California aging residents testing whether demography is fate

California is a living laboratory for the observation that demography is a fate first spoken by the 19th -century French philosopher Auguste Kont.

During the first 150 years of its statehood, California’s population increased rapidly thanks to the effects of immigration from other countries and other countries. However, although its ethnic and cultural qualities developed, there was one constant: his youth.

Immigrants tend to be young people who are looking for a better life for themselves, and young people also multiply, adding babies-somewhat more than half a million a year to the population of the state.

However, as the centuries turned, the growth of the population in California stopped, thanks to the decline in both immigration and fertility, and even declined in some years due to the leakage of other countries. The result, for better or better, is that California’s population is getting old.

“By 2040, 22 percent of Californians would be 65 years or older, compared to 14 percent in 2020,” Institute of Public Policy in California, announced in a recent reportS “The older population (aged 65+) will increase by 59%, while the population of working age (aged 20-64 years) will remain largely unchanged and the child’s population (aged 0-17 years) will decrease by 24 percent. “

The tendency for aging has or there will be two different effects, one of the population of the elderly itself, such as its needs for housing, medical care and other services are increasing and the other for the state as a whole as the number of adults of working age is stagnant.

Governor Gavin Newo’s administration says it works to mitigate the negative aspects of the first impact with a Master plan for aging.

“California boldly perceives the possibility and challenge to improve its life with advancing age,” Newsom says in a preface to the latest plan reported last month. “I made a commitment in my first state in 2019 to develop a master plan for aging in California, in honor of my late parents. I did this, knowing that people from 50 to 100 years old became a greater share of our families and communities. The Californians live a long, more diverse life. The change is here, the change is necessary – and California is the leader on the road. “

Whether the high goals in the master plan can be achieved is not certain given the prospect that State will encounter a multi -million -dollar budget deficit For the rest of the Newsom manager and outside.

It is even less certain whether the impact on the other three quarters of the Californians will be recognized and processed.

Although there are more than a million unemployed workers, California still has a severe shortage of workers in many key professions, including healthcare and construction. Maintaining more elderly people can be one aspect of the situation, but there is an obvious limit to it.

“It is predicted that the degree of participation in the workforce for 65 to 74-year-old children will increase over the next 15 years,” said the Institute of Public Policy in California. “The largest profits in participation will be among those aged 65 to 69, led at least partly by the age at which people are entitled to complete social security benefits, to be raised to 67. This suggests that more adult adult adults suggest They can work with necessity instead of choosing, especially those with lower levels of education and perhaps more lifelong revenue. “

In the past decades, when California needed more workers, it could rely on migration from other states and nations to fill the vacuum, but the extremely high costs of life of the state, Especially for homes, Make the move to California much less attractive. To President Donald Trump Repressing illegal immigration It can worsen the shortage even more.

Do not have enough workers can be a fate of demographic changes in California.