We’ve all been there. You sit slack-jawed swiping and swiping past dozens of movies you’ve seen/want to see/added to your queue all in the hopes of selecting one to watch. But that doesn’t happen. Your friend is late to meet you at the bar, so you sw…
In September of 2014, we caught our first glimpse of a slick Mr. Fusion replica just like the one Doc Brown had on his DeLorean time machine. The catch at the time was that the replica wasn’t available just yet. We sort of lost track of that cool replica and it has now surfaced again at ThinkGeek.
The top of the device is hinged and opens to allow you to drop make-believe fusion material into the base. It even makes sound effects when you switch it on.
It appears to be the same replica we saw last year, this time you can get it in stock right now for $399.99(USD) at ThinkGeek. That certainly isn’t cheap, but awesome movie prop replicas rarely are.
I went to a great baseball game on Sunday — in Seoul, South Korea. As my son Luke had told me, baseball is getting bigger and bigger in Korea, and several Korean players have now come to play in Major League Baseball here in the U.S. The Doosan Bears are the best team in South Korea, and they do play very good baseball, but what I most enjoyed was the amazing singing in the stands with fans harmonizing to beautiful team songs. I’ve never heard that at an MLB game.
But the 26,000 fans on hand was smaller than the membership of the Myungsung Church where I preached that Sunday morning — 100, 000 members! And the singing was powerful there too.
What brought me to Korea was a unique “Global Forum for the Future of World Christianity.” Held on Jeju Island, off the coast of South Korea, the conference was hosted by three of the largest megachurches in South Korea (and the world) including Myungsung Church. That means this Korean conference of evangelical and Pentecostal leaders from around the world was financially independent from American evangelicalism’s money and political ideology. Wes Granberg-Michaelson, who attended and wrote about the gathering for Sojourners, pointed out that for the first time in 1,000 years, more Christians are found in the global South than the North. The center of Christianity has dramatically shifted, and that means the agenda was very different from the northern and western agendas of the older white evangelicals in America and the issues they think most important. Korea could play a particular and convening role as a bridge between the churches of the global north and south.
In sharp and grateful contrast to the old ideologies of global North evangelicals, these global South evangelicals spent their time together wrestling with issues of global economic inequality, the realities of climate change, the imperatives of racial justice, and the need for Christians to wage peace instead of war. Since these are the issues that global evangelical and Pentecostal constituencies are facing in their own lives — and of course, the Bible addresses all of them as central issues Christians need to confront — the narrow, white American evangelical agenda had no interest in this global evangelical and Pentecostal forum. The fact is that they represent a different evangelical world.
Phillippe Ouédraogo, a pastor in the African nation Burkina Faso, has pioneered an intensive educational program that reaches children 9-12, two-thirds of whom are girls, which is now transforming his whole country’s educational system. He was there in Korea. So was young Bishop Joshua Banda, whose HIV/AIDS initiative in Zambia is transforming his nation’s health care systems. They and the many other evangelical and Pentecostal leaders I met in Korea are putting their personal faith into practice.
I was asked to keynote the gathering by answering the question: How do we take personal faith into the public arena? Their passion is for public discipleship. And the 40+ years of Sojourners’ mission for an evanglically rooted public discipleship is very appealing to them. Time and time again they said “You’re an evangelical committed to social justice and that’s what we want to be too.” They were clearly not interested in the political identity of white American evangelical leadership that has yet to seriously address issues of justice as central to Christian faith — issues like global economic inequality, climate change, racial justice, moving away from more and more American-led wars.
Many of us feel politically homeless in America, but are committed in solidarity with our sisters and brothers in the global South whose political agenda is defined by the needs of “the least of these” around the world.
I preached from Luke 4 and Jesus’ first sermon at Nazareth announcing bringing the good news to the poor as central to his mission and therefore to ours. When I said, “Any gospel that is not good news to the poor, is not the gospel of Jesus Christ,” the congregations responded AMEN!
Rev. Young Hoon Lee, pastor of the world’s largest congregation, Yoido Full Gospel Church, named the growing gap between the haves and have nots as a central gospel issue and called out the rich, saying they should “die to themselves,” reject the “idol” of wealth, and serve others, as the epistles call Christians to do.
How refreshing it was to be in the presence of leaders of faith — heads of these huge churches that represent millions — who are more interested in the needs of the poor and the call of Christ than in being “conformed to this world” and its shallow interests or reducing gospel concerns to a few hot button social and sexual issues. Their wider global evangelical agenda rings true with black and brown evangelicals in America and a new generation of even white evangelicals emerging in America.
