Sometimes it is hard to know what to believe about anything when you get so many "facts" from both sides.
We are repeatedly told, for example, that we are facing enormous increases in health/care costs due to the increase in over 65s:
While that statement may well be true, there is a problem with assuming that, as more and more people reach 85+, the spending will rise proportionately. According to another source, and it appears to contain some reputable links, this is simply not true. Good health increases with life expectancy. Health conditions only become much more expensive to treat in the last few years of life, regardless of how old people are.
Plus it is incorrect to assume that just because people are retired they contribute nothing. As that link says:
Maybe also this bracket of "old" is over-generic. It is not the elderly in general who will be a burden, given that councils will seize significant assets to pay for care and many will pop their clogs long before they have been drained. It is the lowest performers in general, the ones who have taken more from the system than they have put in all their lives, who will not be able to pay for their own care. Perhaps the real problem is too much socialism.
We are repeatedly told, for example, that we are facing enormous increases in health/care costs due to the increase in over 65s:
The prevalence of long-term health conditions increases with age; and according to a 2010 estimate made by the Department of Health, such conditions account for 70% of total health and social care spending in England. The Department of Health also estimates that the average cost of providing hospital and community health services for a person aged 85 years or more is around three times greater than for a person aged 65 to 74 years.
When measured using remaining life expectancy, old age dependency turns out to have fallen substantially in the UK and elsewhere over recent decades and is likely to stabilise in the UK close to its current level. It is not age but nearness to death that accounts for health expenditure.
It is estimated that taking together the tax payments, spending power, caring responsibilities and volunteering effort of people aged 65-plus,older people contribute almost £40 billion more to the UK economy annually than they receive in state pensions, welfare and health services.3
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