Tell HN: your next idea should focus on aged care

Post by binary132 » Sun, Jul 14, 2024, 2:41 PM UTC

CapricornNoble wrote: post #118

linotype wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if I did want to have kids, I wouldn’t have them to take care of me in old age. What if they move to Japan? Should I have them move back to the US to take care of me? Nah, we should build a society that can and does take care of its elderly.

I moved to Japan 13 years ago. My mother developed early-onset Alzheimer's in 2021, and I'm her only child. I relocated her to Japan. It has been immensely stressful but I know she's getting better care and this also avoided the US healthcare system completely bankrupting our family and robbing us of our chance to build multi-generational wealth. But living in a country with an outsized elderly population/terrible de…

Post by mindslight » Sun, Jul 14, 2024, 5:11 PM UTC

binary132 wrote: post #121

mindslight wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A society based on individual agency and transactional dynamics is foundationally incapable of communally taking care of elderly people as they lose their faculties. Some family member or other personally-invested party has to be involved to represent the interests of the elderly person, many times even clashing with the immediate whims of the person themselves. Leaving this dynamic to third parties in the biz create…

To be fair the transaction is supposedly something like “old person has added value all their life and now receives some return on investment” but in reality the past (along with other elements of their personhood) typically just disappears once someone loses agency, unless they have a committed and devoted advocate. Even illness or injury are enough to dehumanize someone, since they make it harder to self-advocate a…

Post by carlosjobim » Sun, Jul 14, 2024, 7:19 PM UTC

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #79

lolinder wrote: post #9

> or wiping his butt Slightly weird take: bidets have this field fully covered and the only thing stopping them from being widely used (especially in this domain!) is user resistance to an unfamiliar solution to a very personal problem. We don't need new tech for this, we just need a marketing breakthrough.

> bidets have this field fully covered No, they don't. This "let them use a bidet!" stuff is an asinine response that is literally the equivalent of "let them eat cake." Elderly people who need someone to wipe for them are usually either completely physically immobile where they're not exactly strolling to the toilet in any case, or they're wearing diapers, or they're so mentally declined they basically forget what t…

Post by carlosjobim » Sun, Jul 14, 2024, 8:49 PM UTC

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #127

carlosjobim wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you have to sacrifice one of two people. Either the old who cannot take care of himself, or the caretaker who has to waste their life taking care of the old.

Tell me you've never taken care of a loved one without telling me you've never taken care of a loved one...

Post by binary132 » Sun, Jul 14, 2024, 11:53 PM UTC

mindslight wrote: post #124

binary132 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair the transaction is supposedly something like “old person has added value all their life and now receives some return on investment” but in reality the past (along with other elements of their personhood) typically just disappears once someone loses agency, unless they have a committed and devoted advocate. Even illness or injury are enough to dehumanize someone, since they make it harder to self-advocate a…

> the transaction is supposedly something like “old person has added value all their life and now receives some return on investment” What you're describing isn't really a transaction though? This dynamic can only exist from family and other longer term personal relationships.