Wrinklies Rise Up

Aka
I believe that fulfilling work plays a large part of an individual's mental and physical well-being. Being able to provide for yourself and your family is an important aspect of self-esteem. Society has a duty to equip its young people with the skills and learning necessary to achieve this aim, and bring about the economic conditions which will allow jobs to be created.
Of course it is not one-sided - the individual has to take advantage of what is offered.
But large numbers of our young people are being denied that opportunity - whether they are NEETS for whom the education system has failed, or university graduates who have been persuaded that a university degree will be the passport to a career, only to find themselves in debt and with no job in sight.
If recognising that this generation has it a lot tougher than ours did, is ageist, then I make no apology for that.
Did you not consider JSP's article in any way ageist?

|I wish I could remember how to do a link to a newspaper article but I can't.

So, seems there is a report out saying that people who are in their 40s and 50s today will be compelled to work past 70 due to a) the present economic uncertainty making it difficult to save towards a pension b) problems getting on the property ladder and c) an ageing population, by which I assume they mean that by the time 40 year olds get to retirement there will be a lot of 90 year olds around who need looking after one way or another.

Ouch!

Where are these seventy year olds going to find the energy? Maybe employers will start providing facilities for an afternoon nap!

Yes, of course the article was over the top but that is necessary these days to make your point. A nice sensible dignified article wouldn't get published.

I agree with aka about a meritocracy. I helped a 16 year old and his 18 year old brother with their CVs and job applications a year ago and they both got really good apprenticeships which are going very well. They had no trouble getting them because they had done things with their lives. Both were in scouting, both had windsurfed at a national level and both had little jobs while they were at school. In addition neither of them thought the world owed them anything!

Yes, I know they are young people who can't get jobs despite all the above but I think they are in the minority.why should someone of 65 be put on the scrap heap just because of their age? Why should a young person be given a job just because of their age?

I am a baby boomer and don't think I have had it easy.

I didn't get NI contributions for the time I stayed home to look after my children.

No one paid me for maternity leave.
There were no nurseries to look after my children if I did want to go back to work.

We had to save with a building society for 3 years before they would consider us for a mortgage.

There was no Ikea to buy cheap furniture, we had to accept whatever we could get.

We had no central heating, no carpets.

If we ate out it was only for a special occassion, these days it seems to be because they can't be bothered to cook.

I took on the job of a man who had made a real mess of it and I was paid half as much because I was female.

No, I don't begrudge any of the above, I think they are all great and I am sure there are many more. I just get a bit fed up with all this grannybashing! We didn't have it that easy.

I agree that Wrinklies is not a nice word. I think maybe she was trying to be 'funny'?

I agree with Movedalot

And I'm happy to be a Wrinkly. I much prefer it to Senior Citizen. I'm proud of my wrinklies - I worked hard for them! Call a spade a spade I say (can one say that now?)

My face has grown older and shows it, and defining, collectively, the old as wrinklies just grates. I'm neither proud or otherwise of my lines - they are just there. It happens.

Grouchy this morning. [grouchy emoticon]

As someone who was of the generation before the baby boomers Butty not everyone was fortunate.My mother and father had a very hard time during the 30s and were killed during the war.I worked from 1946 with 10yrs in the forces until 1995 and in that time paid all my taxes and insurances and I object to people who have never got their hands dirty in their lives telling me that i'm a drain on the country.I now live in spain so even now I don't cost the taxpayers anything.Anything I get I paid for in blood and sweat!!!!!!

It's a bit of a rant. To be honest I do not feel hard-done-by at all, although I think that we sometimes need to remind people of our valuable contributions in voluntary work and caring for younger and older members of the family.

I have been watching 24 hours in A&E and have been so impressed by the way the elderly patients are treated with such respect and every medical help is afforded to them regardless of their age.

At my writers' group we try to do something different all the time. I've done sonnets, Pam Ayres' type stuff, short stories, murder stories, a love story, a play.....this is my attempt at slam poetry - it is supposed to be performed with gestures and such. Anyway, it was inspired by this thread.

Beware the Baby Boomers

Don’t call us elderly
Don’t call us old
Don’t think for a minute we’re sweet.
We’re still the same people
Still feisty and bold
Who rocked to the Merseyside beat.

Don’t think for a minute
We’re shocked at your deeds
Or your radical ways are so new.
We might have looked sweet
In our sandals and beads
But our ways turned the atmosphere blue.

Our parents were sure
We’d be so pure and good
As we started to grow up and date
But we smashed all the barriers
Fought and withstood
While our ways won the freedom debate.

But new generations
Have no damn idea
That their absolute right to be free
Did not come from God
And did not just appear
It was fought for by people like me.

And that spirit remains
Though we might appear strange
And you find there’s no easy connection.
But the grey power we hold
Has the power to change
The results of the next big election!

Brilliant!

Love it, Joan! Thanks.

Sweet old dears can kick ass!

Joan...that is excellent, good for you!

joan, yay!

A couple of years ago my local upmarket supermarket started to advertise the smaller trolleys as suitable for use by OAPs. I objected in store to that and it was quickly removed. All age groups were using it, especially if a small amount was being bought and the items were maybe too heavy for placing in a basket.

Jane I can't imagine that there are many 60-plus who are working for the fun of it - mostly people work because they have to.

I objected when my local London council advertised

'Chair-based exercises for the Over 50s' !!

As soon as I reached 50, I began receiving catalogues selling big knickers and frumpy clothes, and adverts for funeral cover. People began calling me 'dear'. I am 63 and most of my friends are around the same age. Most of my crowd look more like Joanna Lumley than Mrs Merton. I am a lot fitter than a lot of young people I know. I saw someone I hadn't seen for a long time recently who is a couple of years younger than me and she said 'don't we get a lot of aches and pains at our age'. Well, no actually I don't.

Rock onJoan

Love it, joan - we should have a thumbs up emoticon.

Riverwalk I accept that there must be many over 60s who work for financial reasons - after all, nearly half of people over 60 are below State Pension age.
But JSP presented over 60s working as a lifestyle choice, rather than a necessity.
I don't think that older people shouldn't work, if that's what they want or need to do.
But I feel more strongly that all young people deserve an opportunity to work, which is denied to many of them for a variety of reasons.
I found JSP's comment that the young should sod off, at the same time as calling for greater recognition for older people, crass and insensitive.

Meant half of people in their sixties.

I think most people, whatever age, work for the money and if they could live as well without it would probably do so! I did say 'most'

I'm 68. I still work. I don't need to but I enjoy it.
(Even when I'm sworn at as I was yesterday)