Globalization, Poverty And Old Age: Why Should We Care?

The experience of ageing is becoming more globalized. Older persons are moving across the world for various reasons: joining their adult children in foreign countries; migrating to big cities or warmer climates; returning to their country-of-origin or distantly caring for other ageing family members. However, from an economic perspective, in many countries, older persons still suffer from poverty. Especially in developed countries, the aged population is characterized by high rates of poverty and deprivation. This general picture hides a more complex socio-economical reality in which minority or weakened social groups, such as women, disabled, or the older old, experience even higher rates of poverty in old age. An ethical argument is presented for the moral duty to eliminate poverty in old age. This principled argumentation will attempt to go beyond the existing general and universalistic reasoning that supports the eradication of poverty as such, and will try to emphasize the uniqueness of the social phenomenon of old age.