I think so, as every childless family has more disposable income, and gets used to spending it. I agree that it's a continuous transition, but I think that's how continuous transitions work. Not that I'm not suggesting that childless families are spending lavishly - other expenses such as housing may also adjust to the ability to spend.
As to your second point, shifting the tax load from retirement contribution to jobless benefits doesn't really make sense, as you say, unless the jobs are there. But the accepted wisdom seems to be that increasing the retirement age is necessary, while increasing taxes of any kind is bad. To oppose this means going against two pieces of accepted wisdom, which will be quite difficult, though hopefully not impossible.
That's not exactly what I said. What I said was that if the jobs aren't there, increasing retirement age will, in effect, only shift the tax load from retirement contribution to jobless benefits (because more people are forced to stay in the labor force, thus more people can't find jobs). *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
