As the much publicized "graying of America" progresses, political groups that lobby for the elderly have achieved enormous power and organizational success, with no sign of decline in the foreseeable future. What Older Americans Think provides a fresh look at these groups. Are older people united in support of increasing old-age benefits--or perhaps even obsessed with their own financial self-interest, as is sometimes alleged? Do younger people tend to oppose old-age benefits? Why do aging-based political organizations attract so many members? How do Washington policymakers see the "gray lobby"? Focusing on the last decade, Christine Day offers new answers to these and other questions.Drawing on survey data and interviews with organization leaders, congressional staff, and executive branch employees, Day presents an objective, rather than an impressionistic, view. Her findings dispel the myth that older people agree in a desire to receive expanded government benefits: they are no more likely than younger people to support more federal spending on the elderly, or to consider aging policy a highly salient issue. Day also reveals that while older people have become wealthier as a group, they have also become economically more diverse. Old-age interest groups have little control over the degree of inequality between the rich and the poor.Originally published in 1990.The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

As the aging population of the United States continues to increase, age-related policies have come under intense scrutiny and have sparked heated debates. Demographic, economic, and political trends have transformed the understanding of older people's role in America's public policy. The New Politics of Old Age Policy offers a variety of perspectives on these policy issues -- particularly the relative merits of using chronological age to determine eligibility for government programs.The chapters address theoretical approaches to age-based policy; population dynamics and how growing diversity within the older population may affect these policies; issues surrounding major age-based programs such as Social Security and Medicare; and the national, state, and local political issues associated with these policies. Contributors: Robert Applebaum, Ph.D., Miami University; Robert H. Binstock, Ph.D., Case Western Reserve University; Alan Burnett, M.A., Area Agency on Aging, Ohio; Chenoa A. Flippen, Ph.D., Duke University; Judith G. Gonyea, Ph.D., Boston University School of Social Work; Colleen M. Grogan, Ph.D., University of Chicago; Madonna Harrington Meyer, Ph.D., Syracuse University; Pamela Herd, Ph.D., University of Texas at Austin; Martha B. Holstein, Ph.D., consultant, Chicago; Eric R. Kingson, Ph.D., Syracuse University; Marc Molea, M.H.A., Ohio Department of Aging; Marilyn Moon, Ph.D., American Institutes for Research; John Myles, Ph.D., University of Toronto; Christy M. Nishita, University of Southern California; Angela M. O'Rand, Ph.D., Duke University; Jon Pynoos, Ph.D., University of Southern California; Sarah Poff Roman, M.G.S., Miami University; Steven M. Teles, Ph.D., Brandeis University.

In an era of changing demographics and values, this volume provides a cross-national and interdisciplinary perspective on the question of who cares for and about the elderly. The contributors reflect on research studies, experimental programmes and personal experience in Japan and the United States to explicitly compare how policies, practices and interpretations of elder care are evolving at the turn of the century.

Product Description: This book examines the aging of the US population as a primary domestic public policy issue. An increase in the proportion of the elderly in the total population will potentially result in a significant growth in the number of beneficiaries in major federal entitlement programs, leading to fiscal pressures and challenges for economic growth...read more

Product Description: Learn how public policies can help families provide the care their elderly relatives needFamily and Aging Policy examines how public initiatives to assist the elderly in the United States, Canada, Singapore, Denmark, and Sweden can impact families who provide them with long-term care...read more

Product Description: Examine the changing structure of the family as America’s population ages!As the United States’ economy evolves and manufacturing jobs disappear, the prospect of each generation experiencing a standard of living that exceeds that of their parents’ generation also disappears...read more

Examines different points of view in the debate over what services elderly people need and who should pay for them, covering issues such as social security, medicare, transportation, elder abuse, and long-term care.

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Product Description: Explore significant—but often-overlooked—aspects of aging policy! This unique addition to the literature on aging policy will help you understand devolution—the decentralizing of service provision—and the roles that state/local government and private organizations now play in addressing the needs of our aging population...read more

Examines the circumstances and experience of being old in the United States and contradictory popular attitudes and public policy, and offers reform programs directed toward an adequate and comprehensive national policy on aging

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Product Description: When Congress enacted Social Secuirty in 1935, with the age of retirement set at age 65, average life expectancy was 62 years. By the time Medicare was enacted 30 years later, life expectancy had risen to age 70. Since the enactment of Medicare, life expectancy has risen to age 76 today and may be expected to increase further in the decades to come...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: This study demonstrates a textual approach to analyzing policy documents to establish a method of study applicable to any social policy documents. This method should be analytically adequate to this kind of material and of critical interest both from the standpoint of substantive policy areas (here, policy on ageing and "the aged") and the broader standpoints of democratic practice, social stratification and the emancipatory possibilities of social theory...read more

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Product Description: This groundbreaking book provides comprehensive treatment of the political economy of aging by a scholar widely credited as the founder and key thinker of this field in the US and internationally. The body of work presented in this volume, in developing this critical perspective, aims to contribute to the understanding of old age and aging in the context of problems and issues of the larger social order in the world's most advanced capitalist nation, the U...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: By the end of the current decade, many baby boomers will be senior citizens. What policies should we enact to prepare for an aging society?In the coming decade, we have a unique opportunity to create new and better aging policies...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: Making Aging in Place Work will help social workers and family members of elderly individuals improve the quality of life for loved ones by enabling the aging to stay in their current living arrangement for as long as possible. Addressing issues ranging from home modification to treatment of depression, this book will help you identify the needs of the elderly in order to offer them a comfortable and more independent life...read more

Product Description: "Aging Public Policy: Bonding the Generations" is presented in three parts. Part One describes the policy process as a response to human needs through the laws of our country. Part Two explores the national policy development on behalf of older persons...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: The past thirty years have seen an extraordinary expansion of federal programming and expenditures on behalf of older Americans. Largely as a result of these efforts, poverty among the aged has fallen three-fold, their real income has jumped 69%, and their access to health care services has doubled...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: In Facing the Age Wave, four experts explain the most significant areas of concern created by the aging of the American population and offer possible solutions. From a symposium of distinguished scholars on the subject of aging in America. (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)