In the latest instalment of Paint by Numbers, Crikey’s new series about the big issues of the day told via the numbers, we lay out the challenge facing Australia’s aged care system.
Yesterday’s report from the federal government’s aged care taskforce illustrated the difficulty of the job ahead:
In 2022-23, the proportion of people aged 65 and over for every 100 people of traditional working age (15 to 64) was: 26.6%
In 2062-63, the same proportion is projected to be: 38.2%
Over the next 40 years, the number of people aged over 80 will triple to: more than 3.5 million people.
Total government spending on aged care in 2021-22: $24.8 billion, or 1.1% of GDP
In 2026-63, the projected proportion of GDP will be: 2.5%
The current number of people using home care: about 1 million
The projected figure by 2042: about 2 million
The projected budget required to build aged care rooms needed by older people in 2050: $37 billion
The investment needed to update and refurbish existing aged care rooms by 2030: $5.5 billion
The investment needed by 2050: $19 billion
Percentage of aged care providers that made an operating loss in 2020-21: 54%
Percentage of aged care providers that made an operating loss in 2021-22: 69%
The proportion of home care providers that reported an operating profit in 2020-21: 74%
The proportion of home care providers that reported an operating profit in 2021-22: 69%
The projected decline in the proportion of people aged over 65 accessing the aged pension and other income supports by 2062-63: 15%
Home ownership rates among people aged over 65 in 2021: 82% (and stable since the mid-1980s)
The proportion of aged care services that met all quality standards requirements in Q2 of 2022-23 (according to the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission, September 2023): 67%
The proportion of aged care services that met all quality standards requirements in Q1 of 2023-24: 81%
Not so bad. And if we stopped funding America’s bogus wars we could afford for them to eat gourmet food off gold plates.
And if people didn’t have to pay off FOREVER MORTGAGES more old people might be looked after at home by their FAMILY. Just saying.
So don’t think I’m having a go at you – I blame the pollies entirely. We have allowed governments to bend, twist and pervert the basic rules of a good, just society to the point where there is a danger of it breaking. When the unimaginable cost of climate change really starts to kick in we will have nothing to fall back on, no character. Dutton’s Blackshirts will have a ball.
You’re almost totally right – but we’re past the point where society broke; the only reason that’s not completely obvious is inertia. Detonate the foundations of a skyscraper, and the whole thing hangs in the air for a moment before it falls.
Technically the wars are not competing with aged care for resources, so we can ‘afford’ both (unless you believe the federal budget is like your own household budget which it isn’t).
And also wars reduce the pressure on aged care by killing people….
Wars actually increase the pressure on aged care by killing people of working age, who’d be looking after the aged.
Good point. But as an example we lost 50-some of our young in Vietnam (their “American war”) while over 2,000,000 Vietnamese died, plus there were many adversely affected by ongoing famine caused by the war and the filthy embargo by the US for many years after the war. Magnanimity in victory not a concept recognised by the Americans. So anyway, there were two or three million potential care-giving immigrants we lost, right there. So it gets complicated, but napalm, cluster bombs, butterfly bombs, carpet bombing the neighbours, UXBs, and just plain shooting them, well, imho, does zilch for looking after Granny. On the other hand we did score many refugee potential nurses in the Communist aftermath. A rare good deed by PM Fraser who refused to turn back the boats, thereby showing more wisdom than those who followed. Interestingly, Vietnam would not be Communist today had not America gone to war against them forcing them to appeal to the only governments in a position to assist them, namely Communist China and Communist Russia. Ho Chi Minh only wanted independence. The Vietnamese government now largely controls Cambodia and Laos. Dominoes? Off topic, sorry.
I know I seem to always be going on about our brave and free allies, but feel free to correct any errors, please.
By the way, did you know that little old harmless Laos, almost invisible to the world in its weakness, had more tons of bombs dropped on it than any other country in history, including Germany in WW2? They even dig up unexploded bombs and use them as verandah posts (they’re free). Pub quiz trivia. B52s are really amazing.
Thanks drastic for the history remindier. I’d forgotten a lot of that stuff. It’s incredibly mentally healthy and helpful for our perspective on current events to take into account the events that have lead us to where we are now.
The past predicts the future.
Watching the horrible things Israel is doing today, it’s easy to forget that much much worse things were done by the USA, with our help, to the people of Vietnam and Iraq.
500 Australians died in the American War in Vietnam.
Yes, of course, sorry for the typo. I knew it was 500+, and I looked it up now and the number was 523. My sincere apologies to all those families I seemed to disregard.
True….
But it reduces the young male unemployment rate, which is triffic for conservative governments.
It’s the same argument for smoking.
I’ve just been through putting my mum into a nursing home after a sudden illness has rendered her basically bedridden and my main observations are:
Every single word is true. The ONLY point of Howard’s aged care “reform” was to transfer wealth to the for profit sector. Starting with Howard’s mate Doug Moran.
Didn’t the Moran empire go broke?
All good thoughts her and your way. It’s a draining process to go through, for everyone.
I would sooner overdose than be jailed in a aged care maximum abuse facillity which uses and abuse oeople in their senior years – what a acam – my kids will get their inheritence before these property / bankers/ middkemen investment pirates steal my family’s slog
six scam
sic: scam
Here’s a tip I just learnt – instead of posting replies for corrections, copy your post, then hit that little button up there under where it says how many comments, and you can delete your post. Repost it with your correction.
Good tip. Thanks Kimmo.
Ok, that worked. Thanks for that. Except that on the PC the icon that is the person with the settings cog is adjacent to the total comments for the story.
