Elderly

I'm most grateful for the opportunity of answering this question.

Since I began as a Google Answers Researcher, I've always wished to

work on a question that, like this one, dealt with a significant

issue, involving not just searching abilities, but also challenging in

a sensible and intellectual meaning. I hope to have been at its level.

First point: the word "elder". I've chosen to leave aside any

consideration about connotations of the word in the present culture--it

seems appropriate enough to differentiate the group of people over 85

from the other "seniors" within the frame of the present research.

However, when addressing to them, other options such as those

suggested by Hummer-ga might be a better choice.

Since you've introduced this question as the third of a suite I began

by carefully reading my fellow researchers previous works, and taking

them as inputs for further development.

Before getting to the point, I ask you please forgive some apparent

digressions that I considered necessary for a better understanding of

the suggestions regarding government's role in improving elders'

quality of life.

After the excellent job done by Hummer-ga and my own research, I've

divided the subject in these two main aspects to focus in:

1-Cultural preconceptions; capability of choice and decision.

2- Physical, psychological and economic vulnerability; dependence on

the younger people and institutions.

Next, I'll develop each item in two parts: first a description and

then a series of suggestions, some of which may already be part of

programs being held by different governments.

1-Cultural preconceptions.

Description:

The mythical wish of eternal youth is as old as human's conscience of

aging and death, but in our present times this desire seems empowered

by medical technology and social expectations. While the strength,

capacity and health of the young body has always been appreciated,

seniors have been traditionally considered holders of knowledge,

experience and wisdom, and there place and role in the communities was

an important and cherished one. As an example, lets remember that the

words "senior" and "senator" have the same Latin root: "senex", that

means "old person". In the early Roman political system -as well as in

Athena's- the group of governmental high decision makers was

integrated by the old ones. In ancient societies -as well as in

surviving non "modern" ones- the age itself was an attribute to be

respected.

What happened in the way? The current overestimation of youth and its

concomitant underestimation of the older people is a process that

slowly began in the Renaissance, along with the decay of the medieval

guilds--while invention and incipient industrialization was turning

obsolete the ancestral methods of production. The eighteenth century's

philosophical movement known as The Enlightenment--that questioned the

traditional religious vision of the world to the prevail of

Reason--enhanced that change, and it started to take speed in the

latter nineteenth century, as the Second Industrial Revolution took

place. The traditional respect for senior's wisdom corresponds to an

era when the knowledge that the young needed was the same that the old

had gained more experience in. But as technology innovation begun to

be