Aging and Demographic Change in Canadian Context

Front Cover
David J. Cheal, Professor of Department of Sociology David Cheal
University of Toronto Press, Jan 1, 2002 - Social Science - 288 pages

The Canadian population is aging. As the "Baby-Boomer" generation reaches retirement age, policy-makers have begun to fear the economic and demographic challenges ahead. Aging and Demographic Change in Canadian Context responds to this alarmist view. The contributors present several alternative perspectives and question whether an aging society is necessarily inferior or problematic compared with the recent past, cautioning that exaggerated concerns about population aging can be harmful to rational policy making. The contributors argue that it is important to develop forward-looking programs that may influence life course trajectories in favourable directions, and that these new policies should be developed with respect to the life course considered as a whole. "Old age" is a slippery concept, and the effective boundaries between it and "middle age" are not always clear. The essays in Aging and Demographic Change in Canadian Context address these challenges and seek to broaden public discussion on aging and Canadian public policy.

 

Contents

Public Family and Work
22
Catching Up with Diversity in Intergenerational
61
Aging Language and Culture
72
The Impact of Demographic and Social Trends on Informal Support
105
What Do We Know?
133
A Question of Balance
190
Iowa City Declaration
245
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About the author (2002)

DAVID CHEAL is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Winnipeg.

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