Baby boom generation starting to retire in or around 2030

We need to encourage families and for those families to have more children - that's the reality. We aren't the only ones facing a demographic emergency that will have serious consequences on the living standards for everyone.

When you look at the last 30 to 40 years serious shortsighted mistakes have been made here and elsewhere. "Progressive" causes may have been trendy at the time but a cold examination of the impact that is now coming through is, and was always going to be, less children.

Whether it's women encouraged to focus solely on careers instead of raring children or even abortion and everything in between it all has one outcome that was rarely mentioned when these societal changes occurred.

Then you have the economic factors which are also acting against having a family of 2 or more children or even a family at all. There is an ever increasing number of childless couples.

It all looks grim really without radical changes to quickly encourage at the very least replacement level family sizes.

the way some go in you would swear only renters pay tax on this country

Boomers: 1946–1964

Gen X: 1965–1976

Millennials: 1977–1995

Gen Z: 1996–2015

...

I think Ireland has the opportunity to be ahead on this if it (we, the electorate when those knocks on doors come) really want(s) to be.

Currently, we're actually way ahead. We're still a relatively young population and ratio wise, we've 30 years to go until we get to the type of working person/OAP ratio that Spain and France have right now.

Also, France spends about 15% of it's GDP on pension current expenditure. We spend 4.2%

I think the auto-enrollment is a good step towards building something long term for ourselves. I think we can further work on that by increasing incentives and pushing more AVC take-up. Also, perhaps a state scheme for everyone, private and public sector, that you can pay extra into.

I find it funny politicians and so on using the "we'll need to look at pensions in future" and so on when we have the ability to change that now.

They're using figures for France and Spain yet we won't reach those til 2050. Which is why I'm surprised they don't put more effort into doing something NOW.

Not to say we should be complacent on the issue. But... we are actually very fortunate at the moment. We're way behind where other EU countries are in terms of working person to oap ratio and our spend on pensions as a proportion of gdp.

So if we implemented something properly now along with an awareness campaign, it could take the sting out massively.

Dependency ratio figures:

https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/edn-20210930-1

This is such a dumb thread, the baby boom in Ireland was 1980

There are more 45 year old than anyone else

Then you have people who think the world only exists in the states

Baby boomers gen x mean nowt here

wtf?

"Whether it's women encouraged to focus solely on careers instead of raring children or even abortion and everything in between it all has one outcome that was rarely mentioned when these societal changes occurred."

Thankfully we have a history of far-seeing ministers for Health who have made sure our increasing pool of older people will be very well cared for each winter as illnesses inevitably strike.

In UHL you are quite likely to get a bed within a week at many times of the year. That’s all because of the genius move to close down THREE a&e units in the region 15 years ago. What a country.

Self entitled whining… burden on society…

That's because the term baby boomers is meaningless in Ireland so of course it doesn't correspond to anything real. I can't understand why people even do that. Seems like they want to create identity groups to pit against each other or something.

There were no masses of conscripted soldiers coming back after the war to make all these babies, the economy in Ireland had no post war boom, and in fact remained in the doldrums until the mid eighties. It's the opposite really: emigration was significant among Irish people the same age as baby boomers in the US and UK, because their economies were doing well.

The nearest Irish equivalent to the privileged baby boomers is probably those who profited from the (rather short lived) Celtic tiger days. They're a LOT younger.

Ah to be young again 😀

And you can now see why a certain sector of society are a tad uncomfortable with the prospect of legally assisted dying 🤪

These generation labels did not exist 15/20 years ago. I think they are a divide and conquer concoction to attack social cohesion.
I might have heard of Generation X but not in the context it’s used today. But definitely never heard of baby boomer or millennial or silent generation. It’s all bullshit to pit people against each other.
The wealthiest families I know are the ones who work together and pull together inter generationally.

Oh be quiet you, you self-entitled burden on society. 😀

Owning you own home was NEVER a basic

Secure job was NEVER a basic.

I worked since 16. From 22 to 27 I shared a house with three others. Had my first holiday abroad at 28 and scrimped and saved (and, I will admit, there was a certain amount of luck/good timing) to buy my house. Next 5 years also sharing my house with two others.

It was most certainly not considered a basic assumption

I have have had 4 jobs and do not assume that my current job cannot go elsewhere at some stage (two of my previous jobs moved abroad)

(And yes, I do realise that sounded like that Monty Python sketch).

Wow. Did I say any of that?

Why no. No I didn’t.

I said a different thing.

turning former basics such as homes and secure jobs into luxuries

You said they were “former basics”. What do you understand by that, if not that everyone could expect to have ready access to them?

If you want, but my point was not a "silly game", even if yours was.

My very serious point is that it's inappropriate and socially divisive to try to apply a US understanding of the world to other countries, specifically Ireland. We didn't have a baby boom after the war, and young adults in the 60s, 70s and 80s never had an easy time regarding housing or jobs - and those few who may have done were helped by the fact that mass emigration took a lot of pressure off the market for those who were able to stay.

So this "Oh you baby boomers had it so easy compared to us" sh1te is not only divisive, it's factually incorrect.

I graduated in the first year that the number of people arriving in the country finally overtook the number emigrating. I was one of those who left. If the same numbers were emigrating today, housing would no doubt be a lot more affordable. I don't think that makes "housing and stable jobs were a basic back then" a fair conclusion.

That's all I had to say about it, so I'm happy to leave it at that - but not to pretend that I was playing a silly game.

not in Irish media. Not using those de lineations. There was generational differences mostly defined by those who lived through and fought in the war of independence civil war etc and those that came after who came of age in the 60’s/70’s. And then the current post Catholic generation. Boomers , millennials etc are false American media constructs in the Irish context. Invented for the purpose of antagonism over there and exported to here.

Learn something new every day it seems.

Never realised I was a Gen X man.