Age Matters
The folly of keeping over-70 folks in charge
FROM Donald Trump to Joe Biden to Bernie Sanders to Nancy Pelosi to most of the Senate, one might think that the biblical three score and ten had become a mandatory minimum for holding office.
While gerontocracy is most obvious in politics, it is present throughout American life. The average ages of university professors and administrators, banking executives, corporate CEOs and others have all been steadily rising for some time.
The fragility of this gerontocracy has been ruthlessly exposed by the COVID-19 epidemic. The crisis has also shown the damage that can be caused by a ruling class more qualified to be in long-term care than to hold important and intensely demanding positions.
One of the most amazing aspects of the global response to the coronavirus has been the total refusal to classify and treat populations according to agerelated risk. Although COVID-19 can be quite deadly among older populations, it is well established that it poses a fairly minor risk for people under 50. For those under 30, the risks associated with lockdowns — increased domestic abuse, suicide, depression, drug abuse, economic hardship — are almost certainly worse than the disease itself.
Instead of imposing blanket lockdowns on everyone, it would make far more sense to isolate the elderly, while allowing those under 50 (or even 40 if one wants to be really cautious) to go to work, visit restaurants, go on vacations, attend gatherings and have real lives.
Fortuitously, places like large office buildings, restaurants and airports are already well quipped to check IDs and ages, as opposed to enforcing (somewhat arbitrary) “social distancing” requirements.
All this certainly would have been — and still would be — much better than shutting down the entire country for everyone. But it was never even considered. Instead, policymakers and experts (such as the 79-year-old Dr. Anthony Fauci) pretend there is no difference between a 30-year-old and a 70-year-old. Why? Perhaps because baby boomers cannot imagine the world existing without them? Because they can’t even conceive of the existence of anyone but themselves?
One statistic not readily available is the number of young people’s lives that have been stifled or destroyed to preserve the precious egos — and assets — of the boomer generation, both now and over the past few decades. Indeed, one reason I suspect so many statues are being torn down today (often indiscriminately) is because it is frankly easier to topple a statue than it is to displace the boomers and their failed policy consensus (though at this point many of the statues are probably not as old).
A case in point is universities: Many are refusing to open or will switch to virtual learning for the upcoming semester. The risks to the student population are exceedingly low, but 70-plusyear-old professors say they don’t want to teach with the threat of COVID (as if they ever wanted to!).
There are thousands of younger academics, however, who have faced dismal professional prospects for years and who could probably do a better job. Yet our gerontocratic institutions would prefer to sacrifice education for everyone in order to pad the incomes of septuagenarians who should have retired years ago.
The same can be said for the rest of the gerontocracy — in politics, business, academia and beyond. It is time for younger people — that is, people of normal working age — to take over these positions.
If anything, the COVID crisis has shown that it is dangerous and irresponsible to have almost every important office filled by the population cohort most susceptible to being wiped out by a pandemic. In addition to adjusting lockdowns and quarantines to account for age, mandatory retirement policies should be instituted. (This would merely bring the United States into line with Europe.)
The elderly can still serve as part-time advisers, freelance writers and so on, but they should not hold important positions.
Current political officeholders over the age of 70 should have the good sense to resign, and the Constitution should be amended to include maximum ages in addition to minimums.
If a world of pandemics is the “new normal,” then let’s be serious about it.
Julius Krein is the editor of American Affairs, from which this was adapted.