Consumption and population age structure

In this paper, the effects on aggregate consumption of changes in the age distribution of the population are analysed empirically. Economic theories predict that age influences individuals’ saving and consumption behaviour. Despite this, age structure effects are rarely controlled for in empirical consumption functions. Our findings suggest that they should. By analysing Norwegian quarterly time series data, we find that changes in the age distribution of the population have significant and life-cycle-consistent effects on aggregate consumption. Furthermore, controlling for age structure effects stabilises the other parameters of the consumption function and reveals significant real interest rate effects.      

中国人口转变、人口红利与经济增长的实证

我国人口年龄结构的变动使得劳动负担逐渐下降,这对于储蓄水平的上升和劳动力投入效率的提高具有显著的促进作用;我国劳动负担比与经济增长呈现出明显的负相关,劳动负担比每下降1个百分点,经济增长将提高1.06个百分点,在过去的30年里劳动负担降低累计带来的经济增长占总增长的27.23%。通过计量检验证明人口年龄结构变动所产生的促进经济增长的人口红利是存在的。由此我们推断,由于未来的人口年龄结构变动趋向人口老龄化,劳动负担逐步上升,这将会对未来的经济增长造成制约。利用未来10～20年时间较轻的劳动负担的机遇期,我们应当建立良好的教育、人力资本投资、社会保障等方面的制度以及制定积极的人口政策,调整当前生育政策、适时执行宏观经济政策(劳动就业政策)来应对已发生的、正在进行的人口变动,使我国的经济继续保持强有力的增长态势。     

预期寿命增长、年龄结构改变与我国国民储蓄率

人口年龄结构趋于老龄化和人均预期寿命逐步增长是目前我国人口发展的两个典型特征,而年龄阶段不同,个人的收入、消费与储蓄行为也不同。基于生命周期理论,在选定相关分析指标的基础上,文章使用我国省际平衡面板数据,实证分析了我国人口预期寿命增长和年龄结构改变对国民储蓄率的影响。分析结论表明,人口预期寿命增长提高了我国国民储蓄率;不考虑时间效应时,幼年人口负担比提高会减少国民储蓄率,而老年人口负担比提高会增加国民储蓄率;在考虑时间效应时,幼年人口负担比提高会增加国民储蓄率,而老年人口负担比提高会减少国民储蓄率。对此,文章给出了合理的解释。通过使用多种估计方法,我们发现所得到的结论是基本稳健的。     

人口转变、人口红利与经济增长可持续性--兼论充分就业如何促进经济增长

本文援引国际经验,把人口转变引致的不同人口年龄特征阶段看作是经济增长的一个额外源泉,或人口红利;论证了通过高储蓄率、充足的劳动力供给和低抚养比,中国人口转变对改革以来高速经济增长的贡献;揭示了人口红利即将消失的趋势,由此提出最大化促进就业是维持人口对经济增长正面效应的关键.     

Population dynamics and life-cycle consumption

This paper presents a model where aggregate consumption depends on both the level of wealth and the age structure of population. The explicit consideration of an endogenous rate of time preference permits to analyze the important role of population ageing as a determinant of aggregate saving. Received: 23 October 2001/Accepted: 13 February 2002 I would like to thank an anonymous referee for his comments. Financial support from CNR and MURST is gratefully acknowledged. Responsible editor: Alessandro Cigno.     

The effects of economic and population growth on national saving and inequality

This is a progress report on ongoing research into the effects of economic and population growth on national saving rates and inequality. The theoretical basis for the investigation is the life cycle model of saving and inequality. We report evidence that is conditional on the validity of the model, as well as evidence that casts doubt on it. Using time series of cross-sectional household surveys from Taiwan, Thailand, Britain, and the United States, we show that it is possible to force a life cycle interpretation on the data on consumption, income, and saving, but that the evidence is not consistent with large rate-of-growth effects, whereby economic and population growth enhances rates of national saving. The well-established cross-country link between economic growth and saving cannot be attributed to life cycle saving, nor will changes in economic or population growth exert large effects on saving within individual countries. There is evidence in favor of the life cycle model’s prediction that within-cohort inequality of consumption and of total income—though not necessarily inequality of earnings-—should increase with the age of the cohort. Decreases in the population growth rate redistribute population toward older, more unequal, cohorts, and can increase national inequality. We provide calculations on the magnitude of these effects.     

