stylistic:tone, information:extraction
Well-being and social policies

The economic effects of an ageing population are considerable. Nowadays, more and more people are paying attention to the economic issues and social policy challenges related to the elderly population. Older people have higher accumulated savings per head than younger people but spend less on consumer goods. Depending on the age ranges at which the changes occur, an ageing population may thus result in lower interest rates and the economic benefits of lower inflation. Some economists in Japan see advantages in such changes, notably the opportunity to progress automation and technological development without causing unemployment, and emphasise a shift from GDP to personal well-being.

However, population ageing also increases some categories of expenditure, including some met from public finances. The largest area of expenditure in many countries is now health care, whose cost is likely to increase dramatically as populations age. This would present governments with hard choices between higher taxes, including a possible reweighing of tax from earnings to consumption and a reduced government role in providing health care.The working population will face greater pressure, and a portion of their taxes will have to be used to pay for healthcare and pensions for the elderly. However, recent studies in some countries demonstrate the dramatic rising costs of health care are more attributable to rising drug and doctor costs and the higher use of diagnostic testing by all age groups, not to the ageing population that is often claimed.

The second-largest expenditure of most governments is education, with expenses that tend to fall with an ageing population, especially as fewer young people would probably continue into tertiary education as they would be in demand as part of the work force.

Social security systems have also begun to experience problems. Earlier defined benefit pension systems are experiencing sustainability problems because of the increased longevity. The extension of the pension period was not paired with an extension of the active labour period or a rise in pension contributions, which has resulted in a decline of replacement ratios.

Population ageing also affects workforce. In many countries, the increase in the number of elderly people means the weakening or disappearance of the " demographic dividend ", and social resources have to flow more towards elderly people in need of support. The demographic dividend refers to the beneficial impact of a decline in fertility rate on a country's population age structure and economic growth. The older workers would spend more time on work and human capital of an ageing workforce is low, reducing labor productivity.

The expectation of continuing population ageing prompts questions about welfare states' capacity to meet the needs of the population. In the early 2000s, the World Health Organization set up guidelines to encourage "active ageing" and to help local governments address the challenges of an ageing population (Global Age-Friendly Cities) with regard to urbanization, housing, transportation, social participation, health services, etc. Local governments are well positioned to meet the needs of local, smaller populations, but as their resources vary from one to another (e.g. property taxes, the existence of community organizations), the greater responsibility on local governments is likely to increase inequalities. In Canada, the most fortunate and healthier elders tend to live in more prosperous cities offering a wide range of services, but the less fortunate lack access to the same level of resources. Private residences for the elderly also provide many services related to health and social participation (e.g. pharmacy, group activities, and events) on site, but they are not accessible to the less fortunate. Also, the environmental gerontology indicates the importance of the environment in active ageing. In fact, promoting good environments (natural, built, social) in ageing can improve health and quality of life and reduce the problems of disability and dependence, and, in general, social spending and health spending.

An ageing population may provide incentive for technological progress, as some hypothesise the effect of a shrinking workforce may be offset by automation and productivity gains.

Meanwhile, improving the productivity of the elderly has also become a method to alleviate the problem of social aging. But this first requires increasing their investment in education, and providing suitable job opportunities is equally important.

Generally in West Africa and specifically in Ghana, social policy implications of demographic ageing are multidimensional (such as rural-urban distribution, gender composition, levels of literacy/illiteracy as well as their occupational histories and income security). Current policies on ageing in Ghana seem to be disjointed, and ideas on documents on to improve policies in population ageing have yet to be concretely implemented, perhaps partly because of many arguments that older people are only a small proportion of the population

Global ageing populations seem to cause many countries to be increasing the age for old age security from 60 to 65 to decrease the cost of the scheme of the GDP. However, even so, in industrialized countries with the greatest improvement in life expectancy, discussions about continuing to raise the eligibility age for pension benefits have intensified in order to reduce economic burden more significantly. Age discrimination can be defined as "the systematic and institutionalized denial of the rights of older people on the basis of their age by individuals, groups, organisations, and institutions." Some of the abuse can be a result of ignorance, thoughtlessness, prejudice, and stereotyping. Forms of discrimination are economic accessibility, social accessibility, temporal accessibility and administrative accessibility.

In most countries worldwide, particularly countries in Africa, older people are typically the poorest members of the social spectrum and live below the poverty line.

Moreover, the growing burden of health expenditure has evolved into a social policy and cost management issue, not just a population issue.