Episode Details
Back to Episodes
Why Retiring Later Boosts GDP More Than You Think
Description
In this episode of The Demographics Podcast, Lucas and Luna explore how raising the retirement age affects economic output, using Denmark's 2024 pension reform as a case study. They break down the specific mechanism: how a one-year delay in average retirement increases labor supply, boosts tax revenue, and reduces dependency ratios without requiring higher fertility or immigration. The conversation drills into the numbers — Denmark's pension age is now indexed to life expectancy, rising to 70 by 2040 — and compares it to countries like France and the U.S., where retirement age debates are politically fraught. They also touch on the fiscal math: every year of delayed retirement reduces the old-age dependency ratio by roughly 2 percentage points. No abstract theory — just the concrete economic trade-offs of working longer.