averilburystedmunds: National Service for Retirees

Teaching respect for Nature

An interesting article by Rachel Cunliffe in last week’s New Statesman caught my attention with its sub-title, ‘Could national service for retirees be the answer to generational inequality?’ I thought that this approach to considering ageing was a refreshing change from the everlasting, ‘What can we do to help the aged?’

There has indeed been a steady increase in life expectancy in recent decades. In 1999, around one in six people in the UK were 65 years and over, [15.8%] and this had increased to around one in five people by 2019, [18.5%]. The Office for National Statistics has projected that could rise to one in four people in the UK [23%] by 2039. However, there has not been a corresponding increase in healthy life expectancy at birth. The Darzi report [the Independent Investigation of the NHS in England] suggested that our ageing population is the most significant driver of increased healthcare needs while this is compounded by a reduction in public funding for social care despite demand. SO, with the over 65s consuming more of the civic healthcare cake, as it were, perhaps it is past time to discuss payback!

How to fish.

This background information while offering much scope for research on improving healthy life expectancy, does not detract from the fact that there are millions of retirees in the UK who are healthy enough and [from my own observations] enthusiastic enough to give more to civic society. At the same time, there is widespread generational inequality as the younger generation endures eye-watering levels of rents, rising living costs and a steadily climbing higher education economic outlay. Parental wealth is often tied to home ownership, and this provides a significant advantage for young people from wealthier backgrounds and, to an extent, limits the upward mobility of the less fortunate. The fact that ‘twas ever thus’ does not detract from the serious extent of both inter-generational wealth inequality and Government policy which ‘gives’ generously to the over 65s [the famous triple-lock] partly funded, at least, by younger taxpayers. The public sector debt which seems to increase inexorably, will be tackled /endured/inherited by the younger generation! Meanwhile, it is incredibly difficult for the Government to reform benefits for the elderly, say like the triple-lock; witness the uproar over its attempts to reform the winter fuel allowance!

Teaching calligraphy.

And so, to the idea of a National Service for the over 65s. Apparently this has been already advocated in Germany by Marcel Fratzscher of the DIW [the German Institute for Economic Research] who advocates first a non-intergenerational gesture with the emphasis on less re-distribution from young to old, and more on re-distribution from rich to poor within the baby boomer generation. And an even more eye-catching idea is his proposal for a year of mandatory social service for all new elderly retirees. He points to the worker shortage in Germany and other European countries including the U.K. in sectors particularly important to/for the elderly. Here the gaps in personnel could be filled by elderly volunteers; after all, it is older people who are at least partly responsible for these manpower shortages now, by having reduced family size in earlier times. He suggests that this idea promotes solidarity between the generations because economic and demographic trends have advantaged the so-called ‘baby boomers’ while the prospects of the present younger generation have dramatically diverged from those who enjoyed earlier civic and social advantages.

How to ride a bike.

Looking around, one can see grandparents stepping in when needed; baby-sitting; looking after schoolchildren in the hours before parents finish work; funding school trips; providing holidays and covering for parents when needed, in parts of the main school holidays. But these are not mandatory, and we are not all grandparents! A compulsory first year of retirement when people are usually fit enough in their mid-sixties, could soon settle into part of the accepted pattern of life and does seem attractive. One can see a whole little industry developing here, with official volunteer lists of sufficiently qualified and willing gardeners; decorators; admin assistants in clinics and hospitals; school readers [translated as volunteers timetabled to go into schools to hear children read or improve their reading]; sports assistants; scientists; the list could go on. This is an idea to improve and assist civic cohesion with the responsibility to tackle demographic challenges on the whole range of society rather than on the younger generation who have inherited the problem. It also goes without saying, that a job done well, for which a person has volunteered, does give a warm glow of satisfaction to the do-gooder!