Is a mandatory retirement age necessary in the United States? Why or why not?

[Jason]

I recently finished writing a paper for my Intro to Sociology class. The paper centered on the question raised in the title of this thread. I'll briefly share my thoughts on the matter, and then I'd like to hear what you have to say.

A mandatory retirement age is not only unnecessary, it’s discriminatory. By using age as a yardstick by which to measure when a person is and is not capable of performing a specified task or job, we are depriving ourselves of the contributions seniors can make to the labor force or elsewhere in our society. More generally, we are sending a message to seniors and society as a whole that all seniors are the same. That is, they are less capable then younger people. In my opinion, this type of ageism is outright unfair and needs to be eliminated.

So then, what do you think?

[Bigwig]

I vaguely recall reading somewhere that the only reason that retirement was instituted was to help the economy. I think it was during the great depression, so that means rosevelt maybe? saw that old people weren't leaving their jobs and with health care improving they could work at those jobs longer, so young people were stuck at low level jobs or unemployed. I only vaguely remember this so if anyone knows the specifics...Jason you probably covered that in your paper, is any of that right?

[Jason]

You have indeed touched on one of the many aspects of this argument. In sociology, there is what is called the functionalist perspective. The functionalists would argue that retirement can be thought of as recognition for a job well done and an acknowledgement of the fact that a person no longer belongs in the working world. This person is moving out of the way so that a person from a younger generation can step up and fill the vacated position.

[Annux]

Unemployment has nothing to do with the age of your labor force. Unemployment is just another reflection of a country with a poor fiscal policy and out-of-hand deficits (TAX CUTS FOR THE RICH, FOLKS).

In Europe, unemployment is high compared to the US' 5.6% due to the fact that the labor representatives there have achieved alot more than Union heads around here. This is a two edged sword. Employers that hire workers, keep them for a long, long time because of the many labor laws that protect the labor force. That means that it's formidably difficult for people to enter the workplace because of low demand. This is a possible factor of political theory clashing with economic actuality.

Senior citizens are just as capable of doing 6 hours of white-collar work as any of us are. Manually retiring people who can perform but are 'just too old' is immoral and should be illegal.

[pv=nrt]

i think it is illegal to fire someone because of age. In fact from my business minor class we covered the illegality of it, i think. I was doing the crossword puzzle so i may be mixing things up.

[Bigwig]

i only meant to imply that instituting a retirement age during an economic downturn was their way of creating employment, not that age created the economic downturn in the first place.