The advantages and disadvantages of Germany’s aging society

A society with an aging population has no advantages.

Germany has the oldest population in Europe, with more than one-fifth of the population over the age of 65. Worldwide, its population is second only to Japan in terms of aging. Statistics show that Germany's population in 2010 was approximately 81.8 million, of which less than one-seventh of the population was younger than 15 years old. This ratio was the lowest in Europe. Only Japan in the world has a lower ratio than Germany. According to the current birth rate, Germany's population problem will become more and more serious in the future: after 40 years, the population will decrease by 12 million, to as low as 70.1 million.

Population aging has a deepening impact on Germany’s economy and social life, and the social structure is also changing. Germany's economic growth potential has been weakened; the public financial burden has increased; social security funds will face an unprecedented crisis; this will lead to a widening gap between urban and rural areas, rising unemployment, social and psychological problems and other adverse consequences. In 2009, 2.3 million Germans required nursing care, and this number will increase to around 3.3 million in 2030.

Germany is one of the first countries in the world to start a systematic response to aging. After decades of development, it has become a veritable model of a welfare state; the law that took effect in 2012 stipulates that the age of retirees will be changed from the past. The age of 65 will gradually transition to 67; the German ruling party led by Chancellor Merkel has also drafted a bill to levy an additional "age tax" on people with income over the age of 25 to allow these young workers to help The country responds to the looming pressure on elderly care.

Severe aging in Germany

Germany has entered an aging society since the 1980s. Statistics show that the average age of Germans in 1980 was 37.1 years old, an increase of 2.2 years (an increase of 6.3%) from 1970. The average age in 1970, 34.9 years old, was almost unchanged from the average age in 1960, 34.8 years old. In 1990, the age increased by 1.7 years compared with 1980 (an increase of 4.6%), and in 2000, it increased by 1.4 years compared with 1990. The reason for the relatively slow increase in average age from 1980 to 2000 comes from the immigrant population and the reunification of East and West Germany. After digesting these two factors, the age in 2010 increased by 2.6 years compared to 2000.

Germany is one of the most aging countries in the world. In 2010, the average life expectancy of Germans reached 79.80 years, with men reaching 77.70 years and women reaching 82.74 years. According to 2010 figures from the Federal Bureau of Statistics, the number of people over 60 years old reached 21.7 million, accounting for 26.6% of the total population. Among them, the number of people over 65 years old was 16.0 million, accounting for 19.6% of the total population. In 2030, the population over 60 years old in Germany is predicted to reach 36.2%, and in 2050 it will even exceed 40.9%. Currently, 21% of the German population are people over 65 years old. It is expected that by 2030, the number of people over 65 years old will increase from about 16 million currently to 24 million; by 2060, this proportion will reach about 34%. Currently, one in every five people in Germany is an elderly person over the retirement age of 65. By 2030, one in every four people will be over the age of 65, and by 2060, this will rise to one in every three people.

During an interview in Germany, a China Economic Times reporter saw a heartwarming scene of a middle-aged couple crossing the road with their five children on the streets of Frankfurt. The eldest was more than 10 years old, and the youngest was still lying on a trolley. inside. But the German colleague smiled bitterly and shook his head. He told the author a motto - "You can imagine the opposite" to illustrate that the situation in front of him was just a special case. In fact, in Germany, we see the "opposite situation": Lufthansa flight attendants are "sister-in-laws"; hotel waiters are elderly; and most drivers of rented vehicles are elderly.

Germany’s population has been declining since 2003. The main reason for the change in demographic structure is the low birth rate. According to statistics, German women now have only 1.4 children on average. In 2006, the number of deaths exceeded the number of births by 144,000. It is expected that by 2030, Germany's total population will drop from the current 82.5 million to 78 million. With the decline in population, Germany's aging problem has become more and more prominent. The head of the Federal Bureau of Statistics, Sommer, pointed out that since the 1970s, more and more German women have stopped being mothers. The reason for this situation is that there are not enough nurseries in Desi and many primary schools close in the afternoon. In 2008, 11% of women over 60 were childless, compared with 21% of women aged 40 to 44. According to the Federal Statistical Office, between now and 2060, Germany's population will decrease to 65 million to 70 million. As the aging society becomes increasingly serious and the birth rate continues to decline, German society will face huge challenges.

