Then there is the issue of a greying population. It is true that people in Europe live longer today than at any previous period in their history. Barring any major war or pestilence, medical advances should allow the next generation to live even longer still. And of course, although living longer is often painted as a terrible burden, indeed a scourge on a society, it should perhaps be remembered that for most individuals it is rather a good thing. It can also present a whole set of benefits for the rest of society, not least by balancing a cultural obsession with youth against the experience of age. The ‘scourge’ of a ‘greying population’ is only a scourge when it is depicted as such. In any case, even if you agreed that longevity is a curse for a society, there are many things you might do before deciding to import the next generation from another continent.

In the period following the Second World War people were expected to live for a few years after they retired. Today they are expected to live an extra couple of decades. The obvious solution to this economic challenge is to raise the retirement age in order to ensure that in retirement people are not taking out more in pensions and healthcare provisions than they put in during their years of work. In some countries this is happening naturally. For instance, between 2004 and 2010 the average retirement age in Britain rose by a year (63–64 for men, 61–62 for women).¹⁰ Admittedly, this is neither always such an easy nor a voluntary process. After the financial crash of 2008 and the successive Eurozone crises, Greek citizens saw their retirement ages raised. Until then those covering a large, and somewhat eccentric, collection of professions (hairdressers, radio announcers, trombonists) were allowed to retire in their fifties. When economic realities hit, those retirement ages were hauled up. But it is always possible that governments in search of a cheap popular hit will refuse to bend to economic reality. In 2010 President Nicolas Sarkozy managed against stiff opposition to raise the retirement age in France from 60 to 62. Two years later his successor, François Hollande, lowered it back down to 60.

There will always be those who protest about the idea of working into their sixties. But perhaps some people will see working longer in a society they know as being preferable to dying in one in which they feel a stranger. And although there are those who argue that there would not be work for the greying workforce, this requires a serious consideration of how to shift the economy in order to improve productivity among the ‘greying’ community. In a 2012 interview Chancellor Merkel of Germany succinctly laid out the continent’s challenge: ‘If Europe today accounts for just over 7 per cent of the world’s population, produces around 25 per cent of global GDP and has to finance 50 per cent of global social spending, then it’s obvious that it will have to work very hard to maintain its prosperity and way of life. All of us have to stop spending more than we earn every year.’¹¹