Europe's Old Age Dependency Ratio

Which countries are some of the EU's demographically oldest? The OECD's old age dependency ratio is a good way of measuring that and it is defined as the number of individuals aged 65 and over per 100 people of working age (defined as those aged between 20 and 64). The ratio illustrates a considerable age-gap between southern Europe and the rest of the continent.

As the following infographic shows, there were 33.8 people aged 65 or over for every 100 Swedish workers in 2015, a figure that's expected to rise to 45.5 by 2050. In Spain, the figure for 2015 is broadly similar at 30.6. By 2050, however, it is expected to rise to 77.5 over 65s per 100 workers, which will likely place a significant burden on the Spanish health and pension systems.