Saturday, September 8, 2007

political and socio-economic impacts of current demographic changes

the current demographic changes of low birthrates and high life expectancy are one of the many changes that lead to certain socio-economic and political impacts. they may be positive and negative in nature.

positively, a socio-economic impact is that, with higher life expectancies denotes a higher standard of living. this is probably due to the fact that the pharmaceutical industry has improved and this has enabled diseases to be combated better so as to ensure that people live longer.

however, consequently, with the higher life expectancies and a low birthrate, there might not be enough productive individuals to propel the economy. this might inadvertently lead to a downfall of some major economies in the future, like japan. japan doesnt have enough immigrants settling in to keep it's population at a healthy growth rate. neither does it have a high rate of births.

furthermore, the older populace that will become dominant in the future society might lack the traits needed to ensure that the economy is forever diversified. the older generation might not have the traits of being creative and setting forth new products to develop their economy. also, they, generally being individuals who lack the desire of taking possible risks, would not travel on unchartered boundaries to bring in more wealth to the economic sector.

politically, there might not be stability. with the life expectancy growing, there will be more older people in the governing sector. the old, as far as anyone's concern, are not willing to take risks, and neither are they creative nor innovative. this might lead to a dysfunctional country that is not as efficient as it is now.

hence, we see that there are quite a lot at stake if the demographic changes are not changed to ourfavour. though there might be certain positive impacts, the negative ones far outweigh that of the positive. we must put effort so as to ensure that the future is not heavily affected.

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