Nowdays, the improved medical care system of most of the countires in the world allow people to live longer with a consequent increase of the life expectancy. While older people can enjoy this tendency, the latter could represents a significant problem for the governments and have serious consequences on current and future generations.
Before of the two world wars, the medical care system was not so advanced to grant a life expectancy over 60 years, thus people were spending most of their life working and then dying just after the retirement. The main advantage of a greater life expectancy is straightforward: people can live more and have more years to enjoy the life off the work.
On the other hand, the main disadvantage of having a country with an increased number of old people is related to the budget dedicated to pensions paying. The government needs to allocate more money to this cause and, in order to do that, greater incomes are required. However, the latter are dependent on the whole economic system productivity which, in turn, is influenced by the amount of work force available. Clearly, if there is not a constant replacement of people who retire from work, the pensions system will become unsustainable for the country’s resources.
I believe, considering the current situation of my country and focusing only on the economic aspects, that disadvantages of an increased life expectancy outweigh the advantages. Since the 2000, my country has been observing the fall of the birth rate and, due also to other factors, there has been a steadily decrease of productivity.The government responded increasing the age for the retirement, bringing that value around 70 years and it is clear that future generations will see that age still increase.
Increased life expectancy has positive and negative consequences on our economic systems. Currently the main drawback is related to pension plans. if government will not change the overall system, soon people will end up working for their entire life.