In bringing down his
now infamous 2014 Budget, Treasurer Hockey emphasised the age of leaners had to
end, and then went about outlining an ideological assault on welfare
recipients, which included Aged Pensioners, by proposing an increase in the
pension eligibility age to 70 and a re-indexation of the age pension.
An ageing population is
a sign of success, both individually and collectively. Those societies which
are the oldest are also the richest, healthiest and have the greatest life
expectancy.
Worrying about getting
older devalues older people and the significant contributions older people make
to our society. Research constantly shows that older people make a great
contribution to our society, providing child care and acting as mentors and role
models. A significant increase in women’s participation in the workforce in the
past few decades has been facilitated by having grandparents to look after children.
Older people have also been found to make more financial contributions to their
children and grandchildren than the other way around. Far from being leaners
they are in fact lifters. Many age pensioners take on part time and occasional
work and should be encouraged and rewarded for these valuable contributions to
our community.
The whole ageing
workforce scare is based around the idea that the ageing of the workforce will
lead to labour shortages. As Dr Katherine Betts, from the Swinburne University
of Technology, points out in the article, fears that a reduction in the
proportion of tax-paying workers will support a growing proportion of age
pensioners are unfounded: “even with no further growth in labour force
participation rates, the dependency ratio is expected to decline from a current
53.6 per cent to about 44-46 per cent by 2061….Moreover, the health and
cognitive abilities of older people are better today than they were among older
people in the past."
The May Budget was
seriously flawed in not acknowledging the inputs of senior Australians. The
Treasurer would be better placed if he were to recognise older Australians’
contribution to the economy in the form of unpaid work, volunteering,
child-minding and intergenerational transfers of wealth.
If the accusation of "leaners" was made against any other sector of the community, especially some ethnic group, there would be outcries of "racism" and "xenophobia", but the older public are fair game for vilification as being economic threats! Our economy should not be a tool for favouring some demographic group at the expense of others. The economy exists to serve us, not make value judgements of who is more worthy than others. There was a much higher rate of employment in the past, and working people contributed to the success of our nation. Now, it's bigger, and sluggish, and is struggling to provide for our swelling population- thanks to full throttle immigration rates! With high youth unemployment and higher rate of unemployment within migrant groups, the demographic imbalance is what is distorting our economy, not older people.
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