Vienna Yearbook of Population Research

In Europe there is currently an increasing public awareness of the importance that demographic trends have in reshaping our societies. Concerns about possible negative consequences of population aging seem to be the major force behind this new interest in demographic research. Demographers have been pointing out the fundamental change in the age composition of European populations and its potentially serious implications for social security schemes for more than two decades but it is only now that the expected retirement of the baby boom generation has come close enough in time to appear on the radar screen of social security planners and political decision makers to be considered a real challenge and not just an academic exercise.