Both globally and here in America, these emerging leaders give me hope. They are leaders like Hana Kim, son of megachurch pastor Rev. Kim Sam Whan, who contrasts the “lifeboat ethics” of American evangelicals with the “presence of God” in the global public square — and, who, incidentally, did his PhD on the social ethics of Sojourners. They offer wonderful examples that young leaders here should note.
Thanks Be To God, for a new generation of global evangelical leaders. And for the chance to watch such good baseball on the other side of the world!
Jim Wallis is president of Sojourners. His book, The (Un)Common Good: How the Gospel Brings Hope to a World Divided, the updated and revised paperback version of On God’s Side, is available now.
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There may be a women’s history museum on the Washington Mall, if some powerful and generous people have their way. But Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney told me recently, the timing and location have yet to be determined. In the meantime, preparations, lobbying, and fundraising go on with intensity.
One recent fundraising event was held at the Mead Center of Arena Stage on May the 11th. Organizers described the event and those special women who were honored:
“Dr. France Córdova Is the first woman to serve as president of Purdue University and as NASA Chief Scientist; Chief Cathy Lanier is the first woman to serve as Chief of the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Police Department and first Commanding Officer of the Department’s Office of Homeland Security and Counter-Terrorism; and Dr. Ellen Ochoa is the first Hispanic woman to lead the Johnson Space Center and the first Hispanic woman to fly in space.
All these women were celebrated at the National Women’s History Museum “Women Making History”- gala held at Arena Stage Monday night. Joan Bradley Wages, President & CEO of the National Women’s History Museum, said “these exceptional women and their accomplishments serve as testament to the fact that gender need not be a factor in deciding what to pursue in life.
Founded in 1996, the National Women’s History Museum (NWHM, Inc.) is a nonpartisan, 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to educating the general public about the diverse historic contributions of women and raising awareness about the critical need for a national women’s history museum in our nation’s capital. The Museum’s goal is to build a world-class, permanent museum on or near the National Mall that will herald and display the collective history of American women. As the result of legislation signed into law by President Obama in December, 2014, a bi-partisan Congressional Commission for a national women’s history museum has been created and charged with producing a feasible plan to include the governance, estimated cost, location, and organizational structure of the Museum. NWHM is funding the commission – the first privately funded commission for a national museum.”
It may take a while to establish such a museum in the nation’s capital — it took generations to establish many of the museums and monuments already in place. But the backers of this project are determined to succeed.
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Beans on toast, bangers and mash, and other traditionally British foods are what the soon-to-be oldest sisters in the world say are the secret to their longevity.
Photo of the Latham sisters pictured in May 2015 from left Gladys Camp, Phyllis Friend, Doris Latham, and Freda Latham.
Together, the four have 391 years of wisdom and life experience between them, with twins Freda and Doris just celebrating their 101st birthdays. Gladys is 96 and Phyllis is 93. They’ve seen over a dozen prime ministers come and go, and are all older than Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. And, yes, they are all still going strong.
Their secret? A “healthy” British diet (probably not fish and chips) and avoiding spicy foods. Having lived through both World Wars, the sisters said the tough times meant they didn’t have any unhealthy foods available to them due to rations, so they opted for home-grown vegetables.
Their parents both died in their 70s, but the quartet also lost two sisters, who they say lived close to 100. It was a simple life that they also credit for their longevity. “It was the way we were brought up -– I am positive of it. Today they have all spiced up things and I don’t think it does you any good,” Gladys Camp told SWNS.
“We had some lovely times all together when we were children,” she said.
The sisters plan to have their achievement recognized by the Guinness World Records. A spokesperson told The Huffington Post that they have not yet received an application from the sisters, but “of course welcome an application for the title.” They confirmed that the oldest current record for highest combined age of four siblings is over 388 years, also from a UK family. Just earlier this year, we wrote about the world’s new oldest twins, 102-year-old sisters Glenys Thomas and Florence Davies, also from the UK.
There must be something in the water.
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Life in the Boomer Lane doesn’t need Mother’s Day to think about her own mother. She does that all throughout the year. She lost her mother four decades ago, before her mother could have experienced the joy of grandchildren. LBL would have liked to have been the kind of person her mom was: selfless, loyal, uncomplaining, a great cook. Instead, she got other attributes, which she is still trying to figure out. So, in honor of Mother’s Day, she presents to you some of the differences between her mother (Mildred) and herself.
