Most asian cultures, there is no social security cause the children are supposed to take care of the parents. Generally speaking they usually live in same house. Here in Thailand we get tax credits if our parents are old and don't have a pension. Its called the "good child" exemption
Older people tend to live longer and healthier lives if they continue working past the customary retirement age. Both of my grandfathers (who became adults before Social Security existed in the United States, and who aged into old age when the standard retirement age was 65) worked until about age 75. They both lived well into their eighties, with my paternal grandfather dying from being hit by an errantly driven car rather than from disease. My parents both retired right on the dot at age 65, and I think that has been worse for their health than continuing to work longer (my dad has now died, at a younger age than his dad died at).
The article kindly submitted here mentions an issue of age imbalance in the population. "The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and World Health Organization forecast Hong Kong will have the highest share of population aged 65 years and over in Asia by 2050 with 42 percent, outpacing Japan's 39 percent." That's an exceptionally skewed age ratio for any place in the world. If people cease working at age 65 in such a place, a large proportion of the population (both children and the elderly) have to be supported by a not very large proportion of the population at working age. That's difficult to do whether support for the elderly comes from their own children or from taxpayers in general.
What's happening in many countries, of course, is that people are living far longer into old age than they imagined they possibly could decades ago.[1] Life expectancies at adult ages (say, 40, or 65) are increasing steadily all over the developed world. If people retire at the same age as decades ago, in much better health and with many more years of remaining life ahead, it's not surprising that their personal savings may run out. The response is to keep the proportion of working years over a whole lifespan a more or less constant proportion of healthy life years.
I think you've got to be careful when making a claim that working longer means you live longer.
Ignoring that this is anecdotal, but you're comparing across generations, upbringings, etc.
Our society is prolonging the lives of our weakest members, not our strongest. We've got centennials whose only visit to a hospital has been for childbirths.
My grandmother has outlived her fraternal twin by over a half century, plus a couple other siblings. My mother hasn't outlived any siblings.
Our grandparents are of a generation when vaccines were just beginning, and our parents are mostly of the generation where they were well in place and widely used. My grandad was born before penicillin was discovered.
Comparing between generations isn't possible, because we compare between vastly different medical practise. It's highly improbable that a child born at 30 weeks will live as long as a child born at 40 weeks.
A less healthy individual is more likely to take retirement early due to poor health. It's then poor logic to go on to claim retiring makes you less healthy.
Poor health makes retirement more likely. No one in ill health who could retire is going to work into their deathbed when they can retire and spend more time with their family members and doing their hobbies.
One of my neighbours retired after her kids finished school and moved out. She's in far better health than her husband who worked until retirement age. So anecdotes are really irrelevant. He survived the Russian invasion of Prussia.
If work related stress shortens your life span, and even isolated high stress incidents are correlated with shortened life span. What effect does having your farm commandeered by German Artillery and then shelled into rubble by Russians have on your lifespan? My guess is, not good.
Not so sure about the general health of old people. Modern medicine keeps people alive, but working today's stressful jobs? I'm glad for your grandfathers, what kind of work did they do?
Parents discourage their children from engaging in potentially risky activities (eg. entrepreneur, startups, etc) because that puts their (the parents') future well-being in substantial jeopardy.
The weight of that jeopardy is best conveyed by the fact that there are ~300 families in Singapore that are receiving welfare, and each of those are handled on a case-by-case basis.
Caveat -- my understanding is based on the information provided by a friend living in Singapore, working in the tech industry, having spent some years trying to engender a startup culture. Apparently things are changing now, but that's the (recent) history.
I'm living in Hong Kong now and I see old people collecting cardboard and looking through bins more than once a day. It's not a good situation! There are more news stories of older people commiting suicide compared to the UK.
Five-ish years ago I was living in Singapore too but I don't recall ever seeing it there, especially nothing compared to Hong Kong.
Robots and automation may actually be the way we can get off the addictive economic treadmill of having the you g pay for the old by an ever expanding population. It is unsustainable.
They have already done so through increased worker productivity, but may ultimately replace young people as the "breadwinners" for those who can't or won't work.
This is to be welcomed, as we can economically support a shrinking population that grows wealthier over time. The traditional refrain of wealth redistribution being from "productive" members of society to the non productive will be upended. Many people will be consumers, producing things most people won't pay large amounts of money for.
I lived for a couple years in HK and then other Asian countries, and this does stands out. But if the alternative is a debt-based welfare state....
I don't think there's any doubt the Hong Kong government needs to do a better job with affordable housing, but I also don't like the fact that my nephew was born with a $20K debt while 50% of my mother's pension is being payed by taxpayers.
