Old people with money and power should give others a chance at success: please, just retire!
In the past, transition of power in any industry has happened naturally: as one generation of youngsters enter the work force, another generation over 65 has gracefully exited into the sunset of Florida.
The transition of power and opportunities has not only been important, but poignantly necessary for industries to shake things up, for equality to progress forward, for conventional methodologies to revolutionize, and perhaps most importantly, for young people to have opportunities to do something amazing.
This natural transtion has all but died. People are not retiring at the age of 65, partially because they couldn’t afford to anymore. But even those who have obtained success and have savings stacked up despite this recession, they are not retiring either.
65 is hardly old anymore. We have CEOs, editors, senators and professors who are 70 and 80 years old and still working. I have no problem with people keeping their lives busy because a retirement of not doing anything can be cruel. But please – quit those posts you have been occupying for decades and do something else, give that young person a chance to shine the way you had your chance back then.
We now have youngsters who can’t find jobs not only because this recession sucks, but also because old people are choosing not to retire. They are not retiring because this new generation of “old people” think they will never die due to modern advances in medicine. They are ambitious workaholics who are also too selfish and egocentric to step aside and believe that a younger person could do just a good of a job, if not a better one. They are the first generation who have received so much: peace, propsperity, and technology.
And now: they don’t want to give it all up after squandering away our environment and screwing up our market. So next time when you can’t find a job, don’t blame the minority for filling some quota (that is extremely rarely the reason why you don’t get hired), just go ahead and blame the people at the top.
This is why I love Anna Quindlen. She is retiring from Newsweek. I first fell in love with her column the Last Word when I was 15 years old. She showed me a world of ideas and perspectives I didn’t know existed. Her writings on immigration are some of the most eloquently observant and intimately relevant I have ever read. For 9 years she has been at the forefront of discussion on subjects from oppression to fairness. She is a role model, an inspiration for young people and a woman I still aspire to become. But the time is right for her to leave, and she too agrees, because there are too many amazing journalists out there with too many stories to tell, and after 9 years, she’s had her time.
I urge others to follow her choice, because there are too many young people with too many dreams who are too hungry to take this world into a whole new era. And they cannot wait.
Boy youth is wasted on the young. You miss some critical points in proposing your shortsighted view. First and most serious issue for everyone under 50 (I am 42), is the little matter of Social Security and Medicare going bankrupt in about 10 years if the older generation follows your antiquated advices and retires at 65. This is a very real threat to your future earnings potential and if your suggestion is the course taken everyone will be working much more and receiving substantially less for their labor.
Now for the central assumption you put forth which is that the young offer new and better ideas for the future. This is pure bunk since outside the military, education and a few remaining unionized industries (ironically all of which have a set retirement age), the successful professionals who you so unceremoniously dismissed as selfish and just taking pay for contributing little have not only EARNED their position but apparently continue to create greater value than their potential replacements have reliably demonstrated since for the most part we have an at will labor market. Even your recession argument is laughable because statistics show that older, male labor have taken the brunt of the downsizing companies have done. Your argument might have some weight if not for the fact that companies are either having to outsource or import the professionals with the necessary skills that fulfill their labor needs. Maybe this economic downturn is exactly what the younger generation needs the slap in the face that you’re entitled to nothing. That you have to earn your success by developing the skills needed in the future to generate more value than their predecessor was able to create. Quit asking for things to be just handed to you.
You raised a valid point: social security is a burden to us all so old people should work over 65 because they are living longer lives. I agree with that, but even so, I would want to see these older and successful people pursue something else in their life that is perhaps different from what they have been doing all their lives.
We made sure no President of the United States could be elected for more than two terms, because it is bad when one person, no matter how talented, stay in office for too long. We need diversity of political ideology (and change), and this applies to the business arena too.
I don’t think I said young people are inherently better than the old. I gave the example of an “older” journalist Anna Quindlen and told you how much I admire her. But I do think too much of anything is not desirable. She has been a featured columnist at Newsweek for 9 years and despite how her talented she is (she is VERY talented), a huge fan like me agrees that it will be exciting to see someone else offering a different point of view. And I am confident that with so many interesting voices and passionate jouranlists out there, we’ll find someone equally interesting (but different).
And I’m not saying give the featured columnist seat to a 20-year-old. I say give it a mid-level journalist, someone perhaps like you, so that the 20-year-old can get promoted to actually writing something other than sending coffee, and so that someone fresh out of college can get a intern post somewhere sending coffee.
It is just frustrating when I see people who hog their posts for 20 years and don’t want to leave until another 10 more years and despite their years of experience, change is clealry a good idea. (i.e. GM).
hm… informative
Change can be good in certain situations but your assumption is that older, experienced workers are incapable or at the very least resistant to new ideas. Political power is a quite different beast but even going with your example was it beneficial for our country to have to go away from Clinton to Bush? My point is that in most real world scenarios, even your example of Ms. Quindlen, if someone is not evolving and contributing in new ways, a natural movement will occur much like when a television program will come to an end when it becomes stale. In my view, change for change’s sake is not always a good thing and can be harmful i.e. New Coke. I believe it’s our country’s tendency to expect new is better, instant gratification and change for change’s sake society that was a primary cause of the current economic crisis. The new generation’s time will come and remember just like with a fine wine or balsamic vinegar that it becomes much better with seasoning and age.
I think that people should be allowed to carry on working after 65 if they choose too, it does not mean that they are selfish in my book, some have to anyway due to money problems. Many older people have much to give to our society Knowledge and experience for one thing, I think we have become a very ageist society in recent years, I am now 62 and retired and loving it, I can now carry on with my interests etc which I never had time for when working full time in the past, I applied for a job in a well known supermarket when I was 40 and was told the ruling was that they weren’t taking on people over 40 at the time, I was so taken back I said to the manager are you past your sell by date once you reach 40 it’s laughable. In recent years many DIY stores have employees over 65 some as old as 75 in my local stores. Look at how many older people have learn’t to master computers and found jobs in offices etc and now dubbed silver surfers. Good luck to the over 65’s that’s what I say.