Aging Population

There are two truths in life as they say: death and taxes. The latter is adjustable, the former well, let us discuss things that happen prior to that. Most of us would probably die of old age- of wear and tear and illness-, but the slow burning question is that what happens to the environment as we grow older and of course vice versa.

There are a few responses to aging- one is that of piety- the respect of older folks as the guiding light. 2) tradition- one of which rituals and rites are used to guide appropriate behaviour and dissent in the community. The last is of context- we are the product of times and therefore we must move with the times and not vice versa.

The capitalist system has produced a couple of responses to that of a aging population. Initial responses where that of pension schemes and retirement schemes- both voluntary and mandatory. This is ensure that the retired and older folks have a basic standard of living after they retire and also funds to meet various medical needs as they grow older. This has raised taxes, increased private and public cost and at the same time made economies somewhat uncompetitive- resulting from the senority based reward system.

Another system is that community based aging system. The community replaced the state as the caregiver- and the state would only provide indirect financial assistance. The onus is therefore on the community and family to provide care in the retirement. The reason for it's relative infancy is that of it's uninstitutionalized character within a bureaucratic capitalist system. The informal nature meant the sprawling administration is seen as being helpless and cruel in not directly servicing it's citizens- of which is implicitly understood as the basic provision of the state- in providing rights of it's citizens if one is unable to fulfil it's obligations due to extenuating circumstances- in a social contract.

The last response of which is even more rare is that total community aging response. There are no private property- and only community property. Therefore the community decides on it's needs of the various individuals as if they were equals. The lack of institutional character meant that it does not exist except that of in small communities such as kibbutzim.

Socialism and communism even with it's equality ideals and communal ideas often fall short in execution as it eventually relies on it's bureaucratic character to deliver social goods to it's citizens. The most recent response is that of communitarianism- of which society is the state and vice versa- and with it's rather Orwellian speak, it often come under the purview of another facade for authoritarianism.

Ultimately then, the various responses of which to approach generational divide is often 2 means 1) institutional care 2) community welfare. But in providing retirement facilities for the aged does not answer the question: Does doing this transfer the burden to the young and hence by extension, does the market rule in society or really the community rule society and therefore the economy- and as such how competitive are we then if our response then if it is tha latter and secondly are we no more than market players for the former.

This divide and clash between the "old" and the "new" is more divisive than most thought out to be. The latter believes that they arise out of a vacuum and am above the history, context and structure of prevailing norms and values. They want to be "stars" and assert their individualistic personna by setting themselves in direct opposite of it the public character- thinking that they were newer, better and stronger. But the question remains that they are nothing more than the other side of a same coin.

After all, how can we rebel or be different without somebody being the authority or being conventional in the first place. Some want to test the system and climb up the system by employing unconventional means- having the very idea that he merited the place by the very virtue of being newer, or better, or faster in the new system. But really, how can one be "better" without someone being "worse". Ultimately, most employ to this particular tactic thinking that they have succeeded in the market place- but they managed only to semantically switch places in their brains and nothing else. They are not better or "newer" or "faster"- they basically just flip the coin thats all. The market will eventually punish them for adding no value in it other than flipping the coin. Chameleon will always remains chameleons. No risk is taken in changing colours and therefore- they will always be eating insects and spiders.

Hence, the common refrain in that the new complained that the old refuse to budge and the market will always punished the slow, the weak and the out-of-date. But the fact remains is the methods employed often are uncreative, a poor derivative of the original, lacking in imagination and vision and a lack of risk and gumption; and seems to derived it's competitive edge by constantly shifting the semantic categories and employing sometimes quite anti-social and ethically questionable- even though not illegal- techniques in gaining an upper hand.

The old on the other hand- is the master of asserting it's authority and therefore often espoused the need for respect and tradition- similarly often employs moral suasion to make a point. They do not need to be "better", "faster" or "stronger", they just need to sit there- and most are quite happy to do so- to survive. They lack the ambition and drive- and understandably so, given their age- and are comfortable with the status quo, after all, it benefits them more than anything else anyway. I had a boss who told me this: the less you do, the less mistakes you make. That very often is their mantra. It is both the product of the convention and that of a bureaucratic capitalist system imposition on the labour market requirements on non-capital owners. They condemned themselves to their fate as much as they condemned other's to their similar fate.

Hence, affirmative action preferring either ends often distort the already distorted markets. Therefore the solution is not to prefer one over the other or to encourage market-based solution- as an "objective" "by-the-way" solution.

More then 50% of the young in Spain is jobless, in most countries there are more graduates than there are graduate jobs available- in Japan, Korea, U.S. The ultimate solution is jobs, jobs and more jobs. It is not good enough to argue about the semantics of changing market place- but really where to find the capital to create jobs, and keep the economy chugging along as well.

Given the above numbers, it is not the time to argue about semantics of market place- but nothing really matters until you can put the food on the table. The numbers are drastic, any positive change is positive change, and until you can outpace jobs with labour growth, it doesn't really matter how you do it. The above argument will not exist as such.