The economic lifecycle to a large extent reflects population age structure. Essentially, countries are trading a youth deficit for an old- age deficit of similar size over the course of the demographic transition. The Philippines, for example, has a very young population and a very large deficit at young ages. In Japan, which has an older population, the deficit is much larger at older ages compared with the youth deficit; the old-age deficit will grow substantially unless consumption and labor income patterns change radically.