Includes index.

Introduction / Mitoshi Yamaguchi -- Job opportunities for older workers : when are jobs filled with external hires? / Robert Hutchens -- Skills, wages, and the employment of older workers / Naoki Mitani -- Work-life balance measures and gender division of labor / Akira Kawaguchi -- Optimal education policies under an equity-efficiency trade-off / Takashi Oshio -- Why are Japanese refusing to pay the national pension Tax? A simultaneous equation analysis / Noriko Aoki -- A century of demographic change and economic growth : the Asian experience in regional and temporal perspective / Robert M. Schmidt -- Evolution of recent economic-demographic modeling : a synthesis / Robert M. Schmidt -- Demographic dividends : the past, the present, and the future / Andrew Mason -- Demographic change and regional economic growth : a comparative analysis of Japan and China / Mitoshi Yamaguchi.

Birth rates are dropping to ever-lower levels around the world. Populations are growing more slowly and, in some cases, beginning to decline. Rapid population aging has begun in the West and parts of Asia and is just over the horizon elsewhere. The demographic changes, their economic implications, and possible policy responses are the subject matter of this volume. What will be the effects on economic performance? How can couples be encouraged to marry and have children? Can educational reform lead to a more productive young labor force helping to offset their meager numbers? Can labor market reform extend the work life of older workers without damaging the interests of others? How should the social safety net that supports the elderly evolve in ways that are both fair and sustainable? The papers in this volume draw on international experience to address these issues, but emphasize the experience of Japan the country with the worlds oldest population. It includes contributors such as: Noriko Aoki, Akira Kawaguchi, Allen Kelley, Wei Huang, Robert Hutchens, Tomoko Kinugasa, Andrew Mason, Naoki Mitani, Takashi Oshio, Robert Schmidt, and Mitoshi Yamaguchi.