Author: Researcher of China Social and Development Research Center, Peking University, Professor of Sociology Department Lu Jiehua
The scale and speed of population aging in China is unprecedented. On January 15, 2024, the General Office of the State Council issued the Opinions on Developing the Silver Hair Economy to Improve the Welfare of the Elderly, which is the first policy document named "Silver Hair Economy" in China. The silver economy not only provides the elderly with products or services such as enjoying their old age, combining medical care with nursing care and home-based community care, but also a series of economic activities related to the whole society, the whole population and the whole life cycle under the new form of aging society. From this point of view, it is of great importance and urgency to deeply explore the pension concept of contemporary youth groups, not only focusing on the pension responsibility of the young generation to their parents, but also focusing on the analysis of youth groups' own pension willingness and planning for the elderly. From the supply side and the demand side of the dual engines, it is necessary to seize and promote China's current and future silver economy and intergenerational harmony.
Main characteristics of youth's concept of providing for the aged from the perspective of silver economy
The concept of providing for the aged is a slow variable. The contemporary youth's concept of providing for the aged has undergone a turning change from child rearing to multiple autonomy, which is not only in line with the requirements of the times when the country constructs a multi-level supply pattern of silver economy, but also in a broader perspective to make a proactive pension reserve for themselves and their families. To observe the new features and changes of the contemporary youth's concept of providing for the aged from the new perspective of the silver economy is not only to analyze the youth's filial duty to the elderly, support consumption, care and care, and other intergenerational feedback; The more important implication is to outline and measure the pension literacy and cost-effectiveness of the whole society to actively respond to population aging from the perspective of the whole population structure. In summary, the contemporary youth pension concept from the perspective of silver economy has the following prominent characteristics.
First, the attention of contemporary youth to the silver economy shows fusion and diversity. Although the younger generation has not yet entered the stage of old age, their attention to the silver economy has a more long-term significance. Contemporary youth do not pay more attention to meeting the direct needs of life in their later years than the elderly, such as tangible products such as "food, clothing, housing, transportation, health, culture, tourism and clothing", high-quality institutions, and adequate pensions, which are closely related to aging. Contemporary youth's attention to the theme and content of the silver economy is diversified, returning to the essential attribute of "more effective allocation of scarce resources in an aging society". Their interests go beyond the traditional aging industry, and not only focus on retirement and re employment with the elderly as the main producer, or modern service industries or products with the elderly as the main consumer. It can be considered that the contemporary youth's focus on the silver economy is relatively broad, spanning the economic entities of the first, second and third industries, especially the modern financial and comprehensive industrial system, involving the policy arrangements and independent choices of various economic entities such as the government, market, society, families, organizations and individuals, In order to adapt to the impact of the structural change of the country's population age on the sustainable development of the economy and society.
Second, the contemporary youth show a distinctive feature of "strong awareness and weak action" in their pension preparation. According to the data of "2022 Survey on Contemporary Youth Pension Planning", more and more contemporary youth are beginning to realize the importance of pension prospective preparation and pension wealth planning. Among the 3000 valid samples from the post-85 to post-00 generation, 90.3% of the youth interviewed agreed that the earlier the better the pension preparation is. However, most of the interviewed young people did not put their awareness of old-age care into action in view of such pension concerns as serious illness reimbursement and medical treatment, insufficient income savings and declining quality of life in their later years. Among them, 43.7% of the youth interviewed are just "slowly beginning to understand pension products"; 31.1% of the youth associations interviewed "occasionally think in the dead of night, but have not yet taken action"; Another 8.6% of the youth interviewed said that "retirement is too far away for me to consider"; Only 16.6% of the youth interviewed believe that "providing for the elderly is a major life event, and relevant assets are already being allocated".
Third, contemporary youth's understanding of pension investment focuses on its public economy rather than personal benefits. Silver economy has a special attribute of public goods, which is social, welfare and market. Contemporary youth understand that pension investment is fundamentally different from other financial products of market economy in terms of supply and demand, profit fluctuation and market capacity. Pension investment products are largely subject to administrative constraints on public policies for population aging and financial guidance of public products from top-level design. Therefore, contemporary youth adhere to the "endowment attribute" of pension finance and personal pension and other pension investments, but do not pursue individual investment returns. Instead, they focus on holding experiences such as "long-term preservation, safety, stability, and appropriate mobility" by combining personalized information such as age and gender, retirement plans, financial status, and risk preferences. The above survey data further shows that nearly one third of the surveyed youth agree that pension planning and participation in pension investment is a way of personal finance, which can not only help them accumulate pension reserves, but also obtain other returns such as tax incentives. Considering the low profit, welfare and public economy of pension investment products, contemporary youth have more diversified choices in specific pension investment product configuration. Commercial pension insurance, life insurance and other dividend return products are the most popular (65.3%), followed by savings deposits (54.6%), bank financing (37.9%) and public funds (25.8%).
