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MEDICATION ROBBERY

#health #politics #money #budget #subsidies #drugs #basic #drugs #medications

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Unhappiness Does Not Shorten Life

Being happy helps you to live longer right? Wrong! The grumpy old man is real. He just makes life miserable for everybody else. People have to earn a living. Many jobs, particularly the monotonous production line ones, are boring, tedious and soul destroying. Unhappiness is the consequence.

Poor health can also contribute to discontent. Unfortunately, only a group of women in their sixties were surveyed. This is neither young or old. I wonder why they didn't examine elderly people? Ah well, scientists work in mysterious ways.

If you are chronically ill, you could behave in a way that does shorten your life, like giving up exercise and adopting a poor diet. Some even harm themselves which does damage the body, but does not really shorten life.

It seems 83 per cent of women in their sixties are "generally" happy. This is very high. It needs to be qualified, however, as 44 per cent said they were "usually" happy. There was another choice: "happy most of the time". Isn't this the same as " usually" happy? Thirty nine per cent chose "most of the time". Throw in unnecessary choices and you get odd results. There was a strong correlation between being ill and unhappiness.

Older women were happy if they enjoyed the following conditions: were physically active, had a partner, not deprived, mixed socially, participated in church and slept well. Some of these are out of one's control, like being married and having wealth. For the most part happiness is beyond our control.

◆ Society by Ty Buchanan ◆

Australian Blog

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BE MISERABLE AND LIVE JUST AS LONG
#aged #elderly #old #women #happiness #unhappy #laugh #fun #data

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Businesses Will Treat Young and Aged Employees Differently

With the federal government intending to lift the retirement age because of a shortfall in tax collections, businesses will have to adapt to a new employment environment. The reason given for the policy is claimed to be that the proportion of young taxpayers to middle-aged workers is declining. Of course, this a furphy. There is a shortfall now and the disparity in age sectors is a long term issue.

Older aged mature experienced worker employee

Government will have to subsidize the employment of aged people. Even if the government denies it, this will be necessary. Conditions of employment will have cater for the inability to perform at a high physical level. This is an area where the elderly will not be able to compete. The young will have to vacate their comfortable seats for those much older. This is obvious.

The young can learn from those with a lifetime of work experience, but what can these people learn from the young? Businesses should know that these groups will remain different and will have to treat them accordingly. Taking orders from a person seen as a young know-it-all upstart is not something the experienced will accept.

School leavers have workplace demands. A luxury the aged did not enjoy when they started work at 13 years old. They were treated as dogsbodies: carry this; go fetch that! Giving the young privileges will be frowned upon. If anything, it is the elderly who should get the benefits.

✴ Technology by Ty Buchanan ✴

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Ultrasound to Treat Alzheimer's Disease

A great deal of research is going on into solving the problem of Alzheimer's disease. It is a major issue with the number of elderly people increasing in most countries. Though young people can suffer from the illness it is perceived as a disease of the aged.

While most work has been done on the chemical and molecular structure of the brain, it seems that a simple treatment has been there all along. The University of Queensland has stumbled onto ultrasound as an effective treatment. First successful on mice, it is now being rolled out for humans.

Waves of ultrasound break up neurotoxic amyloid plaque. The cause of the illness is still there, but the damage done is reversed. Some old memories could still be lost. However, new ones will be kept. This will reduce the need for resources in caring for the elderly who will able to function on their own.

In tests, mice were capable of solving problems that had beaten them before. Decision making is the most important function of the human brain apart from those keeping a person alive. Long term memories are not so critical: though ideally, one would not want to loose these.

It is debated whether the use of ultrasound would improve executive functions of healthy brains. Other diseases also damage the brain and detection of them is difficult. In the future we could all be getting regular ultrasound.

✴ /Health by Ty Buchanan ✴

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Bank Staff to Spy on Bank Accounts of the Elderly

Bank staff are to be allowed to monitor the bank accounts of the elderly to see if relatives, friends and carers are stealing money. At first glance this may well seems to be a good thing. However, banks staff swear to keep all bank information private. Instant dismissal is the penalty for telling others about a customer's financial status.

The thought of bank staff having the authority to pass on private information to government is frightening and will, no doubt, be challenged in court. Of course people with dementia will have someone managing their bank account. Reporting a carer just because a customer is permanently incapacitated is stupid. You don't need special training to see someone has decreased capacity to manage their own affairs.

Smart Sparrow's who are developing the app to do this are wasting their time. Society will not accept bank tellers snooping into their affairs. It will not be allowed. Tremendous damage will be done to families on mere suspicion. Tellers will be expected to examine the accounts of people who just look mildly incapacitated. Bank staff are not qualified to judge health issues.

Can you imagine a social worker knocking on your door based in the perception that the parent you are looking after looked a bit lost in the bank? Surely, social workers have got better work to do than snooping around perfectly innocent family members. Smart Sparrow's seems stupid to me!

