High dependency case study-Italy

What does it mean for a country to have a high dependency

It means that a country has a large amount of people that are either too young to work or are retired

What is the total population and population density of Italy

Italy has over 60 million residents and a population density of 201/km²

What differs high dependence in Italy to high dependence in LEDC’s like Afghanistan

In Italy the high dependence is mostly equally spread between the retired population (people ages over 65) and young population whilst in LEDC’s many people die before they reach 65 and the birth rate is usually high meaning dependency comes from people who are too young to work

What are some ways the government is trying to reduce the impacts of high dependency.

The government may have to

• Increase immigration to bring more workers in and offset the high dependency

• Raise taxes to pay for increase cost of maintaining public services that support dependents

• Increase the retirement age drastically to make sure the population is working for longer decreasing the amount of dependents per person

• Reduce the number of schools by closing or merging some to decrease costs involved in education

What is Italy’s population growth like

Italy is experiencing a natural decrease with death rates above birth rates but immigrants mean that the population is not decreasing yet.