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Shrinking Workforce Shrinks

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A population that consists of a higher percentage of older adults presents various challenges and opportunities to society. Some of these challenges include a shrinking workforce, reduced payroll tax revenues, increased demand on healthcare systems and social services provided as public goods by the government. Immigration may present a solution towards a shrinking workforce, but immigration policies need to be focused on educated and highly skilled individuals that will participate in the workforce. Increases in demand for healthcare services drive an indirect demand for the factors of production for healthcare services, such as the demand for nurses. This increased indirect demand drives further increases in demand for other services such …show more content…

There are a number of socioeconomic issues this condition creates. One is that the growth of an economy is predicted by economists using two statistics, the size of the workforce and its level of productivity (Hoagland, 2017, p.17). In advanced economies, as the population moves to a higher concentration of older adults, a larger percentage of the workforce retires and is not replaced, shrinking the size of the workforce. Unless these workers are replaced through immigration or productivity increase offset this decline in workforce size, the economy will contract.
One other factor that may influence the size of the workforce is young adults entering the workforce. According to Hoagland (2017, p.17) young adults may delay their entry into the workforce deciding instead to focus on education. This factor may initially have an affect on the size of the workforce, this effect is temporary as these young adults do eventually enter the workforce and do so better educated and skilled increasing their productivity. Hoagland (2017, p.18) goes on to state that this increase in productivity could counter a shrinking …show more content…

This upward pressure may be positive for workers initially, but wages have a direct impact on the profitability and competiveness of business, especially in the global economy. Batalova and Lowell (2007), stated to meet the demands of the global economy internationally oriented business depend on a workforce that is highly skilled. In the face of a shrinking workforce, business turn to immigration to satisfy their demand for these highly skilled workers. This places additional demand on these highly skilled workers from less economically developed

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