Are you a burden?

[GGT]

To your children, or to society?

This might be the quintessential question in the modern era.

Since I'm a late boomer, I do feel like I'll either be a "burden" to my kids or to society in general. It's a horrible no-win feeling.

If anyone feels more optimistic, please share....

[GGT]

For context: my sister retired last week, went to use her employer health insurance before it expired, and got a questionable mammogram, requiring a second mammogram and ultrasound. She needs a needle biopsy and had to time the procedure with changing from private employer health insurance to Medicare. Now her happy retirement is going to be spent on zoom meetings with a Medicare rep selling her expanded coverage, in case they DO find cancer.

Each worker funding 8 seniors (for SS and Medicare) isn't a sustainable plan. The burdens will be unequal and disproportionate. What gives?

[Aimless]

Not more of a burden than anyone else, but, in general, I reject that framing completely anyway. Humans aren't burdens, even when we impose burdens on others.

[GGT]

That's not how it feels in the US. We've been debating "entitlements" for a long time, my entire life. It's insidious--the feeling that as you grow old you become an expensive burden. No one wants to admit it, but it's there, screaming in the silence.

[Aimless]

That's not how it feels in the US. We've been debating "entitlements" for a long time, my entire life. It's insidious--the feeling that as you grow old you become an expensive burden. No one wants to admit it, but it's there, screaming in the silence.

Oh for sure, it's not just the US... I just reject it when it comes to my own personal positions

[Steely Glint]

It's insidious--the feeling that as you grow old you become an expensive burden. No one wants to admit it, but it's there, screaming in the silence.

Is paying forward not a thing over there?

[Ominous Gamer]

Is paying forward not a thing over there?

That's pretty much limited to paying for the car behind you at Starbucks.

[Steely Glint]

harsh

[Hazir]

Actually, I don't. I know that sounds privileged, but I simply don't.

[GGT]

It's also insidious politically, at least in the US, but especially with the Republican Party. The whole "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" mentality morphed from encouraging independence/autonomy to demonizing entire groups of people...and even the government itself.

I hadn't realized just how effective that was over time, as a political strategy, until recently. When I look back and connect the dots, the GOP has always framed their principles & policies from the "burden" aspect -- they just changed the narrative along the way to suit the times.

The GOP has somehow managed to convince millions of Americans that freee market capitalism solves all problems, that taxation is theft, that immigration is bad, and that federal regulations or standards are antithetical to state's (and therefore individual) freeedoms. It's been going on for so long we barely notice how they've framed government as Big Brother, or The Deep State...let alone how the Trumpistas cowtow to conspiracy theorists and QAnon crazies in their quest to hold power.

Some *Republican* quotes that stuck for the base, but don't really make sense in a modern context:

"Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice"
~ Barry Goldwater, former (R) Senator from Arizona

"The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help."
~ Ronald Reagan

"There are more important things than living"
~ Dan Patrick, Lt. Gov. of Texas


edit: and oh yeah, can't forget the Tea Party Republicans with protest signs saying, "No Socialized Healthcare" AND "Hands off my Medicare"

[GGT]

Republicans are the biggest burden to US democracy....