Home Instead Senior Care has commenced a new public education campaign to help family carers. “Our research and day to day experience shows there are many people worried about their ageing parents and are trying to care for  someone who says they’d rather not have any help at all” says local franchise owner Sarah Warner.

“This resistance can be a real problem for family carers – they can be worried about the safety of a senior loved one forgetting food on the stove or neglecting to take their medications. We are spreading the message that keeping fiercely independent seniors safe at home isn’t a lost cause; there are solutions for them and their family carers.”

The campaign includes a free a resource booklet When Seniors Say No! – overcoming resistance to assistance and features practical tips and insights.

The Home Instead Senior Care survey revealed that 42% of carers spend more than 30 hours a week caregiving. And that’s what makes countering that resistance to assistance so important. “Many times family carers make assumptions but never ask: ‘Mum, I’ve noticed that every time I bring up having someone come in to assist, you don’t want help”.

Why is that?

Sometimes the parent doesn’t realize they’re being resistant. Also, reassuring a senior loved one that you have the same goal in mind will help. Start with something like: ‘My goal for you is to be independent, too. You know I can’t be here all the time. A little extra assistance will help you stay at home.’”

You can download the resource booklet When Seniors Say “No!” from the Home Instead website.

A special report by the NSW Treasury released with the state budget this Tuesday has provided an insight into state finances in 2050.

A key finding of the report was that impacts already expected by the ageing population have not fully materialised because older workers were staying in the workforce for longer.

Specifically:

The workforce participation rate for men in NSW aged over 65 has lifted from about 10 per cent in 2005 to 15.1 per cent in 2010-11. Treasury says this trend will continue and by 2028 one in five men over 65 will be working.

For women over 65, the participation rate has risen from about 3 per cent in the mid-2000s to above 7 per cent, and is expected to continue to rise to 12.3 per cent by 2050.

You can read more at the Sydney Morning Herald site HERE.

Why is this happening?

My feeling is that people are unable to retire due to the impact of the GFC on their retirement nest eggs and have to stay in the workforce longer until they can top-up their superannuation or their investments recover. Either way, I cannot see this trend changing anytime soon.

What about you? Are you staying in the workforce longer than necessary for financial reasons?

When it releases a major report on aged care tomorrow, the government will unleash a debate that, if not handled carefully, could turn into a fresh nightmare for Julia Gillard.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/evergreen-controversy-stirred-by-report-on-the-aged-20110806-1igc0.html#ixzz1UQ0nHMEV

The latest Reserve Bank Bulletin points out the labour force has grown at an average rate of 2.5 per cent a year since 2005. That’s fast – it’s also an extra 1.4 million people. Where have they all come from?

The first source is more people of working age (those 15 and over) choosing to actually participate in the labour force. And the big increase has been among women, plus older workers choosing to delay their retirement.

Great article by Ross Gittins in the Sydney Morning Herald today…

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/business/immigrants-and-oldies-share-our-growing-work-load-20110708-1h6ht.html#ixzz1RYqKeHYW

The biggest demographic shift of the 21st century is under way. In 1900, life expectancy at birth in the U.S. was 47 years. Now it’s closer to 80, and many of today’s children could live to 100. This gift of longevity represents a big and permanent shift in American life — one that may require a new set of rules.

Social visionary Marc Freedman, founder of the Civic Ventures think tank in San Francisco, recalls his own aha moment three years ago. As a 50-year-old father of two young boys, Freedman booked a hotel room for a family vacation using his AARP discount and requested two cribs. “There are a growing number of us who can be classified as neither-nors,” Freedman, now a father of three, writes in his new book, The Big Shift: Navigating the New Stage Beyond Midlife. “Neither young nor old. Neither ready to retire nor able to afford it.”

New opportunities

The first wave of baby-boomers turn 65 this year and the looming demands of 78 million seniors in the US threaten to swamp Social Security and Medicare. Some warn that the financial stress could cripple the economy and ignite a battle between people with walkers and those pushing baby strollers. But Freedman believes the unprecedented aging of America presents an opportunity to redefine the golden years for boomers and the generations that follow.

A yet-unnamed chapter of life is evolving for people between middle age and old age — much the way that adolescence was first recognized as a distinct developmental stage in the early 20th century. Many of today’s 65-year-olds are vibrant, active and engaged. Rather than retiring to a golf-course community and living off their savings for 20 years or more — an impossible scenario for many in the wake of the Great Recession — some are searching for a second act that combines meaningful work and a paycheck.

Freedman calls this new life phase the “encore years.” A few years ago, he launched a national conversation with his thought-provoking book Encore: Finding Work That Matters in the Second Half of Life. The companion Web site offers advice on switching directions in midlife and inspirational stories of individuals who carved a new path. Recent research sponsored by Civic Ventures suggests that there could be labor shortages by 2018 if boomers retire at traditional ages, particularly in education, health care, government and nonprofit organizations.

In The Big Shift, Freedman offers a recipe for transforming America’s coming midlife crisis into an opportunity for individuals and society. “Never before have so many people had so much experience and the time and capacity to do something significant with it,” he writes. He outlines out-of-the-box ideas, such as “gap years” for grown-ups; new kinds of internships and fellowships for Americans moving beyond middle age; remodeled higher education to help retrain people for these new roles; and new kinds of investment accounts to finance the cost of transitioning to new careers.

Sound like an impossible dream? No, it’s more like practical idealism, based on Freedman’s decade-plus-long mission to link experienced people who are eager to make a difference with nonprofit organizations in need of leadership. He spearheaded the creation of Experience Corps, a national service program for people over 55, and created the Purpose Prize, which annually provides five $100,000 prizes to social innovators in the second half of life.

If the golden-years dream was once freedom from work, the dream of this new wave is the freedom to work, says Freedman. The oldest boomers may be the lab rats in this longevity experiment, but every generation will benefit from new rules and roles for those who are beyond middle age but still too young to be old.

Article by Mary Beth Franklin, senior editor at Kiplinger’s Personal Finance.
Read more: http://www.kiplinger.com/magazine/archives/too-young-to-be-old.html#ixzz1PbDDE2Cd

We are continually bombarded with media articles and research about the impact of our ageing population and how it is going to result in higher taxes, over-loaded hospitals and caravan-clogged road networks. So I think it is high time that we closed the door on our dooms-day soothsayers and thought about some of the more positive aspects of an older population (not all of them serious!)…

1. The hidden economics – Figures from the Welsh Assembly Government’s Strategy for Older People show the value and cost savings that many older people are making to the Welsh economy. If those older people who take on caring responsibilities were paid it would cost at least £1 billion a year. Similarly, the value of childcare provided by grandparents is estimated at £259 million a year.
2. Volunteers – Older people are the most likely group to offer their time to volunteer – the value of which has been estimated at £469 million a year. Similarly, Carers UK have argued that if carers across the UK (the majority of whom are older people) downed tools, it would cost the economy a staggering £87 billion annually.
3. Less graffiti – Most graffiti is done at night and older Australians generally prefer ABC’s re-runs of “The Bill” to spraying tags on local fences and walls.
4. Less traffic – Many seniors don’t drive, which has to result in less traffic.
5. Cheaper suburban homes – Many empty-nesters seek to sell and downsize out of their suburban family home where they have raised their families and move to smaller digs elsewhere (retirement communities, apartments, etc). With less demand coming through for larger properties prices have to come down.
6. More re-runs of “The Bill” on the ABC!

Can you add any more suggestions as to the positive aspects of an ageing population?