That debt isn't new, but is instead just a formalization of an arrangement that goes back to antiquity--each child is born with the obligation to take care of his or her parents when they get old.
[+] [-] kanwisher|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lars512|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tokenadult|11 years ago|reply
The article kindly submitted here mentions an issue of age imbalance in the population. "The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and World Health Organization forecast Hong Kong will have the highest share of population aged 65 years and over in Asia by 2050 with 42 percent, outpacing Japan's 39 percent." That's an exceptionally skewed age ratio for any place in the world. If people cease working at age 65 in such a place, a large proportion of the population (both children and the elderly) have to be supported by a not very large proportion of the population at working age. That's difficult to do whether support for the elderly comes from their own children or from taxpayers in general.
What's happening in many countries, of course, is that people are living far longer into old age than they imagined they possibly could decades ago.[1] Life expectancies at adult ages (say, 40, or 65) are increasing steadily all over the developed world. If people retire at the same age as decades ago, in much better health and with many more years of remaining life ahead, it's not surprising that their personal savings may run out. The response is to keep the proportion of working years over a whole lifespan a more or less constant proportion of healthy life years.
[1] http://www.nature.com/scientificamerican/journal/v307/n3/box...
[+] [-] electromagnetic|11 years ago|reply
Ignoring that this is anecdotal, but you're comparing across generations, upbringings, etc.
Our society is prolonging the lives of our weakest members, not our strongest. We've got centennials whose only visit to a hospital has been for childbirths.
My grandmother has outlived her fraternal twin by over a half century, plus a couple other siblings. My mother hasn't outlived any siblings.
Our grandparents are of a generation when vaccines were just beginning, and our parents are mostly of the generation where they were well in place and widely used. My grandad was born before penicillin was discovered.
Comparing between generations isn't possible, because we compare between vastly different medical practise. It's highly improbable that a child born at 30 weeks will live as long as a child born at 40 weeks.
A less healthy individual is more likely to take retirement early due to poor health. It's then poor logic to go on to claim retiring makes you less healthy.
Poor health makes retirement more likely. No one in ill health who could retire is going to work into their deathbed when they can retire and spend more time with their family members and doing their hobbies.
One of my neighbours retired after her kids finished school and moved out. She's in far better health than her husband who worked until retirement age. So anecdotes are really irrelevant. He survived the Russian invasion of Prussia.
If work related stress shortens your life span, and even isolated high stress incidents are correlated with shortened life span. What effect does having your farm commandeered by German Artillery and then shelled into rubble by Russians have on your lifespan? My guess is, not good.
[+] [-] unknown|11 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] UweSchmidt|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] seivan|11 years ago|reply
I see old people begging because lack of jobs - that's native Swedes, not just EU-migrants these days. Didn't see that 10 years ago.
[+] [-] Jedd|11 years ago|reply
Parents discourage their children from engaging in potentially risky activities (eg. entrepreneur, startups, etc) because that puts their (the parents') future well-being in substantial jeopardy.
The weight of that jeopardy is best conveyed by the fact that there are ~300 families in Singapore that are receiving welfare, and each of those are handled on a case-by-case basis.
Caveat -- my understanding is based on the information provided by a friend living in Singapore, working in the tech industry, having spent some years trying to engender a startup culture. Apparently things are changing now, but that's the (recent) history.
HK is doubtless more complicated.
[+] [-] danschuller|11 years ago|reply
Five-ish years ago I was living in Singapore too but I don't recall ever seeing it there, especially nothing compared to Hong Kong.
[+] [-] Zirro|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] EGreg|11 years ago|reply
Robots and automation may actually be the way we can get off the addictive economic treadmill of having the you g pay for the old by an ever expanding population. It is unsustainable.
They have already done so through increased worker productivity, but may ultimately replace young people as the "breadwinners" for those who can't or won't work.
This is to be welcomed, as we can economically support a shrinking population that grows wealthier over time. The traditional refrain of wealth redistribution being from "productive" members of society to the non productive will be upended. Many people will be consumers, producing things most people won't pay large amounts of money for.
[+] [-] latch|11 years ago|reply
I don't think there's any doubt the Hong Kong government needs to do a better job with affordable housing, but I also don't like the fact that my nephew was born with a $20K debt while 50% of my mother's pension is being payed by taxpayers.
[+] [-] rayiner|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] calyth42|11 years ago|reply
Their lack of tax diversity is also one of the main reasons why housing is so damn expensive, because the government make money there.
[+] [-] throwaway344|11 years ago|reply