Italy: Demographics

        What are population challenges?

        By population challeges this is refering to any major demographic challenges that Italy is experiencing now and any major demographic challenges it will run into as time progresses.

        Current Challenges

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        The one major challenge that Italy is facing is the growing number of elderly people.  They have the most rapidly aging population in all of Europe and also the lowest birth rate in all of Europe.
        Currently, the average lifespan for an Italian is increasing yet they are having an ever lessening amount of children.  This situation has gotten so extreme that in the Italian city of Genoa the birth to death ratio is 2:1, there are two deaths for every birth.  
        In addition, there are many more people retiring and less people working.  In Italy the unemployment rate is 45%.  It is predicted by the Lisbon Council that italy will emloy 15.7% less people then it did in 2005 by the time it reaches 2030.  Because there are less people working healthcare, familes, labourmarket, and pensions will all suffer(hi...)
        Less people working and a steady increase of the elderly means an even greater dependancy load on the younger population of Italy.  Currently, only one percent of the Italian population trust old age nursing homes and therefore there are many more elders living with or near there children increasing their dependancy load.  More then half of the Italian elderly live within 1 kilometer of their children and 12% of elders of 74 live with their parents.
        Fewer babies being born means that the elders are suffering yet the young portion of the population cannot produce more children because they do not have enough money to support their parents and children at the same time.

        The second current population problem is the decreasing number of children.  With no children their can be no country, children are the base of a country.  With no young people and a mostly elderly population there is no people to work to support the ever increasing number of elders.  In addition to there being a low birth rate, 21% of students drop out of school compared to the average in Europe of 15% (hi...).  With just over one fifth of the already small portion of the population that works being unedecated that means they cannot find work.  To help those that are not able to support themselves.

        Future Challenges

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        One large challenge in the future will be the economy.  With the birth rate dropping at such and exponential rate it will be impossible to find enough people to work.  With no working class the country produces no money.
        It is predicted that 15% of the Italian population will be over the age of 80 years old in the year 2050 (Aspen institute Italia).
        
        The other problem will be the same as the current problems of to large of an elder population and to small of a working population,
    This problem will continue to become more exceedingly difficult to control as the elder class gets even larger and the working class gets even smaller.  In the year 2020, Italy will need over 200,000 extra people just to support the elderly population (Aspen institute Italia).