Forget all that hogwash about the economic threat of our "aging" population. The real problem is that our populace is getting younger.

So argue the grandfather/grandson research team of Marcel Boyer and Sébastien Boyer in a paper released by the C.D. Howe Institute Wednesday. The paper, entitled "The Main Challenge of our Times: A Population Growing Younger," says we've been looking at demographics backward. Instead of considering population distribution in terms of the number of years since birth, we should be looking at it in terms of life expectancy – and by that measure, our society is getting further away from death. A 35-year-old Canadian in 2010 had a remaining life expectancy of 46.8 years – 8.2 years longer than a 35-year-old in 1950.

"Viewed so, the Canadian population is not getting older in the traditional sense, but 'younger,' because many workers are approaching retirement age more able, and willing, to work longer than were previous generations of Canadians," they wrote.

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While the traditional view of the "aging" population raises policy concerns about how to deal with more people in traditional retirement age in terms of pensions, old-age benefits and health care, the authors argue that we have failed to shift our concept of retirement age or senior citizenship to encompass the improvement in life expectancy, or the relative health of people in that age group compared with past generations. Since a 65-year-old today has as much life expectancy left as a 59-year-old did in 1950, maybe we should be asking why we're still talking about retiring at 65, rather than how we're going to pay for it or how the economy is going to cope with a work force that has been shrunk by age. A 65-year-old today is, simply, younger than a 65-year-old in 1950; why should they both be leaving the work force at the same age?

"Because many older Canadians are already deciding to retire later than the arbitrary age of 65, public policy should aim to provide Canadians with the instruments to better manage retirement decisions," they said.

Still, the postponement of the traditional age-65 retirement has been a relatively new, and small, phenomenon. In fact, they note, average retirement age actually trended lower for several decades, before reversing the trend in recent years. (Two savings-sapping market crashes in less than a decade probably was a bigger factor in this than improved health or longer life expectancy.) Canada's employment rate for people age 65-69 is about 20 per cent.

They said government programs, such as old-age security and the national pension plan, are essentially incentives encouraging people to retire from the work force before they should. In a population where aging demographics are poised to shrink the work force, the government retirement supports run counter to sound economic policy.

They quote a 2006 report from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development:

"Employment and social policies and practices that discourage work at an older age effectively deny older workers choice in when and how they retire. Moreover, in an era of rapid population aging, they result in a waste of valuable resources that business, the economy and society can ill-afford. Policy reforms are needed to reverse the trend towards ever-earlier retirement."

The Boyers said there is a "major social and political urgency" in Canada to redesign social security, medicare and tax laws "to avoid discouraging longer careers and bankrupting social safety net and security programs." At a minimum, this entails increasing the age at which retirees are eligible for benefits (something the Canadian government has already announced, as it intends to push the benefit age back to 67). They also suggest the introduction of "phased-in" retirement, which would allow people in traditional retirement age to keep doing some work while also receiving some retirement benefits.

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They added that with longer life, and therefore more potential years of employment, policy makers should also consider ways to systemically foster "double-career paths." They suggested people should have the opportunity to complete one career, then draw down from their pensions to fund education and retraining in order to prepare for a second career.

"No matter how we approach the issue of population aging, new and more flexible labour market arrangements will be necessary if continued labour force participation after ages 60 to 65 is deemed desirable for the individual involved and society," they wrote.