The future is intergenerational, say experts at major conference

Intergenerational conflict is a myth, concluded experts at the Revolutionise Conference in Boston, late April, and it’s generations working together that bring prosperity. They had come together from a range of disciplines to share the progress they had made in creating more age-friendly communities, homes, healthcare, and other critical infrastructure. “This isn’t about older adults”, said the President of an educational retirement community housed at Lasell University, in Massachusetts, “It’s about everybody.”

The Conference was organised by the Age-Friendly Institute in Waltham, Massachusetts, and the Ageing 2.0 organisation, a global network of over 40,000 innovators across 31 countries.

Chris Farrell is senior economics contributor at Marketplace, American Public Media's nationally syndicated public radio business and economic programs. He moderated a discussion involving the economics of generational conflict – isn’t the older generation hoarding wealth and absorbing too much government spending, leaving little behind for younger generations? He said that the stoking of generational resentment is practically a cottage industry.

“I get variations of the generational conflict assumption all the time. The stoking of generational resentment is practically a cottage industry. Business consultants and ideological driven think tanks seem enamoured with the theme generational warfare lurks everywhere from the policy arena to the workplace.

“Yet the idea that the relationship between older and younger generations is a zero-sum economic gain is wrong – very wrong. The far more powerful story is one of generational interindependence and the advantages that come from nurturing common bonds and mutual opportunities.”Click here for more

An example of ‘generational interdependence’ is the financial help grandparents give their children and grandchildren. The ‘Bank of Grandparents’ knows the pressure of a tightened economy on the young and is usually happy to help as often as they can, sometimes with quite large sums to help towards the deposit to buy a house. Without grandparents providing childcare many parents would not be able to hold down a job. Conversely, grandparents are blessed with the support of their families in practical and psychological ways, especially as they grow older. The interworking of family generations is an example of what God planned for society, at large.

An example of ‘the cottage industry’ in the UK was the assertion by the Intergenerational Foundation (IF) that as one in four pensioners in Britain is now a millionaire the government should abandon the rise in the state pension next April, which would see it rise from £185 .15 per week to £203 .70. The IF quoted analysis by the ONS showing that more than 3 million people over the age of 65 were living in households with property and pensions wealth worth more than £1m. The assets included the value of older persons’ homes.

Responses to the article online were swift and illuminating. One pointed out that pensions are not a free gift. “Everyone has spent a working lifetime paying for their state pension.”

A respondent pointed out that it is often difficult to downsize and release monies from a home because alternatives are not always available in their area.

“This is misleading,” said another. “Their assets have to support them for the rest of their lives with little or no scope to make good any losses suffered due to adverse economic conditions such as inflation, which will hit pensioners very hard. A good chunk of that ‘wealth’ will be tied up in their homes. They will be hit with care home costs, increased healthcare costs and exorbitant age-related insurance premiums. On top of that many are still helping their families with childcare, education etc.”

Baroness Altmann, a former pensions minister pointed out that the UK state pension is the lowest in the developed world, adding that "To say that pensioners don’t need to be protected from rising prices is misguided at best."

The real problem, experts at the Boston conference decided, was increasing income inequality, “considering the massive upward redistribution in wealth and income over the last several decades.”

A study published by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in 2020, based on data from six countries over 15 years found that ‘the benefit of age diversity is that it enables workers of different ages to collaborate, share knowledge and support each other in complementary ways. Age diversity has the potential to make a firm’s productivity greater than what the sum of its workers’ individual productivities would suggest. Such complementarities tend to be particularly strong between young and older workers.’

These ‘complementarities’ are found whenever there are good connections between older and younger people in all contexts – in churches, in institutions and in communities. Wealth is generated throughout the generations and the idea that older people are hoarding more than their share is incredibly naïve. The experts at the Revolutionize conference are right in saying that ‘the far more powerful story is one of generational interdependence and the advantages that come from nurturing common bonds and mutual opportunities.’ In all circumstances, we need the strength and enthusiasm of the young and the experience and wisdom of the older. Proverbs 20:29.