(A note to her mother: If, wherever you are, you are reading this, be so kind as to leave a comment. LBL has been contacted, after death, by her mother-in-law, her dog, her cousin and other assorted people who she didn’t even know very well. Never by you. She still deeply regrets the scare she gave you when she stayed out for hours, playing the pinball machine at one of the neighborhood grocery stores. Please contact her.)
Mom would have gone without eating to make sure LBL had enough.
LBL would have cut the (generous) crusts off the peanut butter and jelly sandwich, scarfed them down, and told her child that she had done them a favor by presenting them the sandwich in that tidy way.
Mom would have spent her last dollar on something for LBL.
LBLwould have spent her last dollar on an ice cream for her child, after sampling all of the flavors in the ice cream store. Then she would have asked for a bite of her child’s ice cream.
Mom never uttered one word about the hardships of her life.
LBL entertained her kids with a comedy routine about life’s tragedies, wrote a blog post about them, told all of her friends in great detail and then increased her meds.
Mom never had the need to hire a babysitter while LBL was growing up.
LBL had a parade of sitters come to the house, some of whom arrived wearing ankle monitors.
Mom would never have considered feeding LBL anything other than a home-cooked meal for dinner.
By the time LBL’s kids were teens, they had developed a real preference for any food product sold in cardboard boxes.
Mom would have sat up all night worrying if LBL had ever stayed out too late.
LBL fully intended to stay up and worry, but then always fell into a blissful, sound sleep.
Mom always made the world a less scary, less complex and a less daunting place for LBL.
LBL will have to check with her kids to see if that was the case for them. If the answer is positive, she’ll let you know. If not, you’ll never hear about this again.
Mom truly believed the wonders of the universe all resided in LBL’s eyes. And that was all she needed in life.
LBL also believes the wonders of the universe all reside in her children’s eyes. But she also requires manicures and online shopping.
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As journalists, we dutifully report on what’s going wrong, from scandals and corruption to natural disasters and social problems. But far too often the media fails to show the whole picture, neglecting to tell the stories of what is working. From scientific breakthroughs to successful crime-reduction initiatives, the What’s Working Honor Roll highlights some of the best reporting and analysis, from a range of media outlets, on all the ways people are working toward solutions to some of our greatest challenges.
Positive News: Young people are changing perceptions about mental health in Lebanon
Nearly everywhere, there is a stigma surrounding mental-health issues — the notion being that if you suffer from a particular mental-health disorder, you should keep it to yourself. It’s a stigma fueled by unjustified shame that feelings of anxiety, depression and other symptoms of mental illness are not normal.
But in a world where hundreds of millions of people struggle with mental-health problems, what are we being so quiet about?
Young people in Lebanon are challenging the shame first hand. And the country, where approximately one in four people has struggled with a mental-health disorder, is seeing a remarkable shift in the way its citizens think and talk about mental health. That’s all thanks to the country’s youth, who are teaming up with non-governmental organizations and local non-profits to raise awareness about mental health and make it acceptable to talk about.
Support group “Embrace,” for example, recently released a video challenging common and distorted Lebanese views of mental health. Advocates are also pushing for better medical care and a greater emphasis on legislative support for mental health issues.
“If awareness is the first step toward change, Lebanon’s young generation are starting a brave journey,” Positive News’ Federica Marsi writes.
MORE:
PRI: How do you save the whales? Slow down the ships
Think Progress: The World’s First Solar Road Is Producing More Energy Than Expected
If you know a story you think should be on our Honor Roll, please send an email to our editor Catherine Taibi via catherine.taibi@huffingtonpost.com with the subject line “WHAT’S WORKING.”
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Imagine if you lost your internet service. Picture having no email capability and access to net-based information for days, even weeks. Yikes! How would the loss of the internet affect your daily work?
But now let’s thicken the plot. Imagine if your job was the emergency feeding of millions of people following a natural disaster. You would need to organize and communicate quickly and effectively with others. At this point, internet is far more than just a luxury or convenience. Lives depend on it.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP), the largest hunger relief organization, makes internet connectivity a top priority when disaster strikes. Basic internet, that many of us take for granted, is often damaged or not available in afflicted, impoverished areas.
After the earthquake in Nepal last month, WFP quickly dispatched a team of technical experts to restore internet communications. They are called the Emergency Telecommunications Cluster (ETC).
The WFP’s Emergency Telecommunications team restoring internet connectivity in Nepal that had been lost following the massive earthquake. (WFP/Mariko Hall)
This elite team allows WFP and partner agencies to have internet capability as they help earthquake victims. This enhanced communication helps fuel the effort to feed millions of people. This leads to food in the hands of a hungry child. It means WFP rations delivered to a family that has lost all its food supplies and income.
