Canada's population of senior citizens hit a record high in 2011 as the oldest of the baby boomer generation entered retirement, new census data showed on Tuesday, an omen of the soaring health and pension costs the government will face in coming years, according to Reuters. Canadians aged 65 or older represented 14.8 percent of the population in 2011, up from 13.7 percent five years earlier for a total of nearly five million of the country's 33.5 million inhabitants. Canada's population remains among the youngest in the G8 industrialized nations because the bulk of the people in the post-war boom - those born between 1946 and 1965 - are still of working age, said Statistics Canada in its report on the age and sex data from the most recent cens us. "In 2011, only the United States and Russia had a lower proportion of seniors than Canada ... The baby boom in Canada was larger than in many other G8 countries, and most baby boomers have not yet reached age 65," Statscan said in its report. By comparison, seniors accounted for 23.4 percent in Japan - the world's oldest population; 16.5 percent in the United Kingdom; 13 percent in the United States and 12.9 percent in Russia. But the demographics in Canada are set to change dramatically by the next census in 2016, when Statscan projects the country will have more seniors than children for the first time in its history. The age group on the cusp of retirement - 60 to 64 - grew 29.1 percent between 2006 and 2011, nearly five times faster than the overall population growth of 5.9 percent. "This suggests that population aging will accelerate in Canada in the coming years," the agency said. -- SPA
