Impact of aging population structure on the vitality of Lahti city centre
Paajanen, Kasper (2024)
2024
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Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2024052716036
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2024052716036
Tiivistelmä
The birth rate of Finland is decreasing rapidly. This phenomenon has been brought to public concern more with every passing year. While the reasons for the aging population and low birth rates are still under debate and solutions for it vary, general consensus is that it will have drastic impacts on the national economy.
Lahti as a city is facing one of the most difficult situations when it comes to population. Most of the citizens in the city centre are elderly people. It creates pressure for authorities and businesses to answer to service needs and demands. This will eventually show up in the out-look of the city centre. Low birth rates cause businesses and workplaces on the public and private sector to suffer from loss of competent workforce. As the amount of elderly people increase compared to those at working age, tax incomes for pensions fall short. This shortfall on taxation will lead to poverty and societal struggles. Labour migration and more flexible parenthood policy has been suggested to solve the deficit. These methods have been proved unsuccessful to solve the problem. The thesis aims to find the fundamental root causes be-hind falling birth rates. It also gives suggestions how Lahti can overcome the challenges of labour shortage. It provides intel on how to better integrate international students to Lahti. In addition to this, the thesis covers the Centre Vision 2040 project and makes comments about its content.
The research was made with qualitative oral interviews with a semi-structured base. Theoretical background consisted of studies that show various reasons for societal changes that con-tribute to birth decline. These were economic, socioeconomic, biological and cultural.
The results showed that financial concerns were not the main reasons for young people delay-ing their plans for parenthood. The reasons are related to different values between men and women and individualistic societal circumstances, but also to the socioeconomic fall of young men. Economic methods alone cannot solve issues related to birth rates, only public policy and cultural change can have an impact on it.
Lahti as a city is facing one of the most difficult situations when it comes to population. Most of the citizens in the city centre are elderly people. It creates pressure for authorities and businesses to answer to service needs and demands. This will eventually show up in the out-look of the city centre. Low birth rates cause businesses and workplaces on the public and private sector to suffer from loss of competent workforce. As the amount of elderly people increase compared to those at working age, tax incomes for pensions fall short. This shortfall on taxation will lead to poverty and societal struggles. Labour migration and more flexible parenthood policy has been suggested to solve the deficit. These methods have been proved unsuccessful to solve the problem. The thesis aims to find the fundamental root causes be-hind falling birth rates. It also gives suggestions how Lahti can overcome the challenges of labour shortage. It provides intel on how to better integrate international students to Lahti. In addition to this, the thesis covers the Centre Vision 2040 project and makes comments about its content.
The research was made with qualitative oral interviews with a semi-structured base. Theoretical background consisted of studies that show various reasons for societal changes that con-tribute to birth decline. These were economic, socioeconomic, biological and cultural.
The results showed that financial concerns were not the main reasons for young people delay-ing their plans for parenthood. The reasons are related to different values between men and women and individualistic societal circumstances, but also to the socioeconomic fall of young men. Economic methods alone cannot solve issues related to birth rates, only public policy and cultural change can have an impact on it.