Human World

Hania Zlotnik sees economic challenges for aging population

By 2050, more than one in five of the 9 billion people on Earth will be over the age of 60, according to a U.N. report. Hania Zlotnik discusses challenges for an aging population.

Hania Zlotnik: The population sixty and over in developing countries is going to almost triple, and in the whole world also is going to slightly more than triple in the coming four decades.

Hania Zlotnik is the director of the UN Population Division. She talked about the challenge of adapting to an aging population.

Hania Zlotnik: The main concern that everyone is talking about is not so much about societal adaptation, but the economic adaptation.

Zlotnik said that people are staying healthier and living longer, and it’s expected that older people will remain in the workforce.

Hania Zlotnik: But it’s also important for the economic system to allow them to save over their working life enough so at some point they are able to stop working as hard as they used to, or maybe stop working at all.

But despite the challenges, she sees the aging of the population as an encouraging sign that people are having fewer children.

Hania Zlotnik: We have to see aging of the population as the greatest success of ensuring sustainability.

At the same time, Zlotnik said, the world’s economies will have to provide jobs for the world’s young people.

Hania Zlotnik: An economy is not going to take off if there’s a lot of unemployment, if people who want to work cannot find gainful employment.

Posted 
September 28, 2009
 in 
Human World

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