In this country we’re lucky enough to have a fairly comprehensive welfare system (though it does fluctuate with governments). In the last few years, a decent bit of scaremongering has been going on, with people such as our treasurer (Peter Costello) claiming that, because people are getting older on average, we’ll soon have a very top-heavy population, with lots of oldies soaking up all the welfare money. (On this basis, he wants us to work for longer and to all have more children while thinking of him; “One for mum, one for dad, and one for Peter”, or something along those lines).

Naturally, in line with his political proclivities, options such as changes to tax and immigration do not pop up as potential solutions. Trawling through the ABC Radio National website today, i found an interesting download of an interview with Sol Encel of the Social Policy Research centre in NSW, and he tells us that the “Ageing Population” crisis is just a lot of politically motivated arm-waving.

I thought it might be worth taking a look:
The “Life Matters” program download page:Life Matters: The Cost of Ageing
General Radio National Downloads: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/default.htm
Abstract of Sol Encel’s report: A critique of the inter-generational reports - if anyone can direct me to a full-text copy of this, i’d much appreciate it…

Related posts:

1. Mark Twain on Colonial Australia
2. The Reason Australia Lacks Unlimited Internet Plans
3. Brazil vs. Australia, Where are you going to be?
4. Farewell to the King of the Mountain
5. Cost of nightclubs going up