✴ Technology by Ty Buchanan ✴

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Part-Time and Full-Time Employment Means Fewer Babies

It is not work in general that is causing a decline in women giving birth at a young age. It is specifically temporary jobs that are responsible. In Australia part-time and casual employment has boomed over the last decade as employers see it as a way to keep costs down. Many work extra hours for no money at all, afraid of losing their jobs.

Women working full time can afford to pay for child care, or at least for critical periods when they are working. Such career women are having children before they reach the age of 35 years. There is a myth out there that it is these career women who are starting families at an older age. Oddly the effects of not working full time changes the behavior of women in the high socieconomic group as well. They may be able to afford childcare from a financial "nest egg", but it is the state of mind about not working enough and not having sufficient income for a family.

Financial security in regard to income is essential for women to even consider having children. Careers are not that important to women. This goes against all of the prevailing stereotypes. The number of years spent in part-time work had a strong impact. A year of part-time employment reduced the probability of having a baby by 35 years by 8 per cent. Five years in such work increased the rate to more than a third.

Another myth is that university graduates go straight into full-time employment. Over 60 per cent of these began working in a job with reduced hours. Therefore, high and low-skilled women suffered the same job market problem.

All economies are moving to less-secure employment to reduce production costs. This means that as the decades go by the world population will fall, confounding all predictions. Furthermore, the population in most countries will have a larger proportion of elderly people. Some of these will have to work to survive. Providing old age pensions will become too costly.

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Economics by Ty Buchanan

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Pensioners Will Be Denied Income

Pensioners have gray hair. They are also entering a gray area, politically, socially and economically. Most people reaching pension age have never paid superannuation and others have only been paying it for a few years of their working lives. The amount saved by super is certainly not enough to live on. This group relies on the government to provide them with an income.

Calls are coming from all sides for an increase in the pension to a "livable" level. Basic costs like council rates, rents, electricity, gas, water and sewerage have gone through the roof in the last decade. There is no solid reason why this should be so. Electricity companies keep saying the old infrastructure has to be renewed. Surveys show they have actually over-spent, pushing the cost onto consumers.

Giving those who could afford solar power a massive discount for feeding electricity back into the grid is appalling political decision making. Pensioners could not afford solar. They are subsidizing the wealthy.

We are entering a tough period for older Australians. As time passes retiring workers will have full superannuation cover. What happens about those already on the government pension? When Paul Keating introduced compulsory superannuation it was with the intention of phasing out state funded pensions. Both sides of politics are pushing toward this. They are not planning to increase the pension by the needed $4,000 a year.

In the past the wandering tramp was common and this wasn't only during the depression. Nearly all of these were elderly. They could not afford to put a roof over their heads. Within a decade, such a social class will return. This time though they will join the homeless young who exist on unemployment benefit that it much lower than the pension.

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Society by Ty Buchanan

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Internet Puts Pressure on Jobs for Older Workers

The Internet is putting more people out of work and this is only the beginning. As more advanced algorithms are being developed established jobs are under threat. It will not only be lawyers and professional photographers employed by newspapers who get the chop. Unless you are in work that involves human problem solving like plumbers, mechanics and vehicle body repairers your job will face "extinction".

Most of the burden will fall on older workers. Retail, for example, only wants teenagers who can be paid a pittance while "training". Open discrimination occurs against people over 45. They are simply not wanted. This barrier age has fallen in recent years. Computerized job selection processes cuts them off at the beginning. Their resumes are not even looked at. If they go personally to apply for a position they face insulting comments and bad jokes.

Employers are no longer afraid of telling them directly that they are too old. Many have simply given up on seriously looking for work and they just do the minimum to justify payments from Centrelink.

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Economics

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The Aged Are Not Employed

Developed country are heading toward a crisis of not enough people to do the work. Baby boomers have reached retirement age and with such a large section of society no longer contributing there will be fewer taxpayers to fund economies. Government revenues will fall. Workers can only pay so much tax. Beyond a certain level incentive to work decreases.

Despite the problem, employers still persist in seeking young employees when there are plenty of elderly people who can hold down jobs. Old legislation covering those in public service force retirement on perfectly capable workers. Some Australian states are planning to change this.

The private sector has no restrictions. Many doctors, for example, work into their 80s. This is because they are self-employed, so they can decided when to stop. Fewer retirees are offering their service free in voluntary work. This means their lives just slow down and they spend their time doing very little. Their lives would be more interesting if they were given the opportunity to work.

Life expectancy has improved. There is no rational reason to refuse work to those who want it. The retirement age will be raised to 67, but this is ten years away. Governments are now heading into a funding crises. Australian businesses are bringing in skilled workers from overseas to fill vacancies that are really are not there. Government needs to give real incentives to businesses to encourage them to offer employment to mature workers.

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Society