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americans have very low kinship/community with their families in general - compared to e.g. southern europeans where generations and cousins etc live under the same roof or in the same street.
I can't prove that these things are related. But they seem as if they were
That's a meaty question. I imagine it's a variety of something fairly universal: i.e. any constituency that is capable of politically funneling resources to itself will do so.
Is there something about our culture(s) that makes age a dimension along which to form a constituency like that, though? I don't know. People talk about the breakdown of other civic relationships having left us with nothing but immutable characteristics to identify with.
People talk about the breakdown of other civic relationships having left us with nothing but immutable characteristics to identify with.
That's certainly an interesting thought, but age doesn't seem to be a category that people actively identify with politically. I do wonder if it has more to do with economic circumstances correlating more strongly with age than ever before... which would actually be pretty consistent with a wtfhappenedin1971 style hypothesis
If you imagine a typical consumption smoothing over the lifecycle scenario, unexpectedly increasing lifespans and devaluing savings will both lead to underfunded retirements.
Where the breakdown of normal relationships factors in is that the oldsters have less (or don't look to) family, church, friends, fraternal order, etc. when things get tough. Instead they just turn to the state.
Further, in a society with those thick networks of relationships, people might be less willing to fleece others politically because it's more likely that they have a connection to them.
Do you think there's anything unique about America, or modern Western democracies, that causes this? Or do you think it's a universal problem that has repeatedly been an issue throughout history and across countries?