In the context of population ageing, the fact that a sovereign government is never financially constrained means that it can always provide first-class health care to its citizens.
Answer: False
The answer is False.
Does the dependency ratio matter? It surely does but not in the way that is usually assumed.
The standard dependency ratio is normally defined as 100*(population 0-15 years) + (population over 65 years) all divided by the (population between 15-64 years). Historically, people retired after 64 years and so this was considered reasonable. The working age population (15-64 year olds) then were seen to be supporting the young and the old.
The aged dependency ratio is calculated as:
100*Number of persons over 65 years of age divided by the number of persons of working age (15-65 years).
The child dependency ratio is calculated as:
100*Number of persons under 15 years of age divided by the number of persons of working age (15-65 years).
The total dependency ratio is the sum of the two. You can clearly manipulate the "retirement age" and add workers older than 65 into the denominator and subtract them from the numerator.
If we want to actually understand the changes in active workers relative to inactive persons (measured by not producing national income) over time then the raw computations are inadequate.
Then you have to consider the so-called effective dependency ratio which is the ratio of economically active workers to inactive persons, where activity is defined in relation to paid work. So like all measures that count people in terms of so-called gainful employment they ignore major productive activity like housework and child-rearing. The latter omission understates the female contribution to economic growth.
Given those biases, the effective dependency ratio recognises that not everyone of working age (15-64 or whatever) are actually producing. There are many people in this age group who are also "dependent". For example, full-time students, house parents, sick or disabled, the hidden unemployed, and early retirees fit this description.
I would also include the unemployed and the underemployed in this category although the statistician counts them as being economically active.
If we then consider the way the neo-liberal era has allowed mass unemployment to persist and rising underemployment to occur you get a different picture of the dependency ratios.
The reason that mainstream economists believe the dependency ratio is important is typically based on false notions of the government fiscal constraint.
So a rising dependency ratio suggests that there will be a reduced tax base and hence an increasing fiscal crisis given that public spending is alleged to rise as the ratio rises as well.
So if the ratio of economically inactive rises compared to economically active, then the economically active will have to pay much higher taxes to support the increased spending. So an increasing dependency ratio is meant to blow the deficit out and lead to escalating debt.
These myths have also encouraged the rise of the financial planning industry and private superannuation funds which blew up during the recent crisis losing millions for older workers and retirees. The less funding that is channelled into the hands of the investment banks the better is a good general rule.
But all of these claims are not in the slightest bit true and should be rejected out of hand.
So the predominant debate is that a fiscal crisis is emerging and that we have to make people work longer despite this being very biased against the lower-skilled workers who physically are unable to work hard into later life.
We are also encouraged to increase our immigration levels to lower the age composition of the population and expand the tax base. Further, we are told relentlessly that the government will be unable to afford to provide the quality and quantity of the services that we have become used too.
However, all of these remedies miss the point overall. It is not a financial crisis that beckons but a real one. Dependency ratios matter because they tell us how many workers will be available to produce real goods and services at any point in time. So we can make projections about real GDP growth for given projections about productivity once we have an idea of these underlying dependency ratios.
Clearly we want to be sure that the projected real needs of the population are capable of being met with the likely available resources.
So the only question we need to ask about the future population trends relate to whether there will be enough real resources available to provide aged-care, etc at a desirable level in the future? However, that is never the way the debate is framed. The worry is always that public outlays will rise because more real resources will be required "in the public sector" than previously.
However these outlays are irrelevant from a financial point of view. The government can purchase anything that is for sale in the currency it issues at any time. There is never a question that the government cannot afford to buy something that is available.
It is the availability that is the issue. As long as these real resources are available there will be no problem. In this context, the type of policy strategy that is being driven by these myths will probably undermine the future productivity and provision of real goods and services in the future.
It is clear that the goal should be to maintain efficient and effective medical care systems. Clearly the real health care system matters by which I mean the resources that are employed to deliver the health care services and the research that is done by universities and elsewhere to improve our future health prospects. So real facilities and real know how define the essence of an effective health care system.
Further, productivity growth comes from research and development and in Australia the private sector has an abysmal track record in this area. Typically they are parasites on the public research system which is concentrated in the universities and public research centres (for example, CSIRO).
Unfortunately, tackling the problems of the distant future in terms of current "monetary" considerations which have led to the conclusion that fiscal austerity is needed today to prepare us for the future will actually undermine our future.
The irony is that the pursuit of fiscal austerity leads governments to target public education almost universally as one of the first expenditures that are reduced.
Most importantly, maximising employment and output in each period is a necessary condition for long-term growth. The emphasis in mainstream integenerational debate that we have to lift labour force participation by older workers is sound but contrary to current government policies which reduces job opportunities for older male workers by refusing to deal with the rising unemployment.
Anything that has a positive impact on the dependency ratio is desirable and the best thing for that is ensuring that there is a job available for all those who desire to work.
Further encouraging increased casualisation and allowing underemployment to rise is not a sensible strategy for the future. The incentive to invest in one's human capital is reduced if people expect to have part-time work opportunities increasingly made available to them.
But all these issues are really about political choices rather than government finances. The ability of government to provide necessary goods and services to the non-government sector, in particular, those goods that the private sector may under-provide is independent of government finance.
Any attempt to link the two via fiscal policy "discipline:, will not increase per capita GDP growth in the longer term. The reality is that fiscal drag that accompanies such "discipline" reduces growth in aggregate demand and private disposable incomes, which can be measured by the foregone output that results.
Clearly surpluses help control inflation because they act as a deflationary force relying on sustained excess capacity and unemployment to keep prices under control. This type of fiscal "discipline" is also claimed to increase national savings but this equals reduced non-government savings, which arguably is the relevant measure to focus upon.
So even though the government is not financially constrained it might adopt a policy platform that undermines productivity growth and leaves the economy short of real productive resources at a time in the future when they will be needed to fulfill its socio-economic program.
You might like to read this blog posts for further information:
That is enough for today!
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