Aging Demography And Well Being In Latin America

Latin American countries are in the midst of a demographic transition and, as a consequence, a population-aging process. Over the next few decades, the number of children will decline relative to the number of older adults. Population aging is the result of a slow but sustained reduction in mortality rates, given increases in life expectancy and fertility. These trends reflect welcome long-term improvements in welfare and in economic and social development. But this process also entails policy challenges: many public institutions—including education, health, and pension systems and labor market regulations—are designed for a different demographic context and will need to be adapted. When We’re Sixty-Four discusses public policies aimed at overcoming the two main challenges facing Latin American countries concerning the changing demographics. On one hand, older populations demand more fiscal resources for social services, such as health, long-term care, and pensions. On the other, population aging produces shifts in the proportion of the population that is working age, which may affect long-term economic growth. Aging societies risk losing dynamism, being exposed to higher dependency rates, and experiencing lower savings rates. Nonetheless, in the interim, Latin American countries have a demographic opportunity: a temporary decline in dependency rates creates a period in which the share of the working-age population, with its associated saving capacity, is at its highest levels. This constitutes a great opportunity in the short term because the higher savings may result in increases in capital endowment per worker and productivity. For that to happen, it is necessary to generate institutional, financial, and fiscal conditions that promote larger savings and investment, accelerating per capita economic growth in a sustainable way.

Latin America and the Caribbean will soon face the challenges of an aging population. This process, which took over a century in the rich world, will occur in two or three decades in the developing world; seven of the 25 countries that will age more rapidly are in LAC. Population aging will pose challenges and offer opportunities. This book explores three sets of issues. First is a group of issues related to the support of the aging and poverty in the life cycle. This covers questions of work and retirement, income and wealth, and living arrangements and intergenerational transfers. It also explores the relation between the life cycle and poverty. Second is the question of the health transition. How does the demographic transition impact the health status of the population and the demand for health care? And how advanced is the health transition in LAC? Third is an understanding of the fiscal pressures that are likely to accompany population aging and to disentangle the role of demography from the role of policy in that process. This book provides an introduction to the concepts and techniques at the intersection of demography and economics. It summarizes the policy debate about potential reforms needed to make population aging an opportunity for development.

Recent demographic trends in the Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) region will shape the growth and age composition of its populations for decades to come. The rapid mortality decline that began during the 1950s, and the more recent and even sharper reduction in fertility, will produce unusually high rates of growth of the older population, a large change in overall population age composition, and significant increases in the ratio of older to younger population. According to the 2013 United Nations projections, the number of people aged 60 and over in LAC is expected to increase from 59 million in 2010 to 196 million in 2050, and the number of people aged 80 and over will increase from 8.6 million to more than 44 million during the same period. To explore the process of rapid aging in the LAC, a workshop took place at the National Academy of Medicine in May 2015. Participants of the workshop presented scientific research emphasizing what is unique about aging in LAC and what is similar to other processes around the world, highlighted the main areas where knowledge of the aging process in LAC is insufficient and new research is required, and proposed data collection that will produce information for policymaking while being responsive to the needs of the research community for harmonized, highly comparable information. The workshop afforded participants an opportunity to consider strategies for articulating data collection and research in the region so that country-based teams can reap the benefits from being part of a larger enterprise while simultaneously maintaining their own individuality and responding to the particular needs of each country. Strengthening the Scientific Foundation for Policymaking to Meet the Challenges of Aging in Latin America and the Caribbean summarizes the presentations and discussions of the workshop.

This paper estimates the fiscal costs of population aging in Latin America and provides policy recommendations on reforms needed to make these costs manageable. Although Latin American societies are still younger than most advanced economies, like other emerging markets the region is already in a process of population aging that is expected to accelerate in the remainder of the century. This will directly affect fiscal sustainability by putting pressure on public pension and health care systems in the region that are already more burdened than, for example, in emerging Asia, a region with a similar demographic structure. A stylized cross-country exercise, drawing on demographic projections from the United Nations and methodologies developed by the IMF to derive public spending projections, is used to quantify long-term fiscal gaps generated by population aging in 18 Latin American countries. Several aspects of current pensions and health care systems in Latin Amer-ica make the region’s long-term fiscal positions particularly vulnerable to population aging.

This book examines one of the most important demographic changes facing the United States: an overall aging population and the increasing influence of Latinos. It also looks at the changing demographics in Mexico and its impact on the health and financial well-being of aging Mexicans and Mexican Americans. The book provides a conceptual and accessible framework that will educate and inform readers about the interconnectedness of the demographic trends facing these two countries. It also explores the ultimate personal, social, and political impact they will have on all Americans, in the U.S. as well as Mexico. Challenges of Latino Aging in the Americas features papers presented at the 2013 International Conference on Aging in the Americas, held at the University of Texas at Austin, September 2013. It brings together the work of many leading scholars from the fields of sociology, demography, psychology, anthropology, geography, social work, geriatric medicine, epidemiology, and public affairs. Coverage in this edited collection includes working with diverse populations; culturally compatible interventions for diverse elderly; the health, mental health, and social needs and concerns of aging Latinos; and the policy, political, and bi-lateral implications of aging and diversity in the U.S. and Mexico. The book provides a rich blend of empirical evidence with insightful, cutting-edge analysis that will serve as an insightful resource for researchers and policy makers, professors and graduate students in a wide range of fields, from sociology and demography to economics and political science. ​

This timely and much-needed book addresses the demographic trends affecting the Latinos in the United States, Mexico and Latin America, looking at the health concerns and of this growing population, as it ages. Further examination of this previously understudied group– now the nation’s largest minority group – offers the possibility to promote healthy aging for the entire nation. As international immigration continues to increase, collections such as this are critical for understanding the social and health consequences of this immigration.