Because the natural balance (the difference between the number of births and the number of deaths) is negative, the German economy faces huge challenges from the labor market, and growth may fall significantly in the next ten years.

The "German Economic Report 2012" released by the OECD pointed out that in the long term, the average growth rate of the German economy will remain at a low level of 1.5%, and may even drop to 1% in 10 years, mainly due to the rapid aging of the population. , and the consequent decline in the potential workforce.

OECD Secretary-General Gurria said at the report conference that if Germany wants to remain wealthy in the future, it needs to carry out structural reforms in the labor market, tax system and energy policy.

Researchers predict that between 2016 and 2025, the OECD’s employment population will increase by an average of 0.5% per year, while Germany’s employment population will decrease significantly during the same period. By the mid-2030s, the proportion of people under the age of 15 and over 64 in Germany will rise from the current 51% to 74% of the total population.

OECD economists asked the German government to carry out reforms to increase the number of employed people and obtain professional talents by allowing more women to engage in full-time work and extending the retirement age. To this end, Germany needs to reform its tax and social security systems. For example, reduce tax incentives for single-earner families, while investing in kindergartens with good services and low prices.

Gurria said that Germany's economic growth rate in 2012 is expected to be only 0.4%. The pillars of Germany's future economic growth are strengthening domestic demand and increasing labor potential. The OECD recommends that Germany relax strict regulations on some service industries such as architects and lawyers, and not only directly fund but also promote scientific research and development through tax exemptions and other methods.

There will also be a gap in the labor force. Although the harmful effects of population aging are currently offset by the increasing number of women and older workers entering the workforce, Koth, a researcher at the Kiel Institute (IFW), one of Germany's six major economic research institutes, predicts: "The decline in employment In the long term, it will weaken Germany's economic growth potential. The growth rate should be around 1.2% per year in the future, compared with 1.5% in 2000. "The Federal Labor Office predicts that Germany will have a labor gap of 7 million by 2025, and it must be introduced on a large scale. Foreign talent.

The number of retired elderly people is increasing day by day, which will have an impact on public finances. According to data from the German Federal Statistics Office, Germany has experienced negative population growth for most of the past 10 years. At this rate, fewer and fewer young people will need to support more elderly people. At present, there are about 2.3 million elderly people in Germany who need care, of which 1.5 million mainly rely on home care and the other 800,000 choose institutional care. In response to the rapid development of Germany's aging population, a September 2011 survey by the world-famous audit firm Enrst & Young concluded that by 2020, 900,000 people in Germany will choose institutional care for their elderly. In other words, 100,000 institutional elderly care beds will need to be added in ten years, and this investment alone will require 17.7 billion euros.

The aging of the population will increase social security expenditures, and the financial security of the social insurance system will face major challenges. Colin Holz, director of the Berlin-based Institute for Population and Development Research, said: “As Germany’s baby boomers enter retirement age, Germany’s social security funding will face an unprecedented crisis. Today’s social security system will not be able to survive due to lack of funds. Even if the birth rate can increase, the absolute number of births will continue to decline because the number of women of childbearing age is becoming smaller and smaller.”

A German Bundestag working group recently proposed. An "age tax" proposal is for every German over the age of 25 to pay a certain amount in proportion to their income to build up a reserve fund to protect rising pension expenses in the future. The working group's reasoning is that the baby boom generation born in the 1950s and 1960s will retire around 2030, which will require significant increases in health and care expenditures.

The birth of the "age tax" comes from concerns that social security expenditures in an aging society will be overwhelmed. Since it involves complex and sensitive political and economic fairness issues, its feasibility has yet to be demonstrated. The proposal also faced multiple criticisms from the ruling party and the opposition.

