Throwing around Numbers

Throwing around Numbers

On Feb 8, 2012, Diane Finley, responding to questions in the House, stated that the OAS will cost 3 times as much and would have 1/2 as many workers. (video, 6.30 minutes in)

I did some work with figures available through the internet, and came up with some interesting conclusions. Total public pensions cost 13% of the Budget.  Budget

The Budget for Canada was reported as $278,700,000,000. The Spec Newspaper  13% of that is $36,000,000,000. That tripled is $108,000,000,000.

I checked on a demographic profile. and found that in 20 years, the number of people at 65 will be twice what it is now. [Not 3 times.]

Based on that, I used the same profile and shifted all the numbers by 20 years.

According to my figures, today’s profile gives 11.7 million people of working age.

The shifted profile, shifted 20 years in the future, gives 10.5 million people of working age.

Diane Finley, you claim the Opposition is fear-mongering. I think you are fear-mongering.  In twenty years, there will be twice as many seniors. [ Not 3 times ]  And, based on the demographic profile, there will be 1 million fewer workers, about 1 tenth less that now.

And that isn’t counting the rising youth populations in the Aboriginal population and among immigrants.

It doesn’t add up.

Related articles

• Public pensions are sustainable long-term: watchdog (ctv.ca)