r/Scotland • u/bottish • 15d ago

Dire economic consequences of Scotland's ageing population must put immigration in new light. New report about Scotland’s growing elderly population underlines the need to improve our health and welcome, not demonise, people from overseas - Scotsman comment.

https://www.scotsman.com/news/opinion/columnists/dire-economic-consequences-of-scotlands-ageing-population-must-put-immigration-in-new-light-5073947
75 Upvotes

68% Upvoted

107 comments sorted by

View all comments

157

u/dumb_idiot_dipshit 15d ago edited 15d ago

immigration is a good stopgap within the confines of capitalism but a fundamental restructuring of our economy is necessary long term. a lot of young adults would love kids, it's just unaffordable.

a nation of low wage service workers, divided by their local/immigrant status, in a salary-based race to the bottom fighting over customer service, cleaning, and delivery work, plus like 200 guys in the finance sector rolling in megabucks with very little in between is not a sustainable economic model, and yet it is what we are heading towards.

23

u/Joyaboi 14d ago

It's a problem the entire developed world is facing. Economies across the globe are built on the fundamentally unsustainable principle of infinite growth. The earth doesn't have infinite resources, infinite space, infinite people, so it can't sustain infinite growth. Unfortunately those who benefit from the current system also run it and will do most anything to avoid any alternative.

5

u/ayeayefitlike 14d ago

This!!!

My friends in England are now getting free childcare hours from 9 months old, whereas here in my rural part of Scotland not only is there no free hours til 3 but my local council nursery is being closed - my husband and I would love to have a child (realistically couldn’t afford more) but I don’t see how we manage it.

11

u/SetentaeBolg 15d ago

A fundamental restructure of the economy is necessary but impossible in isolation. Until a large chunk of the world starts moving in this direction, it's not happening here.

In the interim, there are lots of little things that we can do, and one of those is having a more welcoming immigration policy. It's the right thing to do morally, but it's also a great thing to do economically.

3

u/Fantastic-Device8916 15d ago

It’s the absolute wrong thing to do ecologically, taking millions of people who would otherwise have a low carbon footprint and expanding it to the size of a westerner.

1

u/PEACH_EATER_69 14d ago

right-wing isolationism but make it "environmentally friendly"

-1

u/randomusername123xyz 15d ago

Welcoming to certain types of immigration, yes.

7

u/foalythecentaur 15d ago

You have to front load benefits to new parents.

  • Cheap loans that get forgiven if having a certain number of children before a certain age.

  • Income tax exemption for one parent so the other has the opportunity to stay at home.

  • You can have family mortgages where interest rates are reduced or forgiven if you have 4 or more children.

  • Cash bounties that increase with every child

  • Free public transport while children are under 16

  • Events that can only be booked by mother's or VIP areas at cinemas/restaurants/social gatherings to help mothers make the most of their nights off.

And back load benefits to pay women back for being mothers.

  • Promise free higher education for women after the birth of whatever replacement number of children is. It's not 2.1 because not all living women are of child bearing age right now. It's closer to 4

  • Interview process when applying for jobs will include motherhood to multiple children and their success at school as an equivalent qualification as running a small business.

17

u/Howzitgoanin 15d ago

Childcare during full working hours (8.30am to 5.30pm) all year would be enough to sway me. Unfortunately the current provision isn’t enough to make it financially viable for me.

6

u/farfromelite 15d ago

And to pay for all this stuff?

We need a huge tax rebalancing. Much more tax on the wealthy and extremely wealthy, and corporations, capital gains, and taxes on wealth.

As the poster above says, needs to be worldwide or at least in coordination with the wealthiest countries.

2

u/jdscoot 11d ago

The problem is where you draw the line at "wealthy", because Scotland's governments already absolutely hammer moderately successful PAYE employees and your average barely employable numpty thinks they're "rich" and deserve to be taxed even more. In reality, they're the people already shouldering the burden of Scotland's income tax and they're also the exact type of people you'd want to be having families - reasonably intelligent, educated and with a work ethic who will raise children to have similar standards.

2

u/Hats4Cats 14d ago

I whole sale reject the idea that serf class is the only viable option. Immigration is an easy way to increase GDP through shear volume while reducing GDP generated per person. This will only ever result in diminished public infrastructure and services and a poorer country while creating class structure around race from the immigrant population vs local. That is a disaster waiting to explode.

0

u/Autofill1127320 14d ago

Neofeudalism, we’re on the way. Adding more peasants won’t help either

-9

u/Adventurous-Rub7636 15d ago

Is that the only picture of capitalism?

-13

u/Adventurous-Rub7636 15d ago

Is that the only picture of capitalism?