Are there significant western governance failures in designing, gaining acceptance, and implementing changes to the social contract? Would this lead to measurable (peer reviewed) social instability? A global estimate of 60 year olds has risen from 200 million in 1950, to 760 million in 2009, and is projected to hit 2 billion people by 2050. Youth unemployment & underemployment - if nothing else - detracts from the ability to care for the 60+ demographic by reducing the amount of time to gain & hone skills and fund, via taxation, a portion of the costs the 60+ cohort has not saved for (or subjected to pension shortfalls). It would seem to follow that taxation rates would need to at least meet a transparent cost breakout of items of social value that a democratic society has agreed to fund (rule of law, education, infrastructure, vulnerable demographic cohorts, security, etc). Are there examples of western governance directly engaging the population at large in a substantive discussion regarding these topics? Switzerland perhaps?

WEF Global Risks Report, 2012, http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Glo...eport_2012.pdf

Restoring Fiscal Equilibrium in the United States, by William R. Cline, Peterson Institute for International Economics, June 2012, http://www.petersoninstitute.org/pub...esearchID=2144

How the [US] Tax Burden Has Changed [1980-2010], NYT Graphic, 29 Nov 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2...ax-burden.html