Fourth, the participation of contemporary youth in the silver economy has the dynamic development of keeping pace with the times. The economic activities of contemporary youth's silver hair do not completely point to the savings and consumption that smooth the life cycle, but are in the process of continuous exploration by combining new technologies, new formats and new business models such as policy orientation, mobile communication and digital economy. As the youth's lifestyle, consumption concept and pursuit of life are gradually forming, closely related to scientific and technological innovation, industrial integration and industry segmentation, the connotation and extension of their participation in the silver economy are also expanding. From helping parents with health management to realizing the reallocation of family property, to realizing the "three pillar" pension security system of national basic pension security, enterprise occupational pension and individual pension insurance, contemporary youth have participated in the new wave of silver economy online and offline, flexibly and voluntarily. According to the data of China Family Finance Survey of Southwestern University of Finance and Economics in 2017, only 4.35% and 3.41% of the total sample are young people aged 18-40 who own commercial life insurance and commercial health insurance. Although this indicator is higher than 2.07% and 0.72% of the elderly aged 60 and above, it can be seen that the demand for pension wealth planning of youth in China has not been effectively mobilized a few years ago. It is worth mentioning that in August 2018, the first batch of publicly offered pension target funds were approved for issuance, and China's pension financial product system took shape; In May and August 2021, the CBRC issued the Notice on the Pilot of Exclusive Commercial Endowment Insurance and the Notice on the Pilot of Endowment Financing Products respectively; In April 2022, the General Office of the State Council issued the Opinions on Promoting the Development of Personal Pension. In the past five years, the country has closely arranged a diversified pattern of silver economy and diversified pension financial products. By the end of 2023, more than 50 million people have opened individual pension accounts. According to the data analysis of the First Anniversary Insight Report on Personal Pension Fund, young and middle-aged groups such as the post-80s and post-90s generation show a strong willingness to invest in personal pension.
Fifthly, the pension planning of contemporary youth is not only influenced by the promotion of new media and knowledge popularization, but also shaped by major life events. According to the 2022 Survey Report on the Maturity of Chinese Young and Middle aged Elderly Care jointly released by CITIC Securities and Renmin University of China, the average subjective and objective elderly care maturity scores 5.41 and 6.40 respectively. The value range of this indicator is 0-10. The higher the value, the better the elderly care maturity of the respondents. This survey data shows that the elderly care maturity of the young and middle-aged generation in China is gradually improving, such as the elderly care literacy, elderly care cognition and elderly care decision-making, but there is still a certain distance from the more mature elderly care planning and knowledge reserves. The Survey Report on Contemporary Youth Pension Planning in 2022 reveals that the formation and development of youth pension literacy in China mainly comes from two aspects. First, it is influenced by new media and financial publicity. The main source channels for contemporary youth to obtain pension knowledge are social platforms such as Tiaoyin, Weibo and Xiaohongshu (62.8%), financial institutions such as banks, securities firms and insurance (52.8%), and third-party wealth management platforms such as Alipay and WeChat (51.5%). The second is the major life events they have experienced. The Report on China's Urban Elderly Care Service Demand 2022 points out that due to life experiences such as new parents, parents' illness, and their own hospitalization, young people aged 30-39 have significantly increased their awareness of pension issues and their attention to pension planning.
Main causes of young people's concern about future pension planning
Contemporary youth pay attention to the future pension plan and try to find their own generation's development opportunities and innovation possibilities from the great changes in population and economic and social development. On the one hand, from the perspective of intergenerational friendly social advocacy and social participation, young people's concern about future pension planning is a social phenomenon under the background of accelerated population aging and intergenerational replacement. The young generation's concern for the future pension plan is fully involved in the national strategy of aging economic and social development, and has an important function of promoting the innovative development of the silver economy. On the other hand, from the perspective of the national industrial structure adjustment and the composition of the silver economy, young people's concern about the future pension planning is affected by many factors, such as policy guidance, resource supply, demand structure, scientific and technological development, and yearning for a better life. Contemporary young people gradually pay attention to the future pension plan, which helps to expand the production and consumption objects of the silver economy from the whole population and the whole life cycle, as well as the design, research and development, circulation and sales of old products and services and other omni channel economic and social activities, and realize the transformation of the new economic form from demographic dividend to longevity bonus.