And I have a great idea for Euthanasia cruises where we simply take people who want to die on a cruise out into international waters ( I have the perfect place already) and relocate them to the bottom of the ocean, 5000 at a time. The problem for me is not one of morality or law or any of that anti-human nonsense, it’s one of demand – there will be so much it will be hard to keep up.
Why waste them, use them for fertiliser and give it to one of the foreign owned agricultural conglomerates.
I suggested that once before – mulch. Yeah nah, wasn’t popular. deep ocean trench seems more socially acceptable.
And no thought given to what’s going to happen due to the mass immigration program we’re running today. Migrants don’t age right?
“In 2062-63, the same proportion is projected to be: 38.2%”
No, a red herring and muddying the water, what ‘mass immigration program’?
We have for now a 190k permanent cap, many are already counted into the population by the NOM net OS migration or border movement ‘barometer’.
From the latter we have high temporary churn over of younger students, backpackers, temp workers etc. who pay taxes then majority depart, permanently; ‘net financial contributors’ to support our ageing permanent population.
The latter is significant due to increasing old age dependency ratios i.e. increasing numbers oldies vs. decreasing numbers of working age taxpayers in permanent population; budget stress without the high NOM churn can be avoided by raising taxes and/or lowering service delivery e.g. healthcare and pensions.
Nonetheless, over the next two decades the last of the silent generation and then the ‘boomer bomb’ will pop their clogs, about 5 million, with no ‘bubble’ to follow…..
Last ~15 years approx 250k/yr average NOM.
Last year approx 500k NOM.
This year expected to be even higher.
Australia has one of the highest population growth rates in the OECD, driven primarily by one of the highest immigration rates in the OECD.
Average annual NOM prior to early/mid-2000s was 80-100k/yr.
“In 2022-23, the proportion of people aged 65 and over for every 100 people of traditional working age (15 to 64) was: 26.6%
In 2062-63, the same proportion is projected to be: 38.2%”
At current population growth trends, the 5 million dying over the next twenty years will have been replaced in 10-15 years.
‘At current population growth trends’ which any fule knows is based on temporary churnover including spikes and the elephant in the room, our permanent population with silent generation or oldies and boomers fueling population growth due to better health and longevity i.e. staying in the data longer.
No bubble or bomb following the boomers……
“Temporary” going on 15-odd years…..
If the boomers were a “bomb” what do you call the higher population that will be left in their wake ?
Further, you obviously misunderstand the (UNPD defined) NOM net overseas migration formula which sweeps up temporary border movements and spikes the population regularly i.e. cite early/mid 2000s but ignore the expansion, inflation and conflation in 2006 by moving to 12/16+ month residency test.
NOM accurately counts people.
If anything, the previous methodology was undercounting.
This can be seen by looking at the population reported in the Census.
“what ‘mass immigration program’?”
That’s part of the issue Drew. Both the majors will never say what they think is the right immigration number for Australia, or what they think is the ideal population of Australia, and how we should proceed to get to that number. For about the past 20 years, both sides have turbo charged immigration to: make the economic figures look (superficially) good; to make themselves look “economically responsible”; to keep the big end of town happy(more the Libs), developers happy(more the Libs), construction unions happy(more the Labs) and to stay in power so that they can look after their mates (both).
Some of us just (me very much included) want a small Australia for all sorts of reasons (I won’t bang on), including our kids being able to buy a home just like we did. But nobody is offering us that option. I’m seriously annoyed.
I just skip over Drew’s comments. He doesn’t offer anything of value to the discussion. drsmithy has done an excellent job showing where Drew has faulty reasoning, bad maths, who offers conspiracy theories over substance.
So why did you bother writing if you have nothing substantive to offer nor any specific rebuttal/counter; resentful narcissism of authoritarians?
Classic SPA, Koch think tanks, RW MSM etc., shoot and denigrate messengers to avoid science, data and analysis e.g. climate science, in favour of imported beliefs and junk science of US fossil fueled white nativism, SPA/RW MSM talking points and influencers, desperate to turn voters into nativist authoritarians a la Trump, Abbott, Orban et al?
This much hypocrisy would probably kill a normal person.
The irony meter just exploded.
You make negative claims or linkages regarding impacts of population growth and/or immigration, but no logical linkage, just RW talking points that existed in the 19thC?
Question, if you understand that the silent generation and boomers in the permanent population’s improved health and longevity amongst the same cohort is main driver of long term population growth, what is the ‘solution’?
Like media channeling similar, go to the fossil fuel John ‘passive eugenics’ Tanton linked faux environmental &/or demographic ZPG-SPA NGO, to demand unspecified immigration restrictions using inflated data, and maybe euthanasia for oldies, as suggested by some RW activists during Covid?
Pretzel logic: population doesn’t grow from new additions, it grows from a lack of subtractions.
Insignificant.
It’s deplorable that people are making a profit out of caring for the old. Even so, were the losses in recent years due to the extra expenses of Covid?
Yes Woopwoop, common sense says that as soon as you put a profit motive into child-care or aged-care, the temptation is to cut corners.
Even not for profits are suspect. One church run not for profit was allegedly syphoning money from it’s aged care facilities to finance the lifestyle of it’s boss-poobah clerics.
Age Care should be the same model as Public Health. Pubic Hospital or Private – WE choose.
The current Age Care model is basically a for profit model fuelled by commercial greed, and the Oldies pay the ultimate price.
Not all of them are private. And of course we don’t chose a public or private hospital unless we have private health insurance.
Just what we need – a two tier system!