中国未来“第二次人口红利”探讨——基于人口年龄结构与居民储蓄关系的分析

我国人口形势的新变化直接影响未来经济发展的潜力和活力。在人口环境发生剧烈变化的背景下开展关于第二次人口红利的讨论和研究非常必要。本文在以往相关文献的研究基础上,定位分析我国储蓄率的高水平特征,从人口变化、政策、社保等多个角度探讨未来储蓄持续走高的可能性。并利用全国30个省市地区的面板数据重点分析人口结构与居民储蓄之间的关系,发现老年抚养比与居民储蓄之间存在显著的负相关关系。文章得出结论,“第二次人口红利”在我国难以实现,抓紧开发第一次人口红利、拉动经济增长才是我国现阶段社会经济发展的重点。     

Birth control,income redistribution,and the rate of saving: The case of Mexico

If different groups of people in a low-income society save at different average rates, a program of birth control may affect the aggregate rate of saving by changing the relative shares of income accruing to these groups. A model is outlined in which this process occurs. The only group that saves is profit recipients; peasants and secondary sector employees consume all their income. A decline in fertility leads to a lower demand for food and a lower price of food. This results in a lower money supply price of labor in the secondary sector, and hence greater profits and greater saving. On the other hand, a fertility decline may eventually produce a higher real standard of living among rural workers, hence a higher supply price of secondary sector labor, lower profits and lower saving. These effects are investigated in a simulation of Mexican economic growth with (a) constant high fertility and (b) a declining birth rate such as might occur if a successful national birth control program were instituted. The birth control program results in a higher rate of aggregate saving over the first several decades, and eventually a lower rate of saving once a higher standard of living has been attained.     

Saving,dependency and development

The widely-observed finding in the literature showing little or no relationship between population growth (and dependency) and saving requires modification based on panel and cross-section estimation of aggregate country data. While such a relationship is still weak in the hybrid Leff-type model, it is now found consistently over time and by stage of development in the Mason variable-growth life-cycle framework, where changes in demographic factors account for a notable part of saving.     

中国人口老龄化的宏观经济后果——应用一般均衡分析

本文运用“中国可计算一般均衡模型”(PRCGEM)对中国人口老龄化的宏观经济后果进行量化分析。模型结果显示,中国人口老龄化将通过劳动力的负增长以及由此导致的物质资本的低增长减缓了中国经济增长的速度。人均物质生活水平仍然会继续增长,但是增长的速度会不断下降。在人口老龄化背景下,技术进步和生产率的不断提高是维持中国经济可持续增长的主要源泉。     

中国农村人口结构与居民消费研究

本文运用生命周期模型、家庭储蓄需求模型和家庭生育决策理论等分析了人口结构变化对居民消费的影响渠道,并利用2001～2009年中国农村省际面板数据对人口年龄结构、性别结构与居民消费的关系进行了经验分析。研究表明,农村少儿抚养比与农村居民消费率显著负相关,农村老年抚养比与农村居民消费率显著正相关,而农村人口性别比系数的稳健性较差。     

Population aging and environmental quality in OECD countries: evidence from sulfur dioxide emissions data

Recent literature has suggested that population aging may shape energy demand and related emissions. Recent scholarship also suggests that emissions play a role in contemporary climate change and, as such, understanding the effect of population compositional change has considerable environmental policy importance. The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate the macro-level relationship between population aging and emissions of sulfur dioxide. We extend a standard macroeconomic estimation function by including the age composition of the population. In doing so, we separate, for the first time in the literature on aging and the environment, the life-cycle dimension of the age structure from its cohort dimension. We utilize data representing a balanced panel of 25 OECD countries during the period from 1970 to 2000. Consistent with our expectations, we find that societies with a low proportion of young and a high proportion of senior citizens emit more sulfur dioxide. At the same time, our results suggest that a high proportion of individuals born before 1960 is positively correlated to national sulfur dioxide emissions. Our study contributes to understanding of past emission patterns in OECD countries and the findings may allow for improvements in future emission projections.     

