"Generational equity" and the new victim blaming: an emerging public policy issue.
Recent attempts to frame complex policy issues in terms of "justice between generations" and "intergenerational equity" are based on a series of questionable assumptions and economic calculations concerning the relative financial well-being of the elderly vis-à-vis other groups in U.S. society. On closer inspection, however, these assumptions--e.g., of a homogeneous and financially secure elderly population and of younger cohorts likely to become increasingly resentful of elderly entitlement programs--appear ill-founded. Census data revealing wide disparities in income among the elderly, and national opinion poll data suggestive of a large cross-generational and cross-ethnic group "stake" in Social Security and Medicare, are used to suggest that the intergenerational equity framework may well be an inappropriate one in the public policy arena. Such a framework, moreover, is seen as deflecting attention from more basic inequities in U.S. society and from the need for major policy shifts in response to these more fundamental problems.
D000368:Aged; D001290:Attitude; D004208:Displacement, Psychological; D005006:Ethnicity / Q000523:psychology; D006806:Human Rights; D006801:Humans; D006278:Medicare; D011203:Poverty; D011639:Public Opinion; D011640:Public Policy; D012539:Scapegoating; D012935:Social Justice; D012940:Social Problems; D012943:Social Security; D013240:Stereotyping; D014481:United States