First, the focus of contemporary youth on future pension planning is to deal with savings and income at different age stages with the rational principle of maximizing utility in the context of a deeply aging society. Some studies use Chinese family tracking survey data to analyze the propensity of age and pension planning. The results show that there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between the age of the head of household and the family's purchase of commercial pension insurance. Around 40 years old is an important time node for planning individual and family pension decisions. The 2023 Research Report on the Retirement Readiness Index of Chinese Residents found that the reason why some young people can only save a small part of their income is that their overall income level is low; A considerable proportion of income can only be used to maintain daily expenses, not enough for future pension reserves. It is gratifying that the contemporary youth gradually understand the importance of "making plans as early as possible". The data of the Survey Report on the Prospects of China's Elderly Care released in 2022 shows that the proportion of China's residents' pension savings in total income has shown an upward trend for three consecutive years; Especially among young people aged 18 to 35, their average monthly income used for pension investment or planning rapidly increased from 1624 yuan in 2021 to 1940 yuan in 2022.
Second, contemporary youth's concern about future pension planning is to ease the imbalance of intergenerational exchange in the trend of declining fertility and weakening family functions. "Survey Data of Contemporary Youth Pension Planning in 2022" shows that the primary concerns and considerations of the interviewed youth, such as physical health (39.4%), promotion and salary increase (28.1%), family harmony (24.9%) and retirement pension (7.2%), are closely related to the future pension planning. Contemporary youth no longer rely on the traditional marriage spouse or the "family style pension model" of raising children to prevent old age. They are trying to use the "de family" pension strategy, from a longer period of time and across generations, to layout the important life topic of "pension".
Third, contemporary youth's concern about future pension planning is to actively resolve pension anxiety and resist inflation risks in the overall situation of the country's efforts to build a "three pillars" national pension system. "Survey data of pension planning for contemporary youth in 2022" shows that whether it is the first two reasons for starting pension planning, namely, "I hope to live an ideal life after retirement, so I must plan in advance" (74.6%) and "aging intensifies, and social security pension is not enough to support individual pension" (52.7%), or the first two reasons for not starting pension planning, That is, "the income is fair, and the social security pension is also paid steadily, so the future pension should not be a problem" (56.4%) and "new pension models are emerging, and the future pension can help each other" (47.9.6%). The young people interviewed pay close attention to pension planning, which is closely related to the construction of the institutionalized pension security system under the general situation and the pressure of national pension insurance expenditure. The government led basic old-age insurance in China is the first pillar, covering more than 1.04 billion people nationwide and occupying a leading position. However, as the second pillar, the enterprise led enterprise annuity has a small scale, scope and proportion, and its coverage is low; As the third pillar, individual pension insurance is still in its infancy. For young people, the way to effectively resolve pension anxiety and resist long-term inflation risk is to focus on their own future pension planning, gather the "three pillars" of basic pension insurance, enterprise annuity and personal pension, and reasonably allocate commercial pension insurance.
Fourth, contemporary youth pay attention to the future pension plan, which links pension expectations with high-quality old age life, and helps to improve the happiness of the whole life cycle. The 2022 Survey Report on the Maturity of the Elderly in China found that the way and pursuit of the elderly are changing. The young generation and high-income groups are more yearning for new and high-quality pension methods, such as living pension, city centered pension and high-end real estate pension. This fully shows that contemporary youth's concern for future pension planning is inseparable from their deep yearning for a better life. Young people are not satisfied with their basic pension needs, but look forward to a more comfortable life in their later years. Their pension wealth reserves also need to take into account various expenditures such as medical care, health, leisure and tourism. The sense of security and gain in the whole life cycle depends on the forward-looking pension planning to maintain and increase the value of pension investment and aging reserves.
