本文旨在分析台灣三種依賴比之長期趨勢，以便探討三者之關係及其經濟涵義。本文發現台灣之人口老化速度遠快於美國人口之老化。在可見的未來，台灣將從年輕依賴人口多但老年依賴人口少的情況加速轉型為年輕依賴人口少，但老年依賴人口多之情況。 本文也發現在過去二十年中，勞動參與率調整後之依賴比與家庭消費調整後之依賴比，二者並無顯著差異。二者大致約為粗人口依賴比之三倍。勞動參與率調整後之依賴比與粗人口依賴比之穩定關係是台灣所獨有的，或是二者之間存有一系統性函數關係則有待進一步之研究。最後，台灣人口組成與家庭消費之變化情形顯示過去二十年裡'台灣之家庭負擔逐漸減輕，起因是高消費人口群減少，但低消費人口增加。
This paper analyzes the trends of three dependency measures in Taiwan to observe their relationships and to contemplate their economic implications. The findings indicate that Taiwan's population is aging much faster than that of the United States, and that the shift from more young and less elderly to less young and more elderly dependents will accelerate in the near future. It was also found that there have been no significant differences between the labor-force-participation adjusted dependency ratio (LADDR) and the expenditure adjusted dependency ratios (LEADDR) in Taiwan in the past two decades. These ratios were found to be about three times as large as the crude demographic dependency ratios (CDDR). Whether the consistent and stable relationship in Taiwan between LADDR and CDDR is due to Taiwan's specific conditions or whether there is a systematic functional relationship between the two measures is an issue that needs further study. Finally, the changes in population composition and expenditure indicate that Taiwan's family burden during the past two decades has been gradually eased because the high consumption group has decreased in size while the low consumption group has increased in size.