Poverty and macroeconomic performance across space,race, and family structure

We examined the effects of macroeconomic performance and social policy on the extent and depth of poverty in America using state-level panel data from the 1981-2000 waves of the Current Population Survey. We found that a strong macroeconomy at both the state and national levels reduced both the number of families who were living in poverty and the severity of poverty. The magnitude and source of these antipoverty effects, however, were not uniform across family structures and racial groups or necessarily over time. While gains in the eradication of poverty, in general, were tempered by rising wage inequality, simulations indicated that female-headed families and families that were headed by black persons experienced substantial reductions in poverty in the 1990s largely because of the growth in median wages. An auxiliary time-series analysis suggests that the expansions in the federal Earned Income Tax Credit of the 1990s accounted for upward of 50% of the reduction in after-tax income deprivation.     

Land tenure, population, and long-run growth

This paper brings together the development literature on land tenure with current research on population and long-run growth. Landowners make a decision between fixed rent, fixed wage, and sharecropping contracts to hire tenants to operate their land. The choice of tenure contract affects the share of output going to tenants, and within a simple unified growth model, this affects the relative price of food and therefore fertility. Fixed wage contracts elicit the lowest fertility rate and fixed rent contracts the highest, with sharecropping as an intermediate case. The implications of this for long-run growth depend on the assumptions one makes about scale effects in the aggregate economy. With increasing returns to scale, as in several models of innovation, fixed rent contracts imply higher growth through a market size effect. Without such increasing returns, though, fixed rent contracts reduce output per capita through a depressing effect on accumulation.     

Age structure effects and growth in the OECD, 1950–1990

Economic growth depends on human resources and human needs. The demographic age structure shapes both of these factors. We study five-year data from the OECD countries 1950–1990 in the framework of an age structure augmented neoclassical growth model with gradual technical adjustment. The model performs well in both pooled and panel estimations. The growth patterns of GDP per worker (labor productivity) in the OECD countries are to a large extent explained by age structure changes. The 50–64 age group has a positive influence, and the group above 65 contributes negatively, while younger age groups have ambiguous effects. However, the mechanism behind these age effects is not yet resolved. Received: 16 January 1997/Accepted: 2 July 1998     

The evaluation of China's population policy]

China's population policy has had tremendous effects on the reduction of fertility. The impact of the population policy is manifested in the following aspects. 1) Reducing the size of the total population by 200 million in 17 years. If the population growth rate had remained at its 1970 level of 2.6/1000, the total population would have been 1.28 billion in 1987. 2) The implementation of the population policy accelerated the process of demographic transition. The mortality decline which began in the early 1950s initiated the demographic transition. The Fertility decline began after the birth control policy was implemented and shifted the transition to a low population growth stage even before the socioeconomic conditions which are considered to be the determinants of fertility decline appeared. The fertility decline, in turn, promoted the socioeconomic development of the country. 3) Solving the problem of food; feeding 21.6% of the world's population on 7.1% of the world's farm land is no easy task. The success of population control, no doubt, played an important role in lowering the population growth rate so that the growth of food production could keep pace with the needs of the population. 4) A decline in the dependency ratio is a favorable condition to socioeconomic development. China's dependency ratio of 59.7 is among the lowest in developing countries and is close to the level in developed countries. Therefore, more production output can be used in investment rather than consumption. 5) The fertility decline facilitated a balanced economic growth. The ratio of population growth as compared to the growth of major economic indicators should be considered an important issue in maintaining macroeconomic control. The population policy made it possible for economic growth to surpass population growth.     

