Aging Population. Essay

Ageing population
The problems of ageing population include the prospect of slow growth and low productivity, rising public spending and labor shortages. Looking ahead to the year 2050, it has been predicted that for advanced countries, 10% of the fiscal burden of the crisis will consists of ageing –related costs. The other 90% will be spent on pensions, health and long term care. In 1900 average life expectancy at birth for the world as a whole only around 30 years, and in rich countries under 50. Main cause of ageing societies is that people everywhere are having far fewer children and younger aged groups are much too small to counterbalance the growing number of older people.
Hence it is imperative that we extend the lifespan of the younger generation so that they can support the older generation and boost fertility rates. Human lifespan is finite because our bodies wear and tear due a variety of factors. Firstly, stress is often seen as a life-shortening factor-though perhaps the effects are not as lethal as some people think, or else the Japanese, who are famous for working long hours, would not have the highest life expectancy in the world. Secondly, obesity; a hazard of affluence. Approximately 10-20% of the adult population in many rich countries is clinically obese. Solely based on America, that number reaches a stunning 30%. Overweight people are at greater risk of cardiovascular, leading cause of death and disability. There is therefore increased emphasis in modifying risk factor, such as healthy eating; consumer more fruit and vegetables, regular exercise and avoidance of smoking to extend life spans. Furthermore, experiments on rodents have shown that a severely restricted but balanced diet can increase people lifespan by about 30%.
Alternate method to alleviate the problems of an ageing population is to boost the fertility rates. Fertility rates have dropped steeply in all OECD (Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development) countries in the past few decades, from an average of 3.2 children per woman in 1960 to 1.6 now. Apparently, governments could try to lessen the obstacles to childbearing faced by individual and families. However, on closer examination even if the restrictions were loosened, the birth rate might not tick up by very much. Especially nowadays, people from the big cities are already adapted to the lifestyle that has brought down fertility rate.