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Comment by sean2 | Hacker News Reader

AFAICT this is a value in most cultures in all directions. I think "the west" invented pensions, social security and medicaid (or whatever you call it in your country) so parents nor children had to plan on caring for the elderly when they had trouble working (and with white collar jobs, that may be a long time).

Multi-generational, western (American) guy here: caring for the older generations is a core value to everyone I know and to me. We just don't _have_ to. My mom has money, can drive, owns a nicer house than I do. So, it's really only for 'values' that I check in on her and handyman for her whenever I can. In fact, for the latter, I cause her more problems than I fix.

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Your mom (not you specifically, but the average person's) is being provided for by the collective, ie currently working-age people's pension contributions. She, as a worker, paid taxes in her own working age, and financed stranger's parents' lives, and now the new generation does the same for her. It's a many to many relationship, while the old style arrangement was more point-to-point. The children did the literal manual work to keep their parents fed and cared for, while now they pay some strangers to do it, using their pension.

This is factually accurate - I agree with the description. But I think this new system makes it sound like the ageing parents only need financial and mechanical help -- (handyman etc.), what about emotional support? No, I don't think phone calls cut it. Humans did not evolve to live far away from their kin.

> what about emotional support? No, I don't think phone calls cut it. Humans did not evolve to live far away from their kin.

Children don't choose to be born. Once they reach adulthood the parents are owed nothing. Ideally they were such good parents that the kids want to maintain contact.

Workers should spread the cost of elder care because so many are living long with serious limitations. It's like insurance against otherwise devastating burdens.

> Children don't choose to be born. Once they reach adulthood the parents are owed nothing. Ideally they were such good parents that the kids want to maintain contact.

There's a really good scene in the movie Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (Sidney Poitier, Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy) about this:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTgahyvBMk4

Absolutely. Most people don't realise that the biggest problem old people experience is loneliness. My friend, an only child, came back to India from the US, to personally care for his parents once he realised they were too old to care for themselves properly and needed support.

Nowadays, young people gain experience in being lonely already when young, so they will be a pro at it when old.

That idea makes me laugh and cry at the same time. The next generation indeed is truly fucked.

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