Ageism's ties to economic survival, and why that may bode well for us in the Super Age

Ageism is nothing new.

It is one of our oldest biases and may be intimately tied to the earliest days of our species, which dates back approximately 300,000 years. Our relationship with "the olds" tends to ebb and flow throughout the millennia, yet it appears to be intrinsically linked our economic survival. That could be very good news for future populations living in the Super Age - the first time in history where people over 65 will outnumber those under 18.

Understanding ageism

Our current definition of ageism, which is understood primarily as the bias against older people based on their age, despite the fact that also impacts the young, was first coined by Dr. Robert Butler, who was the first director of the National Institute on Aging (NIA) . Dr. Butler often connected ageism to disability, race, and income. In fact, his first recorded utterance of the term came in a The Washington Post article about a low-income housing project for Black seniors, many of whom were disabled, that was proposed for an middle-age upper-class white neighborhood of Washington, D.C. It was one of the earliest explorations of intersectionality.

Since then, a number of academics, politicians, non-profit leaders, and self-proclaimed activists have poked and prodded at the term in order to give it greater shape, scope, substance, and meaning. However, in many cases, its been watered-down, white-washed, or overused to such a point that it has lost its 'oomph.'

Regardless, consensus around the foundations of the bias have fallen into three theories or ideological camps:

• Terror management theory, where human beings manage deeply-rooted fears about their vulnerability to death through symbolic constructions of meaning and corresponding standards of value
• Social identity theory, where individuals assume expected progressions from midlife to older life based on social factors; and
• Stereotype content model, where we judge people on two main dimensions: warmth, which includes trustworthiness and friendliness; and competence, which includes capability and assertiveness. These judgments drive our behavior toward others, including the old.

The one area that everyone seems to avoid, perhaps because it's uncomfortable, is ageism's connection to economic survival and the social contract.

The one area that everyone seems to avoid, perhaps because it's uncomfortable, is ageism's connection to economic survival and the social contract. Survival is the one condition upon which all other conditions depend and without which no other conditions can exist. Therefore,?it is primary and drives everything we do, including our bias.

A short history

Throughout our time on this planet, an individual's worth has almost always been tied to their ability to work or produce offspring. There are very few exceptions to this rule, and this foundational belief likely governed our species' attitudes towards the young and the old from the hunter-gather period until today. If individuals survived into old age, they likely worked up until they could no longer.

Some individuals in pre-industrial societies moved away from prime working year roles to traditional ones that we associate with grand parenting and caregiving today. Some communities and countries relied on elders and their expertise to operate . Some institutions, like U.S. Senate for example, is modeled after the Roman one, and is still mostly filled with older men.

It wasn't until the Second Industrial Revolution and the creation of the "old-age pension" that the State defined the utility of a person person based on their chronological age at or around 65. Germany led this effort and the developed economies followed. There's been some debate about the rationale for the pension, but the commonly-held belief is that it was altruistic and designed to combat later-life poverty, which was on the rise thanks to industrialization.

During the 20th Century, when ageism as we know it really took hold, a glut of babies were born and survived into adulthood, which was a first. The global population swelled and led to an overabundance of workers. Boomers, as well as Gen X and millennials, unwittingly drove down the cost of labor and drove the trend to push older workers into retirement or redundancy. People over 65, who used to work until they couldn't, were no longer needed.

The post-65s quickly became economic pariahs and social outcasts. One writer even went to call them "greedy geezers." They became the brunt of jokes and moved into old-age ghettos. They were erased from ad campaigns, as well as product and service design. They were no longer part of our community, because we no longer needed them to survive.

Survival

Over the past two decades, things changed. Birth rates in the United States and most of the developed world collapsed; all of the G7, and a majority of G20 and OECD - OCDE countries are now well-below replacement rate. Some nations have entered a period of population stagnation, while others have begun to contract. Last year alone, Japan lost around 644,000 people, which is roughly the size of the population of the city of Las Vegas or the state of Vermont.

With fewer younger people come a smaller "working age population," which is currently defined as those ages 15-64. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics , the United States can expect the youngest cohort of workers age 16-24 to contract by more than seven percent, while those over 75 are expected to nearly double.

In order to keep things humming along, employers and economists are already looking at "non-traditional workers" (e.g. older and disabled workers) as a way to labor costs down and profits high. Some businesses are leveraging technology and inclusive design too. These companies are doing this to survive, because the pool of younger workers, as well as younger consumers, gets smaller by the day; nearly all growth in the U.S. labor market is by the post-45s.

Economic survival in the new demographic reality requires that we bring older people back into the fold as economic contributors, and their inclusion is already paying-off for a handful of forward thinking employers. These businesses have found that age-diversity aids in building organizational resilience and operational efficiency, but it also contributes to the creation of better products and services to meet the demands of the Super Age.

Empathy at work is built on the back of inclusion, which is driven by economic survival. When older and younger workers come together, the unintended byproduct is the slow, but steady erosion of ageism in the workplace, the economy, and society at-large. Market forces are dismantling ageism day by day, not because it's the nice thing to do, but because it's necessary to compete in the Super Age.

To learn more about how the new demographic reality and how it is impacting business and the economy, visit The Super Age to learn how our team can help you plan for the future, or pick-up a copy of The Super Age: Decoding our Demographic Destiny today.

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