Normal service resumes
Normal service is about to resume – with apologies to anyone who noticed that Christmas has been quiet. In the meantime, here are some links: First, a piece I wrote for the Daily Telegraph, pegged to the news that nearly a fifth of people in the UK will live to be 100. Second, a New [...]
Purpose Prize winners 2010
A former homeless alcoholic and a housekeeper are among this year’s winners of The Purpose Prize, a $100,000 award for entrepreneurs over the age of 60. The five winners, announced today, were selected by a panel of judges chaired by Sherry Lansing, former CEO of Paramount Pictures and the first woman to head a Hollywood [...]
Older and wiser?
A couple of items of news pose the intriguing question of what impact an older population will have on politics. To take the more trivial first, research in the UK suggests that over-55s are blocking the development of wind power, consistently leading campaigns against wind turbines that would benefit future generations. On a rather more [...]
Come to our ‘what is the point of retirement?’ event
Here is the invitation to Agebomb’s NESTA event on October 5th. Please do sign up!
If not for old people, we wouldn’t have society at all, says Minister
Last night I went to see David Willetts speak about his book The Pinch and the ideas behind it, courtesy of Policy Exchange. Willetts is always an interesting politician – thoughtful rather than ideological, and exhibiting a fascination with the detail of demographics that is both impressive and slightly exhausting. The evening really came alive [...]
Agebomb to hold an event with Nesta in early October
Excellent news: the splendid Marc Freedman will be visiting London from San Francisco for two days in early October and has agreed to be the keynote speaker at an Agebomb event on the new old age, to be held in conjunction with Nesta on the morning of Tuesday October 5. We will be looking at [...]
The precious gift economy of caring vs. box-ticking technocrats
The funding of care in England and Wales is a Byzantine structure of mysterious entitlements and clawbacks. The new government has wasted little time (rather like its predecessor in 1997) in announcing an investigation into this morass – and, with its Commission on the Funding of Care and Support due to report next summer, it’s [...]
The small society
I met the redoubtable Dorothy Runnicles at a conference a couple of months ago and have just read the report she published in February this year on voluntary groups run by and for older people. Her findings are encouraging – suggesting that there is far more community involvement than anyone officially knows anything about – [...]
The Big Society is alive and well…in Kerala
David Cameron’s idea of the Big Society seems destined for a life as troubled as its long-lost older sibling the Third Way. At its worst, the Big Society could be a flimsy fig leaf designed to cover up some of the worst consequences of deep cuts in public services. Charity, local volunteering, philanthropy, at least [...]
UK state pension age rises – but what is retirement for?
The British government has confirmed that, as expected, it will bring forward the increase in state pension age. The previous planned rise from 65 to 66 for men will now almost certainly come eight years earlier, in 2016, and for women by 2020. Meanwhile, there will be a review of how much further and faster [...]