The German government has realized that the aging of the population will not only lead to a decline in the productivity of the national economy, an increase in tax burdens, a series of problems such as an increase in the burden on young people, and labor shortages, but will also deepen the social generation gap and lead to the emergence of More elderly people living in difficulty will affect social harmony. Practical problems such as the shortage of professional talents in Germany and the shortage of nursing staff in nursing homes indicate that the demographic structural changes characterized by aging have begun to have an impact on Germany's social economy. Some analysts believe that the biggest challenge Germany will face in the next few years is not the European debt crisis and energy shortages, but how to deal with the aging of the population. Various German ministries are working together to formulate a "population policy" plan to make long-term plans for how Germany will respond to its aging population. Merkel chaired an expert meeting on population aging and invited representatives from all walks of life to discuss countermeasures.

In an interview with Handelsblatt, former German Chancellor Schroeder proposed the "2030 Agenda" and pointed out that the challenges brought about by the aging of society must be responded to in a timely manner. He insisted on extending the retirement age to 67, increasing the proportion of women in leadership, and supporting immigration policies. The working group that proposed the "age tax" not only emphasized the stability of social security funds, but also proposed various measures such as creating a family-friendly social atmosphere, promoting immigration, and hiring more women and older workers. At the same time, fundamental issues such as increasing the birth rate and women's balance between family and career require the government to formulate family-friendly and fertility-encouraging policies.

It is believed that the reason why France's fertility rate is better than that of Germany is because of its encouragement and cooperation in family policies.

Some population experts believe that population development generally goes through five stages from an agricultural society with many children to an aging industrial society, and balance should be reached again in the final stage. Judging from the current situation, industrial countries around the world are still developing towards an aging society. Whether they can achieve a new balance in theory remains to be tested by facts.

At a conference in Singapore, Dieter Salomon, mayor of Freiburg, a green city in Germany, talked about the future of the city. When asked what German cities will be like in the next 30 years, he smiled and said: "There will be no future."

Mr. Mayor is not exaggerating. For decades, Europe's population growth has been the slowest in the world, with its fertility rate far below the population replacement rate and about 50% lower than that of the United States. Over time, this demographic trend will have catastrophic economic consequences. By 2050, Europe's current population of 730 million will be reduced by 75 to 100 million people, and its labor force will be 25% smaller than in 2000.

Germany is the super economy of the European continent, and the possibility of escaping the demographic "winter" is slim. By 2030, Germany will have 53 retirees for every 100 people, compared with 30 in the United States. In this way, Germany will face a huge debt crisis - the social welfare costs for the elderly will erode the results of its current frugal/output-based economy. According to Nick Eberstadt of the American Enterprise Institute, by 2020, Germany’s debt principal and interest ratio as a percentage of GDP will be twice that of Greece’s today.

Government Countermeasures

Germany is the first country in the world to establish a public pension system. As early as the end of the 19th century, the then prime minister Bismarck established pension insurance. Throughout the 20th century, medical insurance, unemployment insurance, work-related injury insurance and, in 1995, nursing insurance were successively born. Generally speaking, old-age care is mainly borne by society, and public pension benefits are also very generous. Since the advent of nursing insurance, the elderly care industry has provided hundreds of thousands of employment opportunities to society.

In order to cope with aging, Germany has added a cumulative pension plan based on the single public pension system. The German public pension system (GRV) adopts a pay-as-you-go system, and the required funds come from payroll taxes and financial subsidies. The payroll tax rate is 19.5%, which covers about 70% of public pension expenses. In the late 1980s, the government recognized that aging would seriously affect the sustainability of public pension plans. Germany launched pension reform in 1992. The main policies include modifying the pension benefit adjustment mechanism, avoiding excessive growth in pension benefits, and controlling early retirement. These methods not only reduce pension expenditures, but also reduce pension benefits. In order to make up for the decline in pension benefits, Germany has established a voluntary fully accumulated pension plan, with a personal contribution rate of 4% and tax incentives provided by the government. The coverage of the accumulation scheme is currently limited. In 2004, Germany further revised the formula for determining public pension benefits. The new formula automatically adjusts public pension benefits based on changes in the ratio of retired population to paying population. When the proportion of the elderly population increases, the public pension benefits Pension benefits will be automatically reduced.

