ABSTRACT
The age-relatedness of certain physical conditions and stages of life, together with the modern welfare state’s provision of certain types of social services (such as age pensions and supporting mothers’ benefits) on the basis of age or age-related condition, permits a high degree of predictability about some of the consequences of the demographic conditions to be expected in the countries under consideration-those relating to finances, health and the need for care, for example. But about others, particularly those relating to behavior, there can be much less certainty. The experience to go on is simply too limited. Age structures as old, and growth rates as low, as those expected here have been exceedingly rare and short-lived; while zero (or negative) population growth rates originating specifically in long-term control over fertility (rather than in emigration or increased mortality) are unique to the present age.
