Such
simplified assumption implies that the underlying growth in per capita spending would
have to accelerate considerably in the Recently Acceded Member States. Still, since the
current gap in per capita spending is significant mainly for the older age cohorts (see
Graph 7), the rate of increase would vary considerably across the age groups and the
extra spending would concentrate just in the older cohorts. Indeed, if the convergence of
EU15 and EU12 age profiles was to be achieved by 2060, per capita spending would