Germany’s pension insurance system consists of three parts: statutory pension insurance, corporate pension insurance and private pension insurance. The latter two are also called “supplementary pension insurance”. As the problem of Germany's aging population becomes increasingly prominent, the government's pension burden is also gradually increasing. To this end, while maintaining the dominant position of statutory pension insurance, the German government has also taken measures to encourage more people to participate in "supplementary pension insurance."

In Germany, statutory pension insurance has a wide coverage, including general pensions, vocational rehabilitation benefits, pensions after loss of professional ability or employment ability, etc. In principle, all employees are compulsory participants in statutory pension insurance, and freelancers such as doctors, lawyers, and artistic workers generally participate in private pension insurance.

Statutory pension insurance funds mainly come from employer and employee contributions. The rate is adjusted at any time according to actual needs. The current contribution ratio is 19.5% of salary, with employers and employees each paying half. When the employee’s monthly income is low When the amount reaches a certain limit, the employer will pay separately. In addition, statutory pension insurance also receives state subsidies every year, accounting for approximately one-fifth of the total pension insurance expenditures that year. The pension is calculated based on the retiree's salary and length of service at retirement, but the maximum shall not exceed 75% of the last month's salary before retirement.

In addition, Germany also strongly encourages corporate pension insurance and private pension insurance. Different from statutory pension insurance, enterprise pension insurance adopts the "direct payment principle", that is, according to the amount of enterprise pension insurance an employee has accumulated during his working life, he will receive a corresponding amount of pension after retirement. The proportion of enterprise pension insurance paid by employees to wages is determined annually by the industry labor department and the government through consultation, and this part of the pension insurance can enjoy tax incentives. Enterprise pension insurance was initially provided to employees as a benefit.

Since 2002, Germany has promulgated a new law, stipulating that enterprise employees have the right to ask their employers to convert part of their wages or holiday bonuses into enterprise pension insurance. The financing methods, organizational forms and insured persons of enterprise pension insurance, etc. You can choose freely.

At present, the coverage rate of Germany's corporate pension insurance for the labor force has reached as high as 65%, becoming the most important supplementary part of the pension insurance system.

Although German corporate supplementary pension insurance is a voluntary pension insurance and is operated by private companies, the government does not completely let it go, but carries out macro-control. In order to prevent the risk of employers being unable to pay pensions due to declaring bankruptcy, Germany has established a pension insurance fund organized by employers as a guarantee institution, which stipulates that employers who run enterprise pension insurance are obliged to insure with the guarantee institution. If the enterprise becomes bankrupt and cannot pay the company The supplementary pension is paid by the foundation.

Private pension insurance is also voluntary and can also receive state subsidies. Currently, the proportions of pensions paid by German statutory pension insurance, corporate pension insurance and private pension insurance are approximately 70%, 20% and 10% respectively. The German government hopes that the pension paid by private pension insurance can be increased to 15% of the entire pension in the near future, and to 25% to 30% in the medium and long term. In this way, corporate pension insurance and private pension insurance are expected to gradually upgrade from their current supplementary status to a pillar status similar to statutory pension insurance.

The declining fertility rate and aging population have had a huge impact on the pension insurance system created in Germany in the 19th century. Germany’s retirement insurance system implements a “transfer method”, also known as an “intergenerational contract.” Specifically, the current working generation uses the retirement insurance premiums paid by them to pay the pensions of retirees.

According to general rules, the most reasonable and effective ratio should be that every three active employees support one retiree. Germany currently provides pensions to 44 retirees for every 100 working people. According to the current development process of population fertility rate and population aging, in another 20 years, every 100 active employees will have to support 78 retirees. By then, it will no longer be possible to rely on employees to pay insurance premiums to protect the lives of retirees.

