Population aging and the historical development of intergenerational transfer systems
Abstract From our evolutionary past, humans inherited a long period of child dependency, extensive intergenerational transfers to children, cooperative breeding, and social sharing of food. Older people continued to transfer a surplus to the young. After the agricultural revolution, population densi...
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doaj-5710d99383ae4aa4833e066f4bf196142020-11-25T03:24:05ZengSpringerOpenGenus2035-55562020-09-0176112110.1186/s41118-020-00100-8Population aging and the historical development of intergenerational transfer systemsRonald Lee0Departments of Demography and Economics, University of California, BerkeleyAbstract From our evolutionary past, humans inherited a long period of child dependency, extensive intergenerational transfers to children, cooperative breeding, and social sharing of food. Older people continued to transfer a surplus to the young. After the agricultural revolution, population densities grew making land and residences valuable assets controlled by older people, leading to their reduced labor supply which made them net consumers. In some East Asian societies today, elders are supported by adult children but in most societies the elderly continue to make private net transfers to their children out of asset income or public pensions. Growing public intergenerational transfers have crowded out private transfers. In some high-income countries, the direction of intergenerational flows has reversed from downward to upwards, from young to old. Nonetheless, net private transfers remain strongly downward, from older to younger, everywhere in the world. For many but not all countries, projected population aging will bring fiscal instability unless there are major program reforms. However, in many countries population aging will reduce the net cost to adults of private transfers to children, partially offsetting the increased net costs to working age adults for public transfers to the elderly.http://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s41118-020-00100-8Population agingIntergenerational transferDemographic transitionOld ageSupport systemSharing |
collection |
DOAJ |
language |
English |
format |
Article |
sources |
DOAJ |
author |
Ronald Lee |
spellingShingle |
Ronald Lee Population aging and the historical development of intergenerational transfer systems Genus Population aging Intergenerational transfer Demographic transition Old age Support system Sharing |
author_facet |
Ronald Lee |
author_sort |
Ronald Lee |
title |
Population aging and the historical development of intergenerational transfer systems |
title_short |
Population aging and the historical development of intergenerational transfer systems |
title_full |
Population aging and the historical development of intergenerational transfer systems |
title_fullStr |
Population aging and the historical development of intergenerational transfer systems |
title_full_unstemmed |
Population aging and the historical development of intergenerational transfer systems |
title_sort |
population aging and the historical development of intergenerational transfer systems |
publisher |
SpringerOpen |
series |
Genus |
issn |
2035-5556 |
publishDate |
2020-09-01 |
description |
Abstract From our evolutionary past, humans inherited a long period of child dependency, extensive intergenerational transfers to children, cooperative breeding, and social sharing of food. Older people continued to transfer a surplus to the young. After the agricultural revolution, population densities grew making land and residences valuable assets controlled by older people, leading to their reduced labor supply which made them net consumers. In some East Asian societies today, elders are supported by adult children but in most societies the elderly continue to make private net transfers to their children out of asset income or public pensions. Growing public intergenerational transfers have crowded out private transfers. In some high-income countries, the direction of intergenerational flows has reversed from downward to upwards, from young to old. Nonetheless, net private transfers remain strongly downward, from older to younger, everywhere in the world. For many but not all countries, projected population aging will bring fiscal instability unless there are major program reforms. However, in many countries population aging will reduce the net cost to adults of private transfers to children, partially offsetting the increased net costs to working age adults for public transfers to the elderly. |
topic |
Population aging Intergenerational transfer Demographic transition Old age Support system Sharing |
url |
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s41118-020-00100-8 |
work_keys_str_mv |
AT ronaldlee populationagingandthehistoricaldevelopmentofintergenerationaltransfersystems |
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