Summary: 75 million baby boomers are moving into retirement in the USA as of 2012. How does the world view the expanding population of the elderly? Many people associate the elderly with negativity, fragility, forgetful and unwillingness to change. Many of the elderly in the USA have viewed retirement as a continuation of life with the overall mood of baby boomers being rather positive. Many of the seniors, in fact, feel as if their best years are yet to come. It may be time for the world to reevaluate how it perceives the elderly. Aging baby boomers who enjoy medical advances and improvements to daily life will be younger at heart and generally more physically able than earlier generations. Work that used to be heavily manual took its toll physically on the workers of yesterday. However, baby boomers who work in roles utilizing brain power rather than brawn may be less worn out upon reaching retirement age and do not necessarily require down time. They might prefer a more active existence.
Opinion: In my opinion I do believe that it is unfair to generalize the entire ageing population with a particular stereotype because statistics can prove that many do not behave that way. I believe that we can learn plenty from these old-timers as they have am abundance of knowledge accumulated over decades and also, as people like to call in Malay 'makan garam', meaning that they have experienced a particular occurrence in the past, they can provide us with invaluable advice that may enrich our lives. The elderly should not be frowned upon and viewed as a backwards generation. The elderly who are well-read or up to date with the current trends are often interesting to be with as one would get to reenact tales from the past as well as exchange ideas regarding the present. One would not feel as if the elderly are old, in fact, they may even treat the elderly as proper acquaintances or even friends.
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