ADAPTIVE REUSE: Live longer and prosper.

“Live long and prosper” once sounded like the most logical of greetings: good wishes everyone could agree on. But now that people are actually experiencing significantly longer lives ... attitudes have changed. Longevity has come to portend “an aging society” and the very opposite of prosperity.

The fears are far more profound than mere fiscal concerns about Social Security and Medicare. Illustrating a common reaction, Los Angeles Times columnist Gregory Rodriguez warns of ... “a less optimistic and forward-thinking culture.” Looking at Japan’s “exhausted” and “depressed” but otherwise healthy elderly, he fears “an epidemic of loneliness and ennui.” His conclusion: “Be careful what you wish for. You could make it to 100, with consequences as onerous as the ones you ate right and exercised to avoid.”

Buried in this column is a crucial assumption: that people over 65 will be retired. They’ll withdraw from active engagement with younger colleagues, from productive problem-solving, from the world outside their seniors-only enclaves. They’ll spend 20 or 30 years playing golf, watching TV, and chasing people off their lawns. They’ll occasionally visit the grandkids, but mostly they’ll wait to die.

Postrel argues, correctly I think, that that needn't be the case. But her argument in favor of 'adaptive reuse' fails in the implicit assumption that people nearing retirement age want to repurpose their lives and are wealthy enough to indulge is quasi-amateur/volunteer work.

There is a strong societal imperative to gently -- and sometimes not so gently -- ease the productive older workers out of the workforce and into a reluctant retirement. Thus the 'adaptive reuse' strategy should be applied to society, not the individual, in such a way that the older worker can ease him/herself into retirement -- or not -- as he/she sees fit.

Unfortunately, the current societal imperative is this:

Other than the unborn, no single age group in the United States suffers from a diminished view of the value of human life more than the elderly. Rather than viewing our aging relatives as persons worthy of our utmost reverence and care, [the Roe v. Wade ethic] has taught us to look at other people in terms perceived convenience. If someone is wanted – if we feel that they contribute to our overall quality of life – then their life has worth; if not, it is permissible to store them away somewhere for others to care for until they die.

Connor's view is dark and gloomy; much more so than is warranted. And yet ... and yet. Look around at the Senior centers, the retirement communities, the nursing homes -- what is their purpose other than to entertain and otherwise distract the nonproductive until they have the courtesy to die?