Methodological features of measuring population ageing effects in the inter-country comparison

Population aging is a multifaceted phenomenon affecting all spheres of public life in the “aging” states. This phenomenon is no longer considered as a particular problem, but rather acquires the status of a civilizational challenge, a transition to a new state of not only demographic, but also social structure. Adaptation to these conditions is possible only if there is reliable and relevant information about the mechanisms of the population aging consequences formation and the scenarios of potential changes in their scale. The aim of this work is a comparative critical analysis of the approaches to measuring the effects of demographic aging at the global level and in the inter-country comparison. The author of the study presents three main approaches to the measurement of dependency ratios on the elderly population (DREP): traditional, prospective and economic, and highlights their strengths and weaknesses. The main limitation (to a different extent for each of the approaches) is the inability to universalize the criteria for determining dependency ratios due to the difference in social constructs for determining unproductive ages in each certain select country of the world. This assumption affects the accuracy of estimates in the context of international comparisons. The most accurate estimates concerning the scale of the population ageing effects can be obtained only at the level of a specific “aging” state, taking into account all the legal and institutional features of its economy and labor market. Nevertheless, taking into account the global nature and irreversibility of the phenomenon under study, international comparisons provide us with quite extensive information about the direction vectors of the population aging process and its consequences. In particular, the data from DREP calculations in the prospective, traditional and economic projections allow us to speak about the probability of three scenarios of events (positive, inertial and negative). The advent of each of them directly depends on the effectiveness of the policy to realize the resource potential of the “aging societies” and state policy to regulate socio-economic development in the context of population aging.