The path of forward-looking welfare security for youth group pension planning
It is of great significance to do a good job of youth group pension planning and build a forward-looking pension welfare security with Chinese characteristics. From the perspective of the strategic value of the silver economy, a good pension plan for young people not only emphasizes the commodity attribute of the market economy, but also can strengthen the market operation mechanism to provide more products and better services to support the high-quality pension pursuit of young people through the prosperity and development of the effective market; It also follows the social attributes of remarkable characteristics, which is different from the satisfaction of the practical pension needs of the elderly group. The youth group pension planning exceeds the direct function of consumption safety and service itself, and is a new social culture and new development force under the rapid demographic structure change.
From the perspective of silver economy, the main idea of forward-looking welfare security for youth group pension planning includes two aspects. On the one hand, the forward-looking welfare security of youth group pension planning needs to be more clear about the institutional objectives of the national pension security system. At present, the construction of China's old-age security system is shifting from the narrow sense to the broad sense of policy orientation, from the gap filling type to the inclusive type and then to the service-oriented policy connotation, from improving the coverage level of basic old-age security to the policy content of multi pillar comprehensive well-being, from the elderly group to the policy object of the whole population's life cycle, From cash subsidies to policy instruments that take into account products and services. The implementation strategy of forward-looking welfare security for youth group pension planning needs to focus on the transformation of the above pairs of mechanisms. On the other hand, the forward-looking welfare security of youth group pension planning needs to take the existing basis of the current aging system, pension security level, aging socio-economic conditions and the concept of filial piety and respect for the elderly as the logical starting point. To do a good job of youth group pension planning, we should take more comprehensive consideration of the convergence, adaptability, development and continuity of the rapidly changing system, culture and concepts. Especially in the current important window period towards deep aging and the development of the silver hair economy, it is particularly necessary to pay attention to the overall coordination of the institutional arrangement steps and the related market supply, talent reserves and scientific and technological development, accurately adapt to the differentiated needs of young, middle-aged, elderly and other people in different life stages, marry with love, establish a family Specific needs in the family life cycle, such as childcare and empty nest disintegration, as well as multiple types of services, such as income savings, investment income, health care, tourism and health care, retirement and re employment, social participation and lifelong learning.
In fact, the youth group pension planning is a long-term and systematic process of "being prepared for the old", whose purpose is to accumulate sufficient pension reserves for Chinese modernization and release new demographic dividends. With the joint participation of the government, market, organizations, families, individuals and other actors, we should take into account the transformation costs of the new form of aging society and the development advantages of longevity dividends. Under the principle of "inclusive policies", we should expand the supply of products and services related to the silver economy to benefit the whole population and the whole life cycle, such as young and middle-aged groups and the elderly.
On the specific path of operability, the following three aspects need to be focused on. First, pay attention to the timetable and major task planning for the construction of a multi-level old-age security system. Integrating the characteristics of demography, economics, social security, human resources and other disciplines, the youth group pension plan will be incorporated into the integrated framework of the national strategy to actively respond to population aging as a forward-looking medium and long-term plan as soon as possible. Second, we should properly handle the relationships between "the state and society", "family and individual", "intra generational and intergenerational", and strengthen the co governance system and mechanism for youth group pension planning. From the perspective of the silver economy, to build an old-age security system for the whole population and the whole life cycle, we should not only adapt to the diverse needs of youth groups, but also test whether the central and local governments, the government and the market, and between different generations can form a multi-level, multi-dimensional and diverse "integrated social governance framework for the elderly". To do a good job of youth group pension planning involves the division of labor and cooperation of government supervision, market functions and social responsibilities, such as youth development, labor employment, savings and consumption, family construction, resource allocation, scientific and technological innovation, and concept updating. It is more necessary to mobilize a wide range of social forces from individuals to families and organizations to participate. Third, to do a good job in the forward-looking welfare security of youth group pension planning needs to establish the policy theme of "development type" rather than "welfare dependence". Under the overall goal of Chinese style modernization, the primary task of youth pension planning is to liberate and develop productive forces, so as to ensure the talent base of silver economy. Make a good plan for the elderly care of young people and achieve forward-looking welfare security, including new decisions and new actions on personal consumption, savings and investment in a deeply aging society at the micro level, new development and new adjustment of enterprises and institutions related to the elderly at the meso level, and finance New policies and new configurations such as market and currency. In order to provide a more solid material foundation for the silver economy, the priority of youth group pension planning is still to adhere to productivity and population modernization.
[Note: This paper is the phased achievement of the major project of the Key Research Base of Humanities and Social Sciences of the Ministry of Education "Research on Key Issues of Long term Balanced Development of China's Population" (project number: 22JJD840001)]
