Age Concerns

Here are some facts and figures that you might want to know about. There have been some major population changes:

Lots of children were born in the late 40s and 50s after the Second World War: by 2031 there will be 75% more people over the age of 75 than there were in 2004.
In the 1960’s there was another ‘baby boom’ when a lot of children were born: these children are now in their forties, and many of them are working and paying taxes.
But now there is a decline in the population with fewer children being born: Scotland’s population is predicted to fall below 5 million by 2036.

The consequences are that, increasingly there will be:

fewer people working and paying tax
more people beyond pension age
growth in the numbers of ‘oldest old’ (5 times more 100 year olds in the 2030s than at present)

And it is your generation that will have to support this growing ageing population.

So what might this mean for you in the future? Here are a few questions for you to think about and discuss:

How old will you be in 2031? What bit of the population will you be in: work force or getting your pension?
If there are far more ‘old’ people in the population, what effects could there be: demands on health and care services, how far pension funds and taxes will stretch, differences between ‘young’ old people and ‘old’ old people?

Past