Society's Coming Tug of War

Two groups of Americans may be on a collision course -- parents of kids and elders.  By 2025 --if we don't change course -- the American body politic may be embroiled in a titanic, inter-generational struggle over scarce resources: money and talents for the geriatric care of elders and/or for the education of children.

The coming growth in the population of elders has been well publicized, but consider the numbers:

in the next decade, the population of Americans over sixty-five will balloon to 64mm from today's 38mm, an average annual growth of nearly 5%. The population of those over eighty will jump to 15mm from 9mm today, a growth of near 7% per year!  And as you know, the costs of caring for those elders grows exponentially faster.

What you may not appreciate is that at the same time, the population of children under 20 will keep on growing, to 94mm from 80mm, a steady growth year by year.

Where are these kids coming from? The Boomers had kids, who have given us an echo boom, and the echo boomers are now about to give us an echo's echo boom.  Plus the growing cadre of immigrants and recent arrivals to our shores have more kids per family than do we prior arrivals.

Now, what are the needs?  For we elders, as we edge over 75, there is going to be a major need for in-home services such as lawn care, home maintenance and repair, cleaning, shopping, transportation, meal preparation, medication management, and health care navigation. 

And then, for those who no longer can live at home: retirement home services, assisted living, skilled nursing and the most expensive care of all -- dementia care.  While we are learning how to keep the body healthy and alive longer, we haven't yet learned how to keep the brain healthy.

Those over 85 will be getting increasingly whifty.  (That's a word coined by Helen Holmquist, my mother-in-law, and I find it wonderfully useful. I dare say many of us know somebody who is getting whifty.)  Dementia care typically runs over $150 per day, or $56,000 per year, and if coupled with other needs, care can soar into the hundreds of thousands. 

I don't need to remind you that the bulk of these coming elders have not saved anywhere near enough to pay for all the services they will need in their extended years.

Now what of these youngsters? Needs?: schoolrooms, books, teachers, especially those skilled in dealing with English-as-Second Language kids.  Pre-school facilities and teachers.  Parenting and family planning counselors.  These kids are our country's future, and they must be educated. stimulated and developed into capable citizens or America is doomed to second-rate status.  And they ought not to be burdened with student debts!

Note again these growth rates: elders increasing at near 5% per year.  Education and geriatric care costs rising at 6 - 8% per year.  And our economy's growth?  Something like 3% per year.  We are not going to grow our way out of this bind.  At today's per pupil and per elder costs of education and elderly care, it just doesn't compute.

So, how are these needs to be met?  How do we avoid a destructive competition for scarce dollars between the elderly and the parents of the young?  Those two groups in 2025 will make up around 46% of US population, leaving just over half of citizens to work and pay the bills.

Sixty-four millions over 65 vs. about 44million parents of those 90mm kids.  Who's going to win that battle at the polls? School bond issues, teachers' salaries, class sizes; it's the education dollar that will be most in jepardy.

I am not going to get into liberals vs. conservatives, or progressives vs. libertarians.  For this is all of us -- everybody's' problem.  It is our community's problem -- governments, business, not-for-profit social organizations, charities, universities (especially teacher's colleges), foundations, families and individuals -- everyone's.

Starting now, we as a society must devote resources to development of new ways of delivering education and elderly services.  We need research, ingenuity, diligence, imagination and experimentation to find innovative ways to improve the productivity of our education dollar and of our geriatric services dollar.  We need to think outside the box and take risks.

We need the courage to toss out the current structures and processes of our delivery systems where they prove to be inadequate.  For if we fail, there will come an ugly, inter-generational tug of war that might well rend apart this American experiment of building a diverse, open and accessible society

of comity, and justice and opportunity. 

So think: what is each of our role in this? To the younger reader: are you saving enough?  Do you have long-term care insurance?  Are you setting aside funds for your kids education?  Are your parents prepared? 

For us old farts: are we willing to pay a larger share through taxes and donations?  Are we willing to lobby for reduced defense spending to free up discretionary dollars?  Are we willing to buck entrenched teacher and social worker unions?  Are we willing to lobby legislators to increase tuition support and more teacher training?  Are we willing to toss out mossy incumbents committed to defending the status quo and set aside ideologues and reward pragmatic problem solvers?

Are we willing to increase donations to social service organizations and churches and the like, and to make bequests from our estates? Are we willing to fund-raise for colleges and high schools and school foundations and elderly service organizations?  Are we willing to go on boards and help turn these Queen Marys of education and health care systems? 

In my case, I work as Trustee of a retirement community, and see these elderly needs met every day, and families stretch to do so.  Ann's and my care will probably be covered by savings and insurance; the uncertainty is that matter of whifty.  I have also been working on new models of elderly services, specifically a new Seattle village -- Wider Horizons. 

But of most importance are our kids: grand-kids Christopher and Ella will be coming out of school a decade from now; Parker, Max and Molly will be in high school; my great-granddaughter Natalie will be in middle school; and Peter and Corriell and Liza may well have kids in pre-school or entering elementary school. All of them benefit from middle and upper middle class family structures; there are other millions who do not have that support and commitment to education, and who need our attention even more.  The education needs of all -- upper, middle and lower class -- that must be uppermost.   

Help alert others to the bind that we must all work to avoid over the next decade -- for the sake of your children and grandchildren -- and mine.