Saw this article in the NYT on-line. Your thoughts?

its all gone backwards. However I think that generation will be the last to reach these ridiculously high numbers

This is a typical example of preparing future carers of how easy it’s going to be with the elderly. It’s Disneyland propaganda

I saw that article also, and it left me both heartened and discouraged at the same time. Heartened that the research community is finally taking notice of what we here have known all along (and some of us have experienced first-hand) - that all the progress in extending our lifespans has resulted in the oldest old having children who are getting old themselves, but who are still expected to be caregivers. Discouraged because I know by now that the scholarly community has no influence in society, at least not here in America. The topic of caregiver burnout has been extensively researched and written about since the early 1990's, but even as the problem becomes increasingly widespread and acute there is no action, no plan of action, no remedy or proposed remedy. It's just people who get roped into it muddling through as best they can, under increasingly difficult circumstances. It's terribly depressing. And the worst part is that all these poor people muddling through as best they can are setting what I think is a terrible example. The more adult children go along and act as if it's okay to expect them to give up their own retirement plans, deplete their own assets and ruin their own health to take care of their parents, the more the rest of society will see this as a perfectly fine solution and defer considering any other solutions to the needs of the growing elderly population. I don't blame anyone - I did it myself. It's impossible not to do it when your elderly parent has no other options. But it kills me knowing that as long as we keep on doing it, there won't be any other options because they won't be seen as necessary.

jkm999, thanks for the article. My parents had a wonderful fun filled retirement with travel, dining out, visiting relatives, doing volunteer work, etc. But when they got into their 90's, I had to step in to help. Mom refused caregivers nor moving to Independent Living, but on the other hand Dad was willing to move, but not without my Mom. Oh the huge stress of them living in a large house with a lot of stairs, someone was always falling.... [sigh]

Yep, I was a senior trying to help even older seniors. People told me to have my siblings help [can't only child], to have my children help [had no children], have relatives help [everyone lived out of State and were dealing with their own parents].

Stress of trying to get yet another afternoon off to take my parents to a doctor appointment because Mom refused to ride with strangers. My boss at the time was NOT user friendly to my situation. My current boss was so very understanding when I needed to rush home.

I had to toss away my bucket list because retirement was not in the near future back then, not even now. The stress caused a lot of health issues, so out went my bucket list. I wanted to visit all the Presidential Libraries.

I have so much resentment on how everything turned out.

Back in the 1700's and 1800's in my family tree, parents did live with their grown children, but families were quite large back then. And the tree line had relatives living into their late 80's and into 100. They had their own family village. Not one person trying to do everything.