| The Problem Isn’t Gerontocracy. It’s Inequality.

| Ashton Applewhite and Arielle Galinsky

| The two of us inherited very different Americas.

One of us was born in 1952, into an unprecedented 80 years of national prosperity. The other was born in 2002, into far more uncertain times. That age difference does not divide us. Just the opposite, in fact, because we share a deep concern about the country’s future and a firm conviction that people of different ages have much to gain from one another. 

A new book published this week, Gerontocracy in America: How the Old Are Hoarding Power and Wealth – and What to Do About It, takes the opposite position. Seeking to drive a nasty wedge between young and old, author and Yale law professor Samuel Moyn claims that ours is a zero-sum society where the old benefit at the expense of the young. 

This narrative is wrong in so many ways. 

• It’s straight-up ageism. 
• It pits generations against one another when the country can least afford another manufactured divide. 
• It distracts us from the actual causes and consequences of power and wealth inequalities. 
• Its rhetoric – “gerontocracy” is not a neutral word – is inflammatory.

Yes, there’s a  legitimate “us vs. them” dynamic narrative in play, but it’s not old against young. It’s the rich and powerful vs. the rest of us. Instead of scapegoating older Americans, let’s look at these “greedy geezer” narratives and how they break down under scrutiny.

Margaret Morganroth Gullette: The Old Do Not Eat the Young 

Myth #1: Older people are hoarding wealth.

It’s true that older families hold far more wealth overall. But no generation is a monolith. Peel back the curtain to uncover the fact that an ultra-wealthy minority – the top 10 percent of Boomer households – owns 71 percent of that wealth. 

In fact, according to a 2024 NCOA study, 80 percent of older Americans age 60+ are financially insecure. Census Bureau data show seniors to be the only age group that saw a rise in poverty. According to the most recent Federal data, Americans age 50+ now make up half the homeless population, a figure that’s projected to rise steeply due to fixed incomes and the lack of affordable housing.

As Stephen Crystal and other leading economists have argued, rising wealth disparities within age cohorts, rather than between them, are a key driver of declining economic prospects for ordinary Americans. Young adults and those over 50 are disproportionately represented among those facing income and job instability, as are migrants, minorities, and women. 

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Myth #2: Older people are hoarding power.

It’s true that older adults are overrepresented in the general electorate and in positions of political power. Not incidentally, the overwhelming majority are wealthy, white, and male. This is the predictable product of a system with high entry costs and near-guaranteed incumbency. It’s a structural problem, not a too-many-old-people problem. 

Nor is it a too-many-older-voters problem, as Moyn posits; it’s a too-few-younger-voters one. And it’s solvable: Expand participation. Make Election Day a national holiday. Increase voting hours, early voting, and mail-in ballot access. Invest in civic education for all. Redesign public participation processes so renters, younger citizens, and underrepresented communities all have a seat at the table. These strategies would help turn a damaged political system into one that more younger people find worth voting for.

Media coverage of President Trump’s 80th birthday generated a familiar round of ageist headlines that miss the point. Age is a data point, not a proxy for competence. What matters is what elected officials believe, say, and do. Mandatory age cutoffs would remove qualified people from consideration while failing to address legitimate concerns about political stagnation or obstacles for younger candidates. To make meaningful progress toward more competent leadership, how about deploying campaign finance reforms and considering term limits?

Myth #3: Older people are hoarding jobs.  

When jobs are scarce, older and younger people may indeed compete for the same jobs. But that’s a labor-market problem, not a too-many-older-workers problem. Older people are damned if they do and damned if they don’t. If they stay on the job, they’re greedy and thoughtless. If they step off the treadmill, they’re sucking up more than their share of resources, mooching off younger workers, and leaving nothing in the pot for those who follow.

Again, language is not neutral. “Hoarding” suggests that older people are staying on the job for selfish reasons. In fact, a recent survey from AARP showed that the primary reason older people are working or looking for work is to cover basic expenses. They cannot afford to retire. And if they’re forced out of the workplace, who’s going to support them?

Furthermore, the fundamental premise – that one group should get out of the labor force to make room for another – is false. Economists call it the “lump of labor” fallacy. The number and nature of jobs is not fixed. People seldom compete for the same jobs across generations. Higher employment among older workers is associated with higher, not lower, employment among younger workers. As the OECD has highlighted, early-retirement policies harm the entire labor force.

The false narrative that older people hoard wealth and opportunity reinforces harmful stereotypes and marginalizes millions, especially the most vulnerable among us. The more energy we waste on generational finger-pointing, the less likely we are to join forces across generations, demand a society that supports people at every stage of life, and chart a path to get there.

Despite Moyn’s assumption that we must be adversaries, we’re committed to advancing a more equitable world for one of us to grow old in, for the other to grow older yet, and for all who follow to inherit. We see intergenerational solidarity as not only a moral imperative, but an economic and social necessity. Because if we’re actually going to solve some of the gnarly problems facing our country and our planet, we’re going to need all ages on board.

Ashton Applewhite – author of This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism and co-founder of the Old School Hub – speaks globally about why and how to dismantle ageism. Arielle Galinsky – co-founder and CEO of The Legacy Project, Inc. and a board member at CoGenerate – is an MPP/JD candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School and Yale Law School.