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If you have a savings-based pension system like Australian superannuation, where the elderly live off the interest on their savings, not off wealth transfers fr

• toomuchtodo 2y ago
  Whether investment gains or direct payment transfers, the old are still living off the young, it is simply which Rube Goldberg design it is. Someone is being productive (young), and someone else (old) is gaining from them by some shared delusion economic accounting claim. Doesn't matter if those are investment gains in a capital market allocation system or direct wage tax transfers to social payments. Neither system works if the old don't have enough young to squeeze, hence the panic over the rapidly falling fertility rate and population decline: there will be, for at least the next 100 years, many less young productive people to dump the debts of today on (regardless of the accounting mechanism). https://www.ceda.com.au/newsandresources/news/tax-superannuation/super-system-not-adequate-for-the-future https://www.ceda.com.au/newsandresources/news/tax-superannua... https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2024-05-02/blackrock-uk-envy-australia-s-pensions-but-retirees-still-worry https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2024-05-02/blackrock... https://www.moneymag.com.au/aussies-not-enough-superannuation https://www.moneymag.com.au/aussies-not-enough-superannuatio...
• throwuxiytayq 2y ago
  Having savings allows old people to assert ownership over a larger part of the economy, but it doesn't prevent the economy from shrinking. The amount of wealth produced depends on the amount of people doing the producing. In an economy without working age people, there is nothing for the elderly to buy.