When Germany implemented the pension insurance system in the early 19th century, the legal retirement age was 70 years old, and the average life expectancy at that time was only 45 years old. When the German government carried out pension reform in 1956, it set the retirement age at 65 years old. In recent years, the average retirement age of Germans is 65 years old, but the average life expectancy has reached 80 years old. Therefore, the German government decided to raise the retirement age to 67 starting in 2012.

European society has become accustomed to enjoying a comfortable retirement life, and some welfare states are even regarded as paradises for retirees on the European continent. Although more and more people are aware that the current system is about to go bankrupt, ordinary people are often concerned about immediate benefits and oppose extending retirement time. A German friend of the reporter believes that this decision is unrealistic because two-thirds of people in German companies have been forced to leave their jobs due to health and other reasons before the age of 65.

Other scholars believe that delaying retirement age will squeeze young people’s employment and promotion space, and delaying retirement will prolong the country’s metabolic cycle. German trade unions also criticized the reform measure as unhelpful to Germany's old-age security system and a disguised "reduction of the pension plan." No matter how ordinary people oppose this measure, people must realize that reforming the existing welfare system is a "painful reality" that Germany must face.

In order to solve the problem of aging, the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research has formulated a comprehensive scientific research plan to specifically fund research in various fields related to population aging. When introducing the plan called the "German Government's Demographic Change Research Agenda," German Minister of Education and Research Annette Schaffan said that this is the first time that Germany has formulated an interdisciplinary research plan specifically on population aging. The German government plans to invest more than 400 million euros in this program by 2016. The topics covered by this plan range from principle issues in the field of social sciences to specific technical issues in communication, transportation, new concepts in construction, training, and health care aimed at improving the lives of the elderly.

Shafan said: "We must promote the development of new solutions, products and services that are conducive to improving the quality of life and social participation of the elderly through scientific research. We must explore so far for the well-being of the whole society. The treasures of a longevity society are still hidden.”

The German Ministry of Education and Research emphasized in a statement that Germany must not only properly respond to the challenges brought by the aging population in the future, but also be good at making full use of the advantages of aging. opportunity. For example, in the face of the reality that the number of young workers will gradually decrease in the future, how to better play the role of older workers. One of the funding directions of the research program is to promote the business and educational communities to find better solutions to similar problems.

A model for elderly care in a welfare state

Germany implements a social market economy. Like other economic fields, the German federal government does not directly intervene in the market development of the "silver economy" in principle, but provides full policy support: financial support for the elderly in need of care, and tax support for care companies. The German Social Welfare Law*** has twelve volumes and is a veritable welfare state.

Nursing costs first come from nursing insurance, and the leading unit is the Ministry of Health.

The standards are:

Home care: Care level 1, 450 euros per month; Care level 2, 1,100 euros per month; Care level 3, 1,550 euros per month;

Day or Night care center: care level 1, 450 euros per month; care level 2, 1100 euros per month; care level 3, 1550 euros per month;

Short-term care center: care levels 1 to 3, 1550 euros per month Euro;

Institutional nursing home? Nursing home: Care level 1, 1023 euros per month; Care level 2, 1279 euros per month; Care level 3, 1550 euros per month;

Alzheimer's disease Disease: 2,400 euros per month;

It should be noted that the amount of nursing insurance is based on non-full coverage. For example, a nursing home in Berlin requires a monthly fee of 3,000 euros for nursing level 2. After excluding the 1,279 euros paid per month by the nursing insurance, you must pay the remaining 1,721 euros.

If an individual is unable to pay the 1,721 euros as mentioned above, the state will provide corresponding financial subsidies based on the bottom line of the individual's income. Volume 12 of the German Social Welfare Law stipulates financial subsidies, and the leading unit is the Ministry of Civil Affairs and Welfare.

Give preferential tax policies to nursing companies. There are currently two main corporate taxes in Germany: sales tax (currently 19%) and profits tax. Corporate profit tax is divided into corporate income tax (15%) and corporate business tax (about 13%). Nursing companies are exempt from sales tax and business tax, and only pay corporate income tax.

