstable economic environment.

Need I go on?

These are the things that need adressing to encourage people to start familes.

 

[deltic]

At the same time people are saying robots and AI will reduce the need for millions of workers in the near future!

Just need to increase productivity by a large amount for those people who are working and the issue of falling birth rates becomes less of an issue.

 

[HSTEd]

1. Make Childcare unaffordable.

THere isn't really much you can do about this.
Childcare in the UK is extremely labour intensive due to the regulations about required ratios of children to adults.

Labour is expensive and is only becoming more so.
ATtempting to subsidise your way out of this reality is not sustainable - someone has to pay for it in the end!

You need to somehow hugely increase the productivity of childcare systems.

Tax Credits don't really help in this situation, because they don't solve the fundamental economic reality!
You take money from the working-age people to give it back to them, it achieves nothing.

You have to build a tonne more housing, secure the energy supply to reduce energy costs and then probably attempt to squeeze productivity gains out of transport and automation. In the long run it probably means the virtual death of most remaining "conventional" retail.

 

[najaB]

Childcare in the UK is extremely labour intensive due to the regulations about required ratios of children to adults.

Yet other countries with similar economies manage it.

 

[Dai Corner]

Yet other countries with similar economies manage it.

And many retired grandparents do it so their children can work full time.

 

[HSTEd]

Yet other countries with similar economies manage it.

Normally through large state subsidies, which conceal the cost rather than actually remove it. The working age population still pays.

And even countries with much cheaper at-point-of-use childcare have exactly the same problem of collapsing birth rates.

Ultimately the problem is that people don't really want to have children any more. And without inventing artificial wombs and enormous state creches there is no good answer to this problem.

 

[Dai Corner]

Wasn't the main reason for having many children to ensure that at least some survived long enough to look after their parents if they survived to old age?

The socialisation of elderly care in most developed countries has negated the need to do that.

 

[cb a1]

Are there any women contributing to this thread in the context of birth rates?
I'm not, so I'll throw my tuppence in from a male perspective.
It seems to me that once women have access to contraception, education and employment that many (not all) of them choose not to be baby factories. I witnessed the birth of my son and I'm frankly amazed that any woman would ever choose to have a second baby (and I appreciate that many do and all power to their elbow if that's for them).
Nonetheless, if birth rates are to rise, then society would have to decide to remove some or all elements that enable that choice (e.g. the right to abortion).
Personally, I would not like to live in such a society.

 

[Bald Rick]

Are there any women contributing to this thread in the context of birth rates?
I'm not, so I'll throw my tuppence in from a male perspective.
It seems to me that once women have access to contraception, education and employment that many (not all) of them choose not to be baby factories. I witnessed the birth of my son and I'm frankly amazed that any woman would ever choose to have a second baby (and I appreciate that many do and all power to their elbow if that's for them).
Nonetheless, if birth rates are to rise, then society would have to decide to remove some or all elements that enable that choice (e.g. the right to abortion).
Personally, I would not like to live in such a society.

It’s a good point.

Many of my female friends have specifically chosen not to have children, for a variety of reasons, but the most prevalent is that they just didn’t want to (and yes I have asked, carefully!) Interestingly, none of them mentioned the financial implications - it seems this wasn’t a consideration.

Values have changed in the past few decades, and the societal pressure on women (and to a certain extent men) to ‘settle down and start a family’ is much reduced.

 

[Ianigsy]

I don’t know any female colleagues who have more than two children, but I have a colleague in his early sixties who grew up as one of seven.

I can think of one couple younger than myself (early fifties) with three children, and they had theirs over a period of 7-8 years.

 

[Magdalia]

Many of my female friends have specifically chosen not to have children

don’t know any female colleagues who have more than two children

This is another classic example of "people I know" not being representative of the UK population.

The ONS published the UK births data for 2022 not long ago. A key feature of the data is that, for more than a quarter of live births in the UK, the mother was born outside of the UK.

Births to mothers born outside the UK since 2010 have moved up and down in a narrow range 179-192k, with 183k in 2022.

But births to mothers born in the UK fell below 500k in 2016 and in 2022 were down to 422k. This figure has fallen every year since 2013, except for 2021.

 

[cb a1]

This is another classic example of "people I know" not being representative of the UK population.

The ONS published the UK births data for 2022 not long ago. A key feature of the data is that, for more than a quarter of live births in the UK, the mother was born outside of the UK.

Births to mothers born outside the UK since 2010 have moved up and down in a narrow range 179-192k, with 183k in 2022.

But births to mothers born in the UK fell below 500k in 2016 and in 2022 were down to 422k. This figure has fallen every year since 2013, except for 2021.

The quotes you picked out were about women and multiple births.

The data you've posted is about the mother's place of birth.

I'm failing to see the relevance / relationship?

 

[Magdalia]

I'm failing to see the relevance / relationship?

The relevance is that "people I know" is not representative, unless "people I know" includes a large number of women not born in the UK.

 

[najaB]

The relevance is that "people I know" is not representative, unless "people I know" includes a large number of women not born in the UK.

I wasn't part of this discussion, but I'd say that the majority of the women I know were born outside the UK and none of them want more than two children, quite a few of them want none.

 

[birchesgreen]

This is another classic example of "people I know" not being representative of the UK population.

Arn't you assuming the female friends the OPs have are born in this country?

 

[swt_passenger]

THere isn't really much you can do about this.
Childcare in the UK is extremely labour intensive due to the regulations about required ratios of children to adults.

It’s always puzzled me, how we managed in the 1960s, when IIRC commercial “childcare” was comparatively rare. The traditional “family allowance” which became “child benefit” wasn’t expected to pay for childcare.

Did the large majority of working women rely on grandparents help, or just not work at all until children were at secondary school age?

 

[Magdalia]

Arn't you assuming the female friends the OPs have are born in this country?

No. I was just using where mothers are born as an example of where "people I know" may not be representative of the UK population as a whole.

 

[Wynd]

I am in my 30s, and half of my peer group have made a concious decison to be childfree. Lots of varying reasons.

Project that on the long term, and the population is going to be considerably smaller.