Sunday, August 30, 2009

Explorations on Population Aging

Consider the following set of premises:

1) People ought to be responsible for the consequences of their own choices and actions.

2) People ought not be held responsible for the consequences of actions and choices that are not their own.

3) The economic problem of supporting the elderly is primarily the result of the diminishing base of younger taxpayers.

4) The lack of younger taxpayers is the direct result of the elderly not reproducing enough earlier on.

Taking the above four premises, one arrives at the following two conclusions:

1) From premises 2, 3 and 4, we conclude that it is unjustifiable for the younger taxpayers to assume a larger share of the financial burden of supporting the elderly.

2) From premises 1, 3 and 4, we conclude that it is justifiable for the elderly to be held to a greater level of responsibility for their own upkeep.



Note that the above argument is meant as an philosophical exploration on the issue of population aging, and does not reflect the entirety of the author's views.

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