Global Aging: Key Implications for U.S. Foreign Policy and Federal Agencies

Filed 52m ago · Via GAO · The Buffoon Desk

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Court of the Queen

Kevin MacLeod · incompetech.com · CC BY 4.0

Photo: Alf Altendorf from Salzburg - Vienna, Austria · CC BY-SA 2.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

A GAO report finds the global population aged 60 and over is projected to more than double, from one billion in 2020 to 2.1 billion by 2050, with implications for U.S. national security, economic competitiveness, and global health policy. As allies spend more on healthcare for aging populations, GAO says, they may have less to spend on defense, potentially shifting the security environment.

GAO found DOD, HHS and State each do some work that touches on global aging, such as State training younger workers abroad to fill skills gaps and HHS researching age-related conditions, but no U.S. agency provides foreign assistance specifically targeted at older populations. Officials confirmed this gap directly to GAO.

The report frames this as a strategic blind spot rather than a crisis, recommending better-informed planning without issuing new formal recommendations.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.

✒ FROM THE EDITORIAL DESK

A world getting older sounds like the least surprising headline imaginable, yet the report says nobody in Washington has built a program actually aimed at it. That's the government's usual move: study the iceberg thoroughly, then keep steering the same course. Give it another decade and this same finding will show up again, a little more urgent and a little less surprising.

Source: Read the original at GAO → Scored: Court of the Queen · Kevin MacLeod · CC BY 4.0

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