The Age of the Aged: When Experience Will Really Count

[Thom Little]

In the year 2030 I will be 67. I will be one of Them. I will be old. But at least I will be able to hold my head high, because by then I will be a card-carrying member of the "Mature Majority." Demographers, our modern-day oracles, predict that 25 years from now, there will be more people over 50 than under 18 for the first time in U.S. history. And in numbers there is strength -- perhaps enough strength (despite our presumed feebleness) to revolutionize the look and feel of America. One thing is for sure: We're coming to a neighborhood near you.

The baby boomers are moving through the demographic pipeline like a 12-pound baby squeezing through the birth canal. We are stretching the parameters of society, and by 2030 we will have redefined the workforce, the political discourse, the distribution of public funding and the propriety of seeing your grandmother in a bikini. We aren't going to quietly disappear into retirement communities where we can master lawn bowling. We are more intent on staying wired than retired, and the bridge we'll build across the generation gap will be firmer than any our parents ever cared or dared to construct. In essence, we believe old is a state of mind, and we plan to be on the cutting edge until we drop.

One of my favorite gerontological acronyms is NORC, which stands for Naturally Occurring Retirement Community. This is what happens when residents of an apartment building choose to "age in place," so they become fossilized with the same crotchety co-op board they've long despised. NORCs are leading to the Floridization of cities and suburbs throughout the nation, a trend that is helping to dissipate the age wave so it doesn't become a tsunami that swamps only Fort Lauderdale.

The Mature Majority will stay current with the culture, and possibly even dictate that culture in the coming decades. Surely by 2030 advertisers will finally catch on that people over 60 have the bulk of disposable income in America. Unlike today, oldsters will figure prominently in fashion spreads, TV ads and billboards for everything from blue jeans to sports cars. We will appear in lead roles on television, rather than as comical sidekicks, and we will finally be allowed to have passionate sex on the big screen (Imax, if we have our way).



http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/30/AR2005123001576.html

[Jim Sagle]

1. Yechhhhhhh!!!!!!!

[MercutioATC]

2. Since when is today's 40-year-old a "baby boomer"?

I'll be 61 in 2030 and I'm sure as hell not a baby boomer.

[Hello_Kitty]

5. I think he counts as a Boomer

Having been born in 1963. You were born in '69 so you escaped it. We're early Gen X or a non-designated generation, depending on whom you believe.

[MercutioATC]

7. You're right...I didn't realize the official years were 1946-1964.

I thought the baby-boom generation ended in the late 50's.

I was born in '67. Apparently, I didn't miss it by that much.

[asthmaticeog]

3. First, we poison the Geritol...

[bemildred]

4. No offense, but ...

Anybody that claims to know what is going to be going on in 2030 is full of it.
We got much bigger issues than baby boomers.
Even 2010 is up in the air.

[shraby]

6. You can tell it wasn't written by someone

whose body is that old. There is a huge difference in the body of a 40 year old and a 65 year old. Take it from one who knows.