The better the communication, the more effective the relief response. WFP officer Mariko Hall explains,
“The response community needs internet for uploading assessment data, for example, and ordering relief supplies. They use our services for communicating with their teams in other field locations, with Kathmandu and also their international headquarters. They also use our connectivity for communicating with their families, which helps them to maintain pace in these challenging situations.”
Samaritan’s Purse, one of the charities operating in Nepal, says the internet is their lifeline. It helps them speed the delivery of aid. In the days after the quake, Samaritan’s Purse said, “For people so hungry that they have been digging scraps of food out of the rubble, there was no time to waste.”
Food, blankets, and kitchen kits will meet the needs of earthquake survivors who lost everything. (photo courtesy of Samaritan’s Purse)
Daniella Malave, Programme Coordinator with Samaritan’s Purse, says,
“With the internet, we can communicate with headquarters to swiftly make decisions, or with heads of different districts and other NGOs to coordinate the response. It is crucial that we all have access to the same information, and work from the same information, to avoid duplication and ensure the best response possible.”
After the earthquake hit Nepal, many roads were damaged and filled with debris. This poses a huge problem for moving food aid around the country.
The WFP logistics web site and mailing list keeps tracks of which roads are open or closed. The relief agencies can access this information, including maps. This helps plan how to move the food aid most efficiently and quickly to where its needed.
WFP relies entirely on voluntary donations to provide food aid and these crucial internet services. It’s vital the international community provide the funds so this humanitarian aid is available.
The internet is an amazing tool for communication. We see the best example of this in the conflict and disaster zones of the world. For when it matters the most, internet communication is literally a life-saver.
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Jeb Bush, former Republican governor of Florida, was asked on Fox News by host Megyn Kelly, “Knowing what we know now, would you have authorized the invasion (into Iraq)?”
“I would have,” he answered.
By now, the widespread criticism of his statement, even from many conservatives, has been apparent. His “I would have” is not the problem, though. The problem is that — well, okay, that is the problem. It’s a terrible problem, but what I mean is that it wasn’t the only problem in the interview, and he made it worse. But sure, it’s a problem. Knowing what we know now — that there were no Weapons of Mass Destruction hidden in Iraq, and the supposed evidence we were given about Saddam Hussein trying to buy yellowcake in Niger was actually a lie — it’s sort of ghastly that Jeb Bush says he would still have sent war troops into Iraq.
But without almost skipping a breath, so as not to let the viewer linger on that, he immediately continued, “And so would have Hillary Clinton, just to remind everybody. And so would almost everybody that was confronted with the intelligence they got.”
Here’s the big problem with that — that wasn’t the question. The question, very clearly, began, “Knowing what we know now.” And what we know now is (again) that there were No Weapons of Mass Destruction hidden in Iraq, and it was a lie that Iraq was trying to buy yellowcake to make weapons.
But even that’s problem. This is a tale, after all, of continuing to get it wrong.
For instance, next, his disingenuous obfuscation gets even worse when he rambled on explaining that the real problem with the wrong intelligence (and, again, to be clear, it wasn’t just “wrong,” it was a lie) is that we didn’t establish security in Iraq. No — the real problem with the wrong and lying intelligence is that, had it been accurate, we wouldn’t have gone into Iraq in the first place! And we wouldn’t have had to stay there for over 10 years, spent over $2 trillion and had 4,500 Americans killed. (And over half a million Iraqis, including civilians.)
But that’s not the problem, either. Because somewhat smugly, almost seeming pleased with himself, Jeb Bush added, “So just for the news flash to the world, if they’re trying to find places where there’s big space between me and my brother, this might not be one of those,”
Just for a news flash to Mr. Bush the younger, not having a big space between you and your brother on the Iraq War is not the great selling point you think it is, and you’ve given a great news bite to your opponents, given that an NBC/Wall Street Journal/Annenberg poll just last year showed that only 22 percent of Americans feel that the Iraq War was worth it. And given that according to a CBS/NY Times poll your brother left off office with an approval rating of that same 22 percent, you really might want to be pro-active and get in front of the news to make incredibly clear all those places where there is a massive space between you and your brother. Because if the public is left to decide on their own whether a Jeb Bush presidency will just be a continuation of your 22-percenter brother, that’s just not going to fly.
At least knowing what we know now…
And remarkably, that isn’t the problem either.
