The Effects Of Demographic Age Structure On Economic Development

That population policy adjusted frequently in the past three years indicates that demographic age structure is increasingly severe. At the same time, the economic growth of China is slowing. It’s meaningful to study the relationship between demographic age structure and economic growth at the turning point of both population policy and economic growth.At the beginning, I choose three statistical indicators to measure the demographic age structure transition on the basis of the present state of age structure in China. In order to study the role played by demographic change as a determinant of economic growth, I decompose the output function under the framework of development accounting by incorporating age structure, on the basis of that to determine the equations between demographic age structure and economic growth. I also apply the equations to a panel date set of 28 Chinese provinces. Using the results of the empirical tests, I calculate the contribution value of age structure to economic growth from 1982 to 2100, on the basis of that I attempt to answer the three debates about this proposition. And I also explain the relationship between demographic age structure and provincial income gap. At the end of the paper, I propose some policy recommendations from two perspectives. One is about how to mine and use the "Post Demographic Dividend", and another one is what we should do when the "Demographic Dividend "is vanishing. The main conclusion of this paper is as follows.(1)During our study period 1990-2010, the "First Demographic Dividend" have significant influence on provincial economic growth and the evolution of age structure accounts for nearly 15.77% of the growth in GDP per capita, of which 32% is attributable to shifts in the internal demographic composition of the working-age population.(2) During our study period 1990-2010, population aging has no significant effect on economic growth. The "Second Demographic Dividend " doesn’t exist in china. (3) During our study period 2015-2100, the contribution values of age structure to economic growth are all negative, whether under the high, middle or low birth rates. From this point, I agree with the opinion that the turning point of the "First Demographic Dividend" is about 2015. (4) The influence of age structure on output is the similar to the factors of output:1) the working-age population has significant influence the factors of output.2) The internal demographic composition of the working-age population also has significant influence on the factors of Output, and people in different age groups have different influence on the factors of Output.3) Population aging has no significant effect on the factors of output that means the "Second Demographic Dividend " doesn’t exist in china.(5) Differences in age structure across provinces also explain 13%-22% of the persistent inter-provincial income inequality...