Planning Decisions, Inc.

THE BOTTOM LINE FROM CHUCK LAWTON

Consequences of an Aging Population

Published Saturday December 1, 2007

It has become commonplace to say that Maine is the oldest state in the nation and, therefore, equally commonplace to say that we need to keep and attract more young people in order to maintain a sustainable economy. Simply saying that we are growing older, however, fails to capture the significance of the demographic change. We think too easily of everyone we know simply as a year older each year while everything else remains the same, the same people in the same homes in the same neighborhoods, going about their business in much the same fashion. In fact, aging as a society brings—sooner or later—much more drastic changes. A closer look at our household composition gives some indication of the changes we have experienced and are likely to see accelerate in the near future.

In 2005, the Bureau of the Census estimated that there were just over 542,000 households in Maine. Of these, approximately 151,000, about 28 percent, were the traditional building block of our society—families with children aged 18 or under. About two-thirds of these households are married couples with children, and one-third are single parent households. For the nation as a whole, families with children under age 18 accounted for approximately 32 percent of all households. In other words, we in Maine are 12 percent below the national average in this measure of household composition. Indeed, we are 15 percent below the national average with respect to married families with children, since we are closer to the national average with respect to single parent households. Interestingly, Maine’s single greatest divergence from national averages with respect to family composition is in the category of families headed by a single female where we are a full 24 percent below the national average.

Approximately 205,000 Maine households are families without children under age 18. This number accounts for approximately 38 percent of all families, 7 percent above the national average. In other words, Maine, as a consequence of this gradual aging, is increasingly becoming a state of empty nesters, perhaps one reason for the apparently growing interest in the question of a “brain drain” and the desire to keep our children nearby.

At the other side of the spectrum—non-family households—Maine also exhibits some interesting divergences from the national average, divergences that further illustrate the consequences of aging. About 27 percent of our households are people living alone. This percentage equals the national average. However, in Maine, nearly 40 percent of these single person households are people aged 65 and older. In this category, we are 14 percent above the national average. For younger single person households, we are 7 percent below the national average. In other words, compared to national averages, we have a relatively higher number of elderly people living along and a relatively smaller number of young singles. Aging is not merely everyone growing a year older; it is a process that produces significant differences in demographic structure.

Another fact that emerges from an examination of Maine’s household composition is our above average number of households composed of unrelated individuals—roommates, unmarried couples, friends, whatever other term or reason may apply to this grouping. In 2005, we had nearly 40,000 such households. This amounted to over 7 percent of all households and was fully 20 percent above the national average. Is this a reflection of rapidly rising housing prices leading more people to seek roommates, including elderly people who cannot afford to continue living alone? It is impossible to answer this question from these data along, but the fact that we are so far above the national average is certainly a reason for further investigation.

In sum, it is clear that an aging population is not just a population that is older but a population that lives in different ways. This changing household composition will, in turn, create pressures on our health care and social service organizations and thus on our tax system. In a word, changing demographic structure will create new pressures on our economy and thus on the public policy decisions we will have to make.

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