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The £26 billion cost of ageist UK 16 November 1998 On the eve of the publication of the Government's code of good practice on ageism, an authoritative new report by the Employers Forum on Age (EFA) reveals for the first time the true cost of ageism to the UK economy. The bill? £26 billion each year* - the equivalent of one fifth of the country's GDP over the next five years. 'A PROFITS WARNING - The macroeconomic costs of ageism' takes an in-depth look at the economic impact of ageism in the UK. The implications are vast - it can be argued that the country would not be facing a public sector funding crisis for its hospitals, schools and transport systems if it were not continuing to ignore the productive resources of older workers. Of the 9.3 million people aged between 50 and 64 in the UK today, some 3.7 million are not in work. Most of these (3.4 million) are classified as economically 'inactive'- not currently available or seeking work. A PROFITS WARNING makes a powerful argument that buried within these figures is a hidden workforce, excluded from official unemployment figures and largely rejected by employers. Currently, the numbers of inactive people aged between 50 and 64 are double the unemployment numbers for the entire country. 'We have come to view our ageing workforce as a burden and not an asset,' says Helen Garner, Campaigns Director of the EFA. 'But this ignorance and prejudice is costing us dear, both economically and socially'. *Calculated by applying average output method to all those currently classed as economically 'inactive' who would be willing and capable of re-entering the workforce Sean Rickard, economist and author of A PROFITS WARNING, says, 'The true cost to the nation of economically inactive older workers is not the dependency ratio (how many people each employee is supporting via their taxes) but the loss of goods and services that would have been produced. The challenge facing the nation is to restore the number of inactive people aged between 50 and 64 to the levels of 20 years ago.' It's not just business and the economy counting the cost, A PROFITS WARNING, reveals the victims of Ageist UK, including: The Down-Sized Generation Age has become an accepted criterion for redundancy. In successive waves of down-sizing the older workers have been the first to go in the form of early retirement. The over 50s find themselves cast out of the labour market and facing the irony of not being retrained and recruited when many industry sectors are experiencing acute skills shortages. The Hidden Men Men between 50 and 64 are disappearing from working Britain. In 1976 only 11% of men in this age were 'inactive' (neither in work nor actively seeking work) - the figure today is a startling 27%. Given the advances in medical science and improving life expectancy this marked deterioration appears extraordinary. A PROFITS WARNING highlights our failure as a nation to make full use of our productive resources - in this case people aged 50 and above. back to the archive |
