On Sat, Oct 19, 2013 at 10:28 PM, James Bowery <[email protected]> wrote:
This has resulted in such an enormous demographic collapse in the US -- 10s > of millions children foregone for financial reasons ... You just can't do > this kind of thing to a nation and believe you're going to get away scott > free. Something horrible is going to happen, guaranteed. The > unconditional basic income is what you'll get if you are damn lucky. > In macroeconomic terms, I worry about two trends in the US -- the growing number of aging people who do not have provisions in place for retirement, and, related to the point above, the demographic shift that is likely to occur as the number of young people decreases significantly in relation to older people a few decades out because of the late age at which people are marrying and having children, if at all. These trends lead me to think that the US may end up with a large population of desperately poor old people. What are the next generations going to do with them? Are they going to make gated communities so that they can enjoy prosperity while the old people languish? Is a basic income going to be put in place in order to manage the situation? Is immigration policy going to shift to ensure a continued influx of young people? Whatever happens, I think it will be a challenging situation to deal with. Eric
