Читать книгу These are the British онлайн

101 страница из 108

Such suspicion is increased by the understanding of the other serious long-term problems that British society faces. We need mention only one in this context: how is Britain to maintain its present standards of life and the present levels of government expenditure when it is faced with the coming change in the age distribution of the population?

The steady fall in death rates and the low birth rates of the years between the two world wars are beginning to increase the proportion of elderly people, and thus to reduce the proportion of the working population to the total population. The size of the age groups reaching retirement age increases yearly. It is predicted, on the basis of present population trends, that over the next fifteen years the population of the working-age group will remain about the same but that the number of old people, persons over sixty-five, will rise over the next thirty years by about three million. At the same time the number of children of school age is expected to increase.