Population Ageing Negatively Affects Productivity

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The Impact of a Lower School Leaving Age and a Later Retirement on the Financing of the Norwegian Public Pension System

We analyse how an extended working life could affect the sustainability of the Norwegian public pension system. Particular emphasis is given to a younger school leaving age. The school reform investigated lowers the school leaving age by two years, one by compressing primary and secondary schooling and another by lowering the school entrance age. Graduating at a younger age shifts the timing of subsequent events in adulthood toward younger ages. Individuals enter the workforce earlier, initiate childbearing at a younger age and cohort fertility may increase. This is achieved with minimal losses to human capital: Swiss and Swedish evidence suggest that such variation in the length of schooling and in the school entrance age have negligible effects on adult productivity. Using a large scale, micro-based dynamic model for the Norwegian public pension system, MOSART, we find that the school reform can play a substantial role in increasing the sustainability of public pension systems

Variations in Productivity over the Life Span: A Review and Some Implications

This paper presents a review of the literature on productivity differentials across adult age groups. The causes of age variations in productivity are addressed with special emphasis on the role of cognitive abilities and labor market performance. According to most findings, older workers tend to be overpaid relative to their productivity. The consequence can be difficulties in employing elderly workers

The end of secularization in Europe? A socio-demographic perspective

Much of the current debate over secularization in Europe focuses only on the direction of religious change, and pays exclusive attention to social causes. Scholars have been less attentive to shifts in the rate of religious decline, and to the role of demography – notably fertility and immigration. This article addresses both phenomena. It uses data from the European Values Surveys and European Social Survey for the period 1981-2008 to establish basic trends in religious attendance and belief across the ten countries that have been consistently surveyed. These show that religious decline is mainly occurring in Catholic European countries and has effectively ceased among post-1945 birth cohorts in six northwestern European societies where secularization began early. It also provides a cohort component projection of religious affiliation for two European countries using fertility, migration, switching and age and sex-structure parameters derived from census and immigration data. These suggest that western Europe may be more religious at the end of our century than at its beginning

Decomposing the change in labour force indicators over time

In this paper we study changes in the size and the composition of the labour force in five OECD countries from 1983 through 2000. We apply a recent decomposition method to quantify the components of the change over time in the crude labour force rate and the mean age of the labour force. Our results show that the change in the crude labour force rate was dominated by the change in age-specific labour force participation rates. For the mean age of the labour force we find that for males the change in the age composition of the population predominately explains the overall change while the results for females are less clear-cut.decomposition method, labor force, labor force indicators, population aging

How Would 'Tempo Policies' Work? Exploring the Effect of School Reforms on Period Fertility in Europe

Governments and NGOs in many industrialized countries are concerned about the long-term demographic impacts of low fertility levels. We discuss how "tempo policies," reforms that shift the timing of childbearing, affect period and possibly cohort fertility levels. One such policy is a school reform that decreases the educational completion age, which could be achieved through an earlier school entrance age and compression of the school duration. Such policies are currently in focus in several low fertility countries, although for reasons not related to family issues. We show that a younger initiation of childbearing would have a rejuvenating effect on the age composition and increase the size of the population. Even if just the timing and not the levels of fertility increase, a younger timing of fertility could soften the trends of shrinking and ageing populations

Relative mortality among criminals in Norway and the relation to drug and alcohol related offenses

BACKGROUND: Registered offenders are known to have a higher mortality rate, but given the high proportion of offenders with drug-addiction, particularly among offenders with a custodial sentence, higher mortality is expected. While the level of overall mortality compared to the non-criminal population is of interest in itself, we also estimate the risk of death by criminal records related to substance abuse and other types of criminal acts, and separate between those who receive a prison sentence or not. METHODS: Age-adjusted relative risks of death for 2000-2008 were studied in a population based dataset. Our dataset comprise the total Norwegian population of 2.9 million individuals aged 15-69 years old in 1999, of whom 10% had a criminal record in the 1992-1999 period. RESULTS: Individuals with a criminal record have twice the relative risk (RR) of death of the control group (no-offenders). Males with a record of use/possession of drugs and a prison record have an 11.9 RR (females, 15.6); males with a drug record but no prison record have a 6.9 RR (females 10.5). Males imprisoned for driving under the influence of substances have a 4.4 RR (females 5.6); males with a record of driving under the influence but no prison sentence have a 3.2 RR (female 6.5). Other male offenders with a prison record have a 2.8 RR (females 3.7); other male offenders with no prison record have a 1.7 RR (females 2.3). CONCLUSION: Significantly higher mortality was found for people with a criminal record, also for those without any record of drug use. Mortality is much higher for those convicted of substance-related crimes: more so for drug- than for alcohol-related crimes and for women