Interesting article: Perfect population storm on horizon.
I don't know if my family are typical but my late parents left nine grandchildren, three have already left New Zealand for greener pastures and the next two will be leaving in February, that makes five while the remainder are still at school or studying and are more than likely to follow their siblings and cousins.
And why is the population aging? Why isn't there a better balance between the young and old?
We know the answer to that and we also know that if we had followed the Church's teaching on this matter this wouldn't be the case.
And the problem outlined in the article wouldn't be a problem.
Update: MacDoctor has posted on this - he takes a more sanguine view than I do much to the amusement of one of our regular commentors
Everyone knows a Kiwi who's upped sticks and gone to Oz, or a 20-something who went on their OE, landed a job and decided the grass was greener somewhere else.
It's such an entrenched phenomenon that a population expert is warning there's a gaping hole in New Zealand's workforce where all the 20-35-year-olds should be.
Natalie Jackson calls it the "apple core effect" – the hole left by those who've quit the country and aren't coming back.
She claims the situation is so bad that there could be little left to prop up the workforce as baby boomers start to retire.
Professor Jackson, who heads Waikato University's newly-formed Nidea, or National Institute of Demographic and Economic Analysis, says there is "virtually no understanding" of how New Zealand's age structure has changed, and what that means for the future.
I don't know if my family are typical but my late parents left nine grandchildren, three have already left New Zealand for greener pastures and the next two will be leaving in February, that makes five while the remainder are still at school or studying and are more than likely to follow their siblings and cousins.
And why is the population aging? Why isn't there a better balance between the young and old?
We know the answer to that and we also know that if we had followed the Church's teaching on this matter this wouldn't be the case.
And the problem outlined in the article wouldn't be a problem.
Update: MacDoctor has posted on this - he takes a more sanguine view than I do much to the amusement of one of our regular commentors