Economics of Dependence (1952-82)

Economic thought and the reform of the welfare state

“…A long time ago Jack Wiseman and I wrote a book on UK government expenditure growth 1 and, after some initial hesitation, decided to devote the final chapter to a forward projection of government expenditure based on some even earlier work of mine with Frank Paish. 2 We projected welfare expenditures using the assumption that 'real benefits' would remain constant, making welfare expenditure primarily a function of the changing amount and composition of population and the utilisation of services by age group. Our projection resulted in a rise in government health-service expenditure between 1961 and 1981 of 9%; the actual growth was 50%.…”

The economics of ageing and the political economy of old age

“…Opinions on the age of retirement have changed with economic activity. The labour shortage of the 1940s and 1950s prompted calls in the UK for later retirement and increased economic activity in old age (Hopkin, 1953;Paish and Peacock, 1954). An academic literature emerged in the 1950s with the goal of showing that the elderly are capable of work after the traditional retirement ages (Dex and Phillipson, 1986).…”

Dependence and Population Ageing

“…Policy debate in the United Kingdom dates largely from the Beveridge Report (Beveridge 1942), several decades after population ageing first appeared. Since then there have been two main periods of interest: in the 1940s and 1950s following on from the Beveridge Report (Royal Commission on Population 1949;Hopkin 1953;Paish and Peacock 1954;Titmuss 1955), and in the 1980s (Ermisch 1981(Ermisch , 1983Fogarty 1982;Hemming and Kay 1982;Phillipson and Walker 1986;Wells and Freer 1988). The debate has never been prompted by the population statistics alone, and the lull in interest in the 1960s and 1970s was a reaction as much to the economic and political climate as to demographic change.…”