Alan Greenspan on the Economic Implications of Population Aging

At the 2004 annual symposium of central bank leaders sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City at Jackson Hole, Wyoming, Alan Greenspan, Chairman of the US Federal Reserve Board, devoted his opening remarks on 27 August to a discussion of the economic implications of population aging. The full text of his remarks is reproduced below. Greenspan's high prestige and great influence on US economic policy lend special interest to his views on this much-discussed subject (see also the next Documents item in this issue). He outlines the coming demographic shift in the United States in language that is characteristically cautious and qualified. (The elderly dependency ratio will “almost certainly” rise as the baby boom generation retires, Greenspan says, although elsewhere he terms the process, more accurately, inexorable.) The main factor responsible for population aging he identifies as the decline of fertility. Immigration is an antidote, but, to be effective, its size would have to be much larger than is envisaged in current projections. Greenspan's assessment of the economic consequences of the changing age structure highlights the prospect of a deteriorating fiscal situation in the United States: chronic deficits in the Social Security program over the long haul, assuming that existing commitments for benefits per retiree are met, and even greater difficulties for the health care system for the elderly—Medicare—in which the effects of increasing numbers in old age are amplified by advances in medical technology and the bias inherent in the current system of subsidized third-party payments. The sober outline of policy choices imposed by population aging—difficult in the United States, but less so, Greenspan notes, than in Europe and Japan—underlies the need for counteracting the declining growth of the population of labor force age through greater labor force participation and later retirement. Beyond that, growth of output per worker can provide the key “that would enable future retirees to maintain their expected standard of living without unduly burdening future workers.” This requires continuation of policies that enhance productivity, such as deregulation and globalization, and greater investment. In turn, the latter presupposes greater domestic saving, both personal and by the government, as the United States cannot “continue indefinitely to borrow saving from abroad.” Demographic aging requires a new balance between workers and retirees. Curbing benefits once bestowed is difficult: only benefits that can be delivered should be promised. Public programs should be recalibrated, providing incentives for individuals to adjust to the inevitable consequences of an aging society.     

Intergenerational transfers in US county-level CO2 emissions, 2007

Research has shown that increases in carbon emissions and resulting climate change are not driven by population size alone, but also associated with industrialization, urbanization, and economic development. Further, industrialization and development may, in part, be driven by changing demographic structure, and in particular the process of population aging. Fluctuations in age composition shape aggregate production and consumption. Viewed through this lens, the carbon dioxide emissions of an analytical unit (county, province, state, nation) can be considered a product of its age composition. This analysis tests several demographic theories of age-specific production and consumption on US county-level carbon dioxide emissions. Using a modified STIRPAT framework, econometric estimates identify a positive correlation between county-level labor force participation and total carbon dioxide emissions. These effects are a result of general economic activity as opposed to growth only in energy intensive industrial sectors, a relationship that is widely hypothesized but under-developed in carbon emission estimates. In addition, results show larger households are associated with lower aggregate emissions, confirming the hypothesis that areas of declining household size will experience higher future emissions. In general, this research demonstrates the importance of adding nuance to emission estimates by integrating demographic dimensions beyond population size and growth.     

人口转变的经济增长效应研究新进展：一个综述

关于人口转变对于经济增长的效应研究由来已久,但是研究大多只考虑了人口数量和人口增长率对于经济增长的效应。近二十年来,许多经济学家在揭示“东亚奇迹”和中国经济腾飞等一系列经济现象的原因时。发现了人口年龄结构对于经济增长的重要贡献,并提出了“人口红利”的概念以解释经济发展。本文将具体介绍近二十年来理论界对于人口转变影响经济增长的相关机制的研究以及经验分析。并对这些研究的政策含义和有待深入研究的问题作出简要评述。     

Cohort,age, and period effects upon the employment of white females: Evidence for 1957–1968

The net effects of birth cohort, age, and period upon the employment of white women, 1957–1968, are estimated by a regression analysis of data from the Social Security Administration’s continuous work history file. By conceptualizing period-specific effects as those associated with the business cycle, we avoid multicollinearity and succeed in performing an analysis faithful to the cohort concerns usual in fertility analysis and to the macroeconomic concerns usual in employment studies. The age pattern of employment and the pattern of intercohort employment change are examined in some detail. The long-run (cohort) trend of increasing white female employment is compared with the estimated (short-run) effects attributable to the business cycle, and it is found that, while both are significant, the former exerted a stronger effect in the 1957–1968 period.