[Redway]

Originally Posted by bitontheslide

you would need to define what elderly meant before you could determine whether someone fits into that category or not.

The way the retirement age is defined is against life expectancy. Really, women should retire a couple of years later than men because on average they live a couple of years longer

So, retirement age is set to provide the average man 5 years before they drop. Any more, and it puts too much pressure on the pension system, which is why it is increasing by a year here and there.

So, if we are strictly looking at averages, 65/66 is most certainly where you could consider the average person elderly. The fact that some go on for a couple of decades after that point basically means they were lucky outliers

I think that only holds definitively true if you consider being of a pensionable age the measure for “elderly.” I wouldn’t and neither would/do a lot of people. I guess everyone’s idea of what counts as elderly is somewhat subjective but I definitely wasn’t basing it on when someone’s eligible to collect their pension. Some people who were mothers (for-example) of teenagers doing their GCSEs less than 15 years ago took early retirement from the N.H.S. and working elsewhere/living it up in Spain or their home-countries at barely 60. I’d hardly consider them coffin-dodgers, not just because they’re eligible to a pension.
I’m just using that N.H.S. thing as an example because nurses have been known to take early retirement sometimes (which is understandable considering how gruelling and exhausting a job it actually is). Unlike pharmacists who get paid quite a bit for being glorified shop-keepers who happen to dispense medicines or cozy GPs who often know little more than what a quick google-search can show a lay person (not that these people aren’t helpful and necessary but comparatively they have it easy) and stethoscope wee-babies, nurses are often on their feet for 12 to 16 hours at night and that can take its toll over the years. People often get out of it when they can once they’ve had enough, not because they’re actually getting to an age where they need zimmer-frames to get around. Take a look at Dr Useless Badass (Gadass) on Corrie and see how she won’t be happy doing her nonsense until she’s bloody 99 compared to an over-worked under-paid nurse who gets out while she can. It’s worse in America, where all doctors (from locum GPs to cardio-thoracic neurosurgeons) are on serious buck and substantially more than nurses do. I have tremendous respect for diligent GPs who genuinely care about their patients (and normally when a GP genuinely cares for you and your health you can tell) and pharmacists do their bit but early retirement-age isn’t really a priority for them because they’re comparatively less strained and hard-working than nurses usually are. Being a 67-year-old bedside nurse is definitely doable but it’s tough. And the people who are still in it at that age (whether they made it to band 6+ or not) deserve to at least be paid fairly. Prolonged strike really isn’t the one but I can kind of understand why it’s happening.

You seem to have a very warped understanding of age.