Is Mayor Pete Buttigieg Ageist?
By Michael Hodin
In the Democratic presidential campaign, Mayor Pete Buttigieg has introduced the idea that the aging of our society requires new thinking on long-term care. But Mayor Pete, and most of the rest of us, misses a transformational idea: the wants, desires, and needs of older Americans are both diverse and profoundly different from assumptions rooted in the 20th century. In other words, unlike other groups of society, it still ok to apply the ageism lens to those of us over 60, effectively designing policy based on caricatures of old.
The centerpiece for Buttigieg’s long-term care plan is to “promote dignity and security in retirement” through additional regular payments to older Americans, along with a payroll tax on the wealthiest Americans to “protect Social Security forever.” This sounds like motherhood and apple pie, but, paradoxically, it misunderstands what today’s over 60s are actually saying — 72% of Americans in and around 20th century retirement age norms want to keep working, at least in some form and in some ways. They’re also the largest and most successful of start-up entrepreneurs.
Buttigieg’s wish is also completely out of touch with today’s age-economic realities. Just ask those who understand how this is playing out in Chile and France, where dissatisfied voters have taken to the barricades. As the lead editorial in Saturday, December 7 Financial Times cautions: “Strikers and protesters in Chile and France, as well as academics in the UK, are enraged that the promises made to them about how much money they would receive in old age that their parents enjoyed… are being withdrawn…This is a global phenomenon…the unsustainability of their pension systems as people live longer and the number of retired workers grow [out of proportion to those working]…a cultural shift is needed — one that reimagines what retirement really means.”
Buttigieg, like Macron or the Chilean leaders, is operating under 20th-century standards of who and when one is to be retired and gone from the workplace. Yet if you actually ask many of today’s 60 or 70-year old in America what they want, the answer is: a job. Of course, this job might look different than the one they had in their 20s or 30 — but it’s also not the retirement our parents had in their 60s, 70s, or 80s.
Naturally, it follows that any plan for long-term care or Social Security needs to be updated — reimagined, as the FT cautions — if it’s even applicable at all, for today’s long lives. It must also account for an accompanying economic framework that is, itself, fiscally challenged if such a large share of the population stops working at age 60 or 65 — an unsustainable concept for the labor force, the economy, and public finances.
Buttigieg’s plan breaks down in several key points where it relies on outdated assumptions that lead to unsustainable proposals:
· Takes an old-fashioned view of retirement. Mayor Pete’s plan begins by asserting that “with aging can come deep satisfaction and joy — the chance to slow down, or travel, or play with a new grandchild.” While this is certainly true, aging also — and perhaps more importantly — offers a chance to start a business, become a teacher or consultant, or start volunteering. People shouldn’t have to drop out of the workforce and turn to golf or bingo just because they turn 60 — and they don’t want to. Instead, millions of Americans over 60 are eager to stay economically, socially, and mentally engaged by working far beyond traditional retirement age, seizing the full potential of the 30 years of longer lives the 20th century miracle bequeathed.
· Focuses too narrowly on Social Security. Buttigieg’s plan promises to “fully protect Social Security for the next generation.” However, there are fundamental questions about how to do this effectively and fairly in a world where there are more old than young. Pete, you might ask President Macron, who can’t protect his pension plan, and, in trying, is finding uprising and protest. Instead, look to strategies to boost retirement saving, enable longer careers, and reduce health and care costs through work as a form of active aging. This should be the focus of a modern approach to financial wellness in an era of longevity — not preserving a Depression-era federal program at all costs, a program that is nearly 100 years old itself and whose idea dates to Bismarck’s Germany of the 1880s.
· What Pete gets right: home care. Buttigieg’s proposal does contain innovative thinking on a key point: it promises to “expand access to long-term care at home and in communities.” As Mayor Pete correctly notes, most older Americans want to age at home, which is far cheaper and healthier, it tuns out, than institutional care. Enabling and scaling this model of care, including through new applications of AI-enabled and remote care will be essential to improving health outcomes and reducing costs in the coming decades. But, we hope here that Mayor Pete, or whomever sits at 1600 at the beginning of our third decade in this century, will appreciate the need to support private sector approaches for innovation, best home care, and scalability. So, Mayor, on your trips to Iowa the next two months, stop by neighboring Omaha, Nebraska, where sits the global operations of the most successful private sector elder home care company on the planet, Home Instead Senior Care. You’d do well to talk to their Founder and Chairman, Pula Hogan, and current CEO, Jeff Huber, and then bring their ideas to your campaign.
In most of its points, Buttigieg’s plan is little more than a nod to the health and long term-care trajectory of a bygone era. These assumptions are becoming increasingly outdated and unworkable in the context of today’s age demographics.
Its promises sure sound good, but how can a plan work if doesn’t acknowledge the basic differences between the third decade of the 21st century and the middle of the 20th century, when these American programs were created? Or even 50 years before when the idea first emerged from Germany.
So, Mayor Pete, or, for that matter, the rest of you looking to occupy the White House, how about tearing up that old, tired, and outdated playbook for a 21st century version? One that considers what a 73-year old might want and not what patronizing politicians imagine: a tax break for her start-up as much as a pretense to old age benefits that the economics of 21st century aging will be unlikely to deliver.