Local governments will also provide support for senior housing. Due to the characteristics of Germany's federal system, local governments can provide policy or financial support according to their own circumstances. For example, in response to the current situation of extremely high land prices, the local government of Munich has given strong policy support to the establishment of small elderly residences, which is the so-called Munich model - using construction indicators in exchange for relatively cheap land prices for public services. The "Munich Tudelin Senior Living Community" includes 49 home-service custodial apartments and a 108-bed nursing home? The local government also provides a one-time financial subsidy of 16,000 euros per bed.

Home care and institutional care are complementary in Germany. "Based on home-based elderly care, supported by community services, and supported by institutional elderly care..." This principle has basically been realized in Germany. At present, there are about 2.3 million elderly people in Germany who need care, of which 1.5 million mainly rely on home care and receive help from relatives, friends and neighbors. Their average age is under 80 years old. Another 800,000 people choose institutional care for their elderly. The elderly who usually live in nursing homes are generally over 80 years old. The first stage of the elderly in need of care is mainly home care combined with community services, and the second stage is institutional care.

Home care is mainly composed of traditional home care, supplemented by day care centers and short-term care homes; home care, and nursing insurance support home care services with a fixed amount based on the level of care. . For example, Lena Fan Group provides door-to-door nursing services in many locations in Germany, currently serving 1,600 customers.

With the help of home care services, the elderly can go to the day care center after washing up early. There are usually different activities for the elderly, such as reading, paper-cutting, memory training, playing chess and cards, and making cakes. After returning home, dinner, washing, and going to bed are all completed by in-home nursing services.

When relatives, friends and neighbors are away or when they have just returned home from the hospital and need to recover, the elderly can enter short-term care homes. According to nursing insurance regulations, up to two months per year.

In 2010, 800,000 people in Germany chose institutional care, that is, entered nursing homes. Ten years later, in 2020, more people are expected to enter nursing homes. The elderly are generally separated from their children, the pressure on children to work and their pursuit of personal life, as well as the declining birth rate, are the main reasons for the rapid development of institutional care in Germany. According to statistics, the average length of stay per person in a nursing home five years ago was about 2 years. The current length of stay has been greatly shortened, and is estimated to be about 1 year. In other words, the demand for beds due to the aging population should be greater than predicted. Only the shortening of the cycle and the development of the home care service industry have alleviated this problem.

There are currently about 12,000 nursing homes in Germany with 800,000 beds, which means each nursing home has less than 70 beds. This has to do with Germany's population density and their taste of life. However, due to competition and cost pressure, newly built nursing homes now usually have more than 120 beds, and most of them are built in cities.

The difference between a nursing home and home care is that you can enjoy all-inclusive services 24 hours a day: nursing, day life and living. For example, Lena Fan Group combines professional nursing and hotel services and has established "life service centers" focusing on institutional care for the elderly in many cities.

In recent years, a new type of home care model has emerged in Germany—custodial apartments. Due to the mobility difficulties of the elderly, the newly built apartment is barrier-free and has some additional hardware facilities to serve the elderly, such as electronic annunciators or TV monitors. If care is needed, in-home care services can be booked.

Experience shows that after the combination of custodial apartments and nursing homes, it will be more popular and promoted faster. Not only have the services provided to the elderly increased significantly, but they can also directly enter nearby nursing homes once they become bedridden.

The most representative one is the Lena Fan Life Service Center "Berlin Buch" which opened in 2008. Its services include nursing-style apartments and nursing homes, day care centers, short-term care homes, Alzheimer's care centers and medical intensive care centers.

Due to the aging population and declining birth rate, it is predicted that Germany will need an additional 220,000 nursing staff from 2012 to 2020. There are currently about 970,000 people working in the nursing industry, and there has been an extreme shortage of professional talents for many years. For a wide range of services such as elderly care, dementia care, intensive medical care, etc., it is very necessary to continuously train and retrain nursing staff by holding professional lectures and communicating with insurance companies or hospitals.