The United States is facing a big economic problem, along with Europe, who has it worse. The problem is simply that as the [tag]population[/tag] grows older there are fewer young people to work and support the economy. There are two separate causes: Americans now have few children, just equal to the replacement rate, and [tag]life expectancy[/tag] for Americans has increased – to 77.6 years up from 66.2 years in 1950. A third factor is the “baby boom” after World War II whose members are reaching retirement age.
This economic problem is substantially one of policy and the expectations of Americans. The policies established in the ’50s assumed that one would retire at 60 or 65 years and have 5 or ten years of retirement. We now have an average life expectancy of 11.6 years after a 65 year retirement instead of the 1.2 year expectancy in 1950. (more…)
