The Bright Side of Aging: Reframing the Debate
Year: 2010
Type: preprint
Abstract: During the past century, people in the developed world have gained about thirty years of life expectancy. Moreover, most people can also look forward living these additional decades of life in relative wealth, health and independence. The debates on aging during the last four decades have largely ignored those positive facts. Instead, policy debates are colored by inaccurate claims about the devastating effects of aging on public outlays on pensions and health care. We believe there is ample reason to celebrate aging as a major accomplishment. In North America and Europe, the population lives longer, is better educated, wealthier and healthier than any previous generation. Older people themselves are a major source of informal care and they continue to support their children in multiple ways. Opponents of social insurance have with the brief and ironic exception of health care reform debate in 2009 and 2010 - depicted older people as “greedy geezers,” who, after having spent the inheritance of their children, become a drain on the public purse. This image has become dominant in the current debate. In this paper, we documented some of the efforts to reframe the image of older people and inaccurate and ideology-driven claims about the consequences of population aging. We argue policy should be based on more realistic projections of the costs of aging and potential courses of action. Population aging is likely to result in higher public spending in some categories and while there is no “right” level of public expenditure, there is reason to look critically at all public spending, particularly in categories that are expanding rapidly. Still, the projected increases in spending attributed to aging are too small to be labeled “unaffordable” and will occur over such a long period of time that there is still ample time to adjust policy.
Source: SSRN Electronic Journal
Authors: Michael K. Gusmano, Kieke G. H. Okma
Institution: Hastings Center
Language: English
Subfield: General Health Professions
Field: Health Professions
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1482837307