China's Age Bank

[pegkerr]

Here's a really excellent and elegantly simple idea being put to good use in China: Volunteers log time with the elderly, so they can in turn get care as they age. This reminds me of my earlier post here where I asked people to post comments passing along ideas that made the world a better place.

Comments

[knitmeapony.livejournal.com]

Oh MAN do I wish they had that in the US.

[snippy]

We do, it's just broken (partly because we threw out the old morality system--for very good reasons--and haven't yet found a good working substitute). It's called a family. Not the 50s US standard model of a couple who moves far from their parents/aunts/grandparents/cousins and brings up children with no connection to the small community of the tribe through which to form connections to the larger community of your town or state or country, but the old (and prone to abuse of the individual) style extended family where you were cared for and valued for your lifetime contributions to that family's wellbeing, because you took care of the kids who had chicken pox while the adults were providing a living. It's harder to keep an extended family going when you split it up, because it's harder to bring up enough kids to keep it going when you divide the resources among many, separated households.

[knitmeapony.livejournal.com]

I don't particularly have a wish or a want for an extended family. I live rather close to the vast majority of my family; frankly, I don't care for a good number of them. I've taken care of cousins, I've crashed at my godmother's house when my parents were out of town, etc. etc.

I don't want kids, I won't be having them. My sister isn't terribly keen on the idea either, and unless something radically changes I'm not sure she'll be having them either. Family isn't an option for a goodly number of folk. A program like this could be ubiquitous and open to everyone, not just people lucky enough to be able to tolerate (or even like!) those they share genetics with.

[aome.livejournal.com]

I wonder if that will shift the current trend to abandon daughters to the orphanage system? Part of the reason for that is because sons are the ones expected to care for elderly parents; daughters move away to live with the husband's family (and care for HIS parents) so if a family has a girl, they have no one to care for them in their old age. In China's system, that's very important, so that's one of the reasons why boys are valued so highly. If the elderly can start to find care from other people, perhaps they will start to keep their daughters?