| As an economic and populous province, Jiangsu has entered the aging society since1986which is13years earlier than the national whole, and the aging of the population is in the acceleration phase. Although the basic conditions "people are already old before they have got money" bring some negative impact on socio-economic development. But the increasing number of elderly population can have positive external effects. With the improvement of life quality, the consumption power and consumption level of elderly population has increased, showing a rising trend in consumption demand. As the consumption characteristics of the elderly is significantly different from other age groups, therefore it started from the perspective of the consumption structure, researching the performance of the elderly on different consumer goods. It has an important role in meeting consumption demand of the elderly, developing the elderly consumption market, developing aging industry and boosting sustainable development of national economic.Firstly, this paper made a comprehensive analysis of changing process of Jiangsu’s aging population from the first Population Census to present, summarized the variation characteristics of the process of aging population, and using international population forecasting software PADIS-INT to predict the developing trend of Jiangsu’s elderly population. Secondly, it analyzed the characteristics of current situation and changing trend of Jiangsu’s residents’ consumption structure from aspects of both static and dynamic, and made a predictive analysis of total demand of the elderly. Then, it studied the specific relationship between Jiangsu’s aging population and consumption structure with the gray correlation method, reflecting the size of correlation degree between elderly population and consumer goods in numerical. Finally, it gave corresponding countermeasures and suggestions from the two aspects of government and business about how to better develop the older consumer market as well as response to population aging basing in the background of the foregoing theoretical and empirical analysis.The main conclusions of the above study:(1) The aging degree of Jiangsu Province is serious and the growth of aging is fast. It also has some other characteristics, such as the elderly population unevenly distributed, aging development. It is predicted that it is the most rapidly growing period of aging population of Jiangsu Province from2030to2050. And the older population over65will reach2013million by2050, which is31percent of the total population.(2) The proportion of consumption in food, clothing tends to decline while the proportion of consumption in medical services, transport and communication, housing, education, cultural and recreation services tends to rise in Jiangsu province. Their consumption structure gradually moves toward rationalization. The living consumption expenditures of older groups are increasing, their consumption requirements shift from survival needs to enjoyment demands.(3) The empirical results show that the older population in Jiangsu Province trends to increase the expenditure in education, cultural and recreation services, transport and communication and medical services. While the proportion of consumer spending on food, household equipment and miscellaneous is declining. Research conclusions for policy recommendations include:the Government should strengthen macro guidance, improve social care service system, and strengthen the aging industry with support and guidance; Enterprises should strengthen the market research, segmentation elderly consumer demand, innovative products and services of the elderly, develop marketing channels, build the core aging industry and improve the aging industrial chain. |
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