[ta1357]

For about the last decade or so, I've held on to the idea that there ought to be a maximum age for elected officials. Ideally, in my view, 60.

As I myself have aged, and watched those around me age, I'm really quite struck by just how many people reach 68 or so and spend an inordinate amount of time looking back, fondly, on their prime years. It seems incredibly natural for that sort of nostalgia to arise, as the body decays. I can't help but think it also leads to "back in my day..." style thinking, and the mythical "golden past" to which we need to return.

When you've reached such a mental state, I suspect you're no longer as capable of thinking critically about the future as someone younger, someone who still has a future. You've got no skin in the game anymore, and when that happens you're no longer fit to serve in any decision making capacity. Act as advisor, absolutely. But without skin in the game, you'll do precisely what our gov't has done: mortgage our future for gains today, and completely screw over coming generations.

It's a weak rationale, I admit. Borne of my own biases against the status quo, for sure.

Still I can't help thinking its a good idea. An enforced retirement age for elected officials would be in public interest.

[codingdave]

If you think older people have 'no skin in the game', you are severely underestimating the value that most older folk place on the quality of life that will be enjoyed by our children, grandchildren, etc.

[emodendroket]

Looking at the government one could be forgiven for the impression that this is not the case for most elected representatives.

[aaron-lebo]

It sounds like something a youngster would say. I bet they are in their 20/30s.

Not to mention, 60 is pretty damn young. You're cutting off people in the prime of their maturity, especially with longer lifespans. Teddy Roosevelt died at 60 and one of his greatest regrets was that he peaked too soon, and that was a century ago

Changing age limits is just a bandage on a bigger wound, which is that US society struggles to produce quality leadership. But that's what dominating the world for a generation will do, it makes you soft.

[grasshopperpurp]

If you're not a selfish person, and you get old, assuming you still have your mental health, you'll use the wisdom you accrued to benefit the world; if you are a selfish person, you lack wisdom, and you'll use the knowledge and tricks you acquired to leech the most from the world before you mercifully die.

>Changing age limits is just a bandage on a bigger wound, which is that US society struggles to produce quality leadership. But that's what dominating the world for a generation will do, it makes you soft.

I agree with this, but I'd replace soft with relentlessly selfish. Instead of realizing the need to work together to make something better, they're in it for personal gain.

[aje403]

Elderly people are not soft. Elderly senators caught the tail end of WW2 and the Cold War. Relentlessly selfish refers to young people who think believe mother nature itself entitles them to the newest iPhone, free housing, healthcare, and debt forgiveness with less financial awareness than the senators they're complaining about.

[grasshopperpurp]

1. Never said old people are soft. 2. Never said old people are more selfish than young people. 3. I hope this is a simple misreading on your part, rather than a deliberate attempt to twist my words. 4. Your portrait of young people and their situation is just a Fox News hot take.

[aje403]

"I agree with this, but I'd replace soft with relentlessly selfish. Instead of realizing the need to work together to make something better, they're in it for personal gain."

Please do not use the phrases "simple misreading" or "deliberate attempt to twist words" to describe anyone else

My portrait is pretty objective - please get deported to some other countries so you can find out what living conditions are and what "in it for personal gain" turns into in the rest of the world. Our system is really not that bad, even taking into account the malevolent actors

[Joeri]

which is that US society struggles to produce quality leadership

Is it a lack of quality leaders, or a lack of electing said leaders?

The more I look at the U.S. the more I think it has only a single political problem: the winner-takes-all voting system. With an ability to form coalition governments the two party system would die, and with it many of the decades-long incumbencies.

[erentz]

I think there’s something to be said for an limit. A term limit on congress of 12 years might be the easier and more straight forward option. This would probably resolve 80% of the age problem as they’d run over their term before they got too old.

[aaron-lebo]

There's some poli sci research that suggests the main effect of term limits in California is to bump people upstairs to compete for positions they aren't worthy of and removes capable leaders from their positions artificially.

If your electorate isn't wise enough to kick a bad leader