There is very little certainty in post-Brexit Britain, and seemingly little prioritised last week that remains politically pertinent today. But our population is ageing, and it is ageing rapidly.
By 2050, it is projected that the number of people over 65 will have doubled since the turn of the millennium, and the number of people over 85 will have increased fourfold. However, the population of 20-64 year olds is only projected to increase by approximately 20 per cent between 2000-2050.
It is hardly controversial to suggest that with an increasingly old and powerful voting bloc, governments are as likely to reduce the generosity of old age benefits as turkeys are to vote Christmas, and therein, governments of all colours risk sowing the seeds of the welfare state’s demise.
In the International Longevity Centre – UK’s (ILC-UK) new book ‘Towards a new age: The future of the UK welfare state’, Dr Cesira Urzì Brancati applied a new index of state effectiveness to 23 European countries, measuring their performance on a range of different indicators.
Despite being the 5th largest economy in the world, the UK is ranked 15th out of 23 for risk of poverty and social exclusion, 14th for housing quality, and a decidedly mediocre 11th for overall state effectiveness.
A number of broad welfare strategies, employed to varying extents across Europe were identified. Some, such as ‘welfare for families’, characterised by high levels of spending on social protection for families and the unemployed were consistently associated with better outcomes.
The only strategy found to consistently have a negative impact of state effectiveness was ‘silver welfare’: a strategy defined by high expenditure as a proportion of GDP on social protection for old age, at the expense of younger generations. In the UK, between 2010-2015 total spending on pensioners rose by 6.2% in real terms. By contrast, non-pensioner spending fell by 6.5% in real terms.
New analysis conducted for the book has found that younger generations are both less able, and less inclined to support the continued existence of the welfare state. A generation fraught by higher levels of youth unemployment, underemployment and temporary job holding is less able to contribute to the welfare state, and is markedly less sympathetic to the concept of one.
‘Towards a new age’ features contributions from parliamentarians, academics and industry leaders of all political persuasions and none. Its 20 essays urge specific policy reforms to housing; health; education; the labour market; and pensions and welfare, to ensure the sustainability of the welfare state.
But above all, it warns that decisions about the welfare state cannot be based on political expediency. Tough choices need to be made to ensure our welfare state is fit for the century ahead of us, rather than the one we have left behind. The results of the EU referendum laid bare a stark generational divide in this country, a divide which will only widen if the allocation of scarce resources is framed as a conflict between young and old.
It does not have to be that way.
The time for a proper debate on the future of the state has come. The time for action is now.
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David Eaton is a Labour activist. He tweets @dpoeaton
‘Towards a new age: The future of the UK welfare state’ is now available to download for free from our website at http://www.ilcuk.org.uk/index.php/publications/publication_details/towards_a_new_age_the_future_of_the_uk_welfare_state
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