Because several days after sitting down in friendly territory on Fox News and giving an answer that has gotten scathing responses, even from conservatives, to a question that was not only incredibly easy, but should have been obviously expected and prepared for when you’re the brother of a former president, and then a full day after that interview went public, Jeb Bush asked for a mulligan, a do-over, a second-chance to get the question right, “Knowing what we know now, would you have authorized the invasion (into Iraq)?”
And the thing is, even with days to think about it and craft a proper, indeed impeccable reply, Mr. Bush the younger still got his answer wrong.
Whereas before he said, “I would have,” and tried to suggest that all candidates would have, he now raised his hand for the teacher to call on him for a second chance — with his carefully crafted response after sitting down with his advisers since he knew that a “Okay, what I really meant…” reply was needed. Actually, he didn’t even wait to be called on — he called on himself, himself. He called Sean Hannity’s radio show (even far friendlier territory than before, sort of the safe room of the save haven “Fox News”) to give his side of…well, his side.
And what Jeb Bush and his foreign policy experts carefully came up with as a much better reply was —
“I interpreted the question wrong, I guess. I don’t know what that decision would have been — that’s a hypothetical. Simple fact is, mistakes were made.”
People do misunderstand questions. Though how on earth do you misinterpret “Knowing what we know now, would you have authorized the invasion?” And bending over backwards to accept that you did misinterpret the question, what does that say about your ability to interpret questions if you ever became president, especially since this wasn’t under stressful circumstances but as easy a question as they come? And what does it say about your ability to correct a misunderstanding when this is the best you and your advisers can come up with after a few days to think about it and carefully craft a reply?
First, where on earth did the “I guess” come from? Are you saying you did interpret the question wrong — or you aren’t sure, but just guessing maybe not? And secondly, agreeing that mistakes were made is not a simple fact, it’s a matter of opinion, and one that I suspect not every conservative agrees with. And further, if mistakes were made, and it’s a simple fact…what were those mistakes? But mainly, while yes, that is indeed a hypothetical question, it’s still a brain-dead easy one: knowing what you know NOW, would you have authorized an invasion into Iraq where we KNOW now there are no hidden weapons of mass destruction, and where we KNOW now it was a lie about yellow cake being bought in Niger, and where he KNOW now that 4,500 Americans were killed, we KNOW that over two trillion dollars were spent, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis including citizens were killed and we absolutely KNOW that were entrenched there for over a decade?
And Jeb Bush’s answer, knowing all that, now, and after days with his experts to think about it, was “I don’t know.”
Seriously? He still doesn’t know?? Perhaps that makes him the Undecider.
Of course, his uncertainty might be the result of how most of his foreign policy advisers are the very same men who crafted President Bush’s war plans. And therefore are not terrible willing to have Jeb Bush say anything different. So much for him being his own man…
(Side note: While Mr. Bush was disparaging about this being a hypothetical question, it’s worth noting that pretty much every question he has gotten and will get about what he’d do “if” he became president…is hypothetical.)
Worse still, though, lost in all this is that the bad part of his initial, terrible answer from days before isn’t just that originally he said, “I would have.” It’s that he also said — “So just for the news flash to the world, if they’re trying to find places where there’s big space between me and my brother, this might not be one of those.”
So…maybe even if he says he misinterpreted the question, it doesn’t appear that anyone else misinterpreted his original answer.
I say “original answer” because when he called in to say that he misinterpreted the question…he didn’t give a different answer. Apparently, he just wanted a do-over on what he was asked.
And news flash to the world, here’s the correct answer to the question which the judges were looking for, when you’re the brother of the guy who started a war that only 22 percent of Americans now say was worth it. And that reply is —
“Hindsight always makes everything easy. If we were able to know the results of all our actions before we made them, life would be so much easier, wouldn’t it? But that’s not how life works. And when you’re president and called on to make monumental decisions every day, life doesn’t given you the luxury of living it hypothetically You can only act on the information you’re given. And while based on that information I understand and agree on acting as we did, same as most people acted, including Hilary Clinton, but given the miracle of looking a decade into the future and knowing what we all know now, and knowing now that so much of that information turned out to be wrong — I don’t think most anyone would have authorized the invasion based on that information, and that includes me. But I think what we’ve also learned in these same past 10 years, especially with the instability still in the region, the continuing threat of Iran, and the growth of ISIS, is that we now know that there are other powerful reasons which justify invading Iraq.”
Bonus answer: for everyone else, the correct answer is, “Knowing what we know now a decade later that our information from experts was wrong, no, of course I wouldn’t have.”
Not that this would do any good, of course. That’s because Jeb Bush continued to screw around with how to answer this easy, basic, totally expected question, and it just keeps getting worse. Because he then told a questioner in an audience — who wanted a new answer to the now correctly-interpreted question — that he now wouldn’t even answer such a hypothetical question since it would be disrespectful to the troops.
Actually, he’s wrong. It wouldn’t be remotely disrespectful if his answer was, as he first said, “I would have” still invaded Iraq. So, perhaps he’s suggesting that his answer is, in fact, no. But the reality is that even that isn’t disrespectful to the troops. It’s just hypothetical. What is disrespectful is having actually sent troops to a war where they never should have been sent, that was based on a lie.
Yet it gets even worse! (No, really.) Because later, Jeb Bush actually, finally answered the question he said was disrespectful to answer. And he said, knowing what we know now — no, he wouldn’t have invaded Iraq. But…but…it gets worse still. (No, really, honest.) Because he immediately followed that by saying – it was still a good idea because it got rid of Saddam Hussein and made the world safer. So…well, that sounds like a “yes.”
Mind you, he didn’t say how it made the world safer, other than getting rid of Saddam Hussein. But since Iraq was destabilized, never formed a substantive government, was weakened as a deterrent against Iran and opened the door for the creation of ISIS, it’s really not quite clear what on earth Jeb Bush means, or if he even knows what he means.
Honestly, I don’t dislike Jeb Bush. I think he’s one of the more thoughtful candidates the Republican Party currently has. (Which should tell you something about the candidates that the party currently has.) But he has no foreign policy experience, and he’s been out of politics for eight years. Indeed, if you looked at his job qualifications to be president, leading the list is “Father was a President. Brother was a President.” But by that standard, I should be up for consideration by the AMA for my medical license. Next on the list of qualifications is, “Was governor of Florida,” one of the most dysfunctional states in the union.
It was a bad weak for Jeb Bush. And no, that is not a typo.
That’s the problem.
*
To read more from Robert J. Elisberg about this or many other matters both large and tidbit small, see Elisberg Industries.
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If you’re over 50, or ever will plan to on it, Australia is the place to be the first week in June. Quite remarkably, one of Australia’s most important and successful companies — AMP, an Annuities Financial Services Company — is transforming its Sydney (national capitol) and Melbourne corporate offices into “learning campuses” for the nation and the world. And chief among its “learning paths” will be how to transform our longevity — the most massive and transformational megatrend of the next 40 years — into a driver of business creativity, innovation and economic growth. Wow, and you thought growing old was about gloom and doom. Turning the received wisdom on its head, AMP has been breaking ground with its Amplify Festival.
What’s really cool about AMPLIFY is that it’s about business innovation, market disruption and the virtues of economic growth from which a thoroughly optimistic view of population aging is born. They’re of course not alone as we see companies from Intel to GE, AEGON to Nestle Skin Health, Home Instead to Bank of America Merrill Lynch increasingly putting this “aging thing” at the center of their considerations for growth strategies. No doubt each of them paid some attention to the S&P 2010 Global Aging Report, which after all is a basis for S&P Rankings and not an inconsequential barometer.
Of course, there is context in all this, with Australia itself at the cutting edge of this demographic shift. A small country by population of roughly 25 million, when 5.5 million are today, you know there is a need for profound and fundamental structural shift from what was so comfortable in the 20th century. Not surprising, therefore, that as the nation continues to benefit from longevity it will get to the point where by mid-century we can expect close to 40% of the population to be over 65. No wonder the Australian government is beginning to prepare: by 2035, it will raise its official, national retirement age to 70. Or that the government has also recently passed a law that gives cash incentives for employees who employ those over 50 and out of work. This is not social policy, but really good economic and fiscal policy — what seniors across the globe want and need. Policy many of their Asian neighbors – China, South Korea, Singapore and Japan might well want to have a closer look.
Getting to Australia is a wonderful vacation. But if you’re interested in healthy and active aging, this June around Amplify would be a great time to go. You’d have lots of fun, learn something, and be part of one of the most invigorating national innovation forums anywhere on the planet. And if you’re over 50 you’d be particularly welcome, as is clear from AMP’s Chief Customer Officer, Paul Sainsbury so clearly says, “As older people leave the workforce they take with them their skills and experiences, while many younger people are struggling to find work. As a consequence it might mean that young people are not getting the experiences to do their jobs in the future”. Not if Amplify has anything to say about it!
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