If you are a Baby Boomer...
For the most part, we find that fear-mongering is not particularly useful and the principles of the parallel village are generally expressed in positive terms. It is difficult to build community around a negative or response to a negative.
However, for one group of potential villagers, a negative of great magnitude is looming, so great that it rarely gets addressed in real terms, and we feel it must be addressed. It is a demographic problem – what happens when too many people grow old at the same time, and there are not enough people in the next generation to take care of them?
If you are a Baby Boomer, you were born between 1946 and 1964. You lived in a golden era, a time of relative peace, prosperity and economic growth. Your life was better than your parents, their parents and grandparents. Today, you may be at the peak of your performance; life is good, as it has been all your life.
But, you are beginning to notice clouds on the horizon. The recent financial crisis serves as a warning. What will happen when your generation retires? There are fewer people in the next generation. This means fewer people to buy your home, your stock (or your pension fund's stock) and other investments, and to pay the taxes to cover your state pension and your medical costs. While the current financial crisis had its roots in greed and deregulation, the next one will be rooted in demographics... not enough people to buy your assets, not enough people to pay for your care. If you don't make your own provisions now, you may find the golden years of life are bitter years of rust – slowly and degradingly corroding into dust. Relying on investments may not prove to be the answer if the market for those investments has eight sellers for every seven buyers. Experts say income taxes would need to rise to 70% to support your generation at the level your parents generation came to know.
If you look for evidence of such a prediction, you will find the experts acutely aware of the problem which is so large the political leadership has no viable answer. In the United States in 2008, the Comptroller General of the United States, David Walker gave a shocking report (click to view) in which he showed that at the end of 2007, the US Federal Debt stood at US$11 trillion, but its unfunded liabilities were an additional $41 trillion ($40,800,000,000,000). Indeed, at the time he gave his report, he said the total liability of the US Government was 90% of the combined net worth of all Americans. Now, after the US has taken on massive new debt and seen housing prices fall, we may presume the unfunded liability of the US government exceeds the net worth of all Americans. All of that $41 trillion liability was for the unfunded Social Security and Medicare... the pensions and medical care committed but not funded for the nations elders - the Baby Boomers.
The handwriting on the wall is clear, not just for the USA, but for all countries with an ageing population and advanced medical care. Central government will not have the resources to provide for the Baby Boomers. If we are to provide for them and all future generations of elders, we must find a better way. If you are a Baby Boomer, you simply cannot expect the government or even the global financial system to provide for you. The past is no indication of the future; you (and we) need to find alternatives - a parallel approach.
We suggest that you need to invest in a local economy where you can have a lifelong place, and not rely on a global economy that has already proved unreliable. What are some of the elements?
Mobility - In Australia, New Zealand, the USA and other new-world countries, when elders loses their driver license, they find getting around very difficult and most end up moving to a retirement home or if infirm to a nursing home. Baby Boomers have seen the effects of this loss of mobility for elders, as many of them placed parents or grandparents in retirement and nursing homes and vowed they would not go there when it was their time. The parallel village solves this issue. Everything is within a 10-minute walk and mobility scooters are permitted. Elder housing is within 50 metres from the plaza and especially designed for handicapped people. Nursing care facilities are on the plaza, so even the bed or wheelchair bound remain among people who know and love them.
Health – Walking every day keeps one healthier. A diet of farm-fresh local foods keeps one healthier, and if flavourful and eaten in good company, perhaps happier.
Engagement – Isolation and a sense of becoming irrelevant probably have a larger impact on health. “Lonely individuals may be twice as likely to develop the type of dementia linked to Alzheimer's disease in late life as those who are not lonely, according to a study by researchers at the Rush Alzheimer's Disease Center… "Humans are very social creatures. We need healthy interactions with others to maintain our health," said [Dr. Robert S.] Wilson. The results of our study suggest that people who are persistently lonely may be more vulnerable to the deleterious effects of age-related neuropathology."
The parallel village provides that engagement naturally. People need do nothing more than walk out there door, to become social. The plazas are designed to be social. And of equal importance, that society is with all ages. Most elders enjoy the company of all ages, and there is an especial relationship between young people and elders; it is in this relationship that the culture of a society gets passed on.
Purpose – In almost all societies except our own, elders remain important. Elders have experience they pass on to younger people. They volunteer time to the community because they have it to offer. They often take the pressure off of young families, knowing that when they get tired, they can send the kids home. Elders sometimes engage in settled work, more a hobby than a profit demanding venture, both to supplement income, but also to work at something pleasurable… something that otherwise would be unavailable to the community.
For example in the lovely town of Somerton in England, there is a streetside window with handmade bellows for sale. On inquiring you find yourself in a private home of an elderly gentleman who perhaps makes one or two every month. Excellently made, they last for years and are a pleasure to use… settled work.
While the village would not be able to carry the burden of expensive hospital care for its elders, it can keep them from needing as much of it. Further, it can lower the cost of living so its elders may live independently for longer.
If you are a Baby Boomer the time to start planning is now while you are still at the top of your game, and have the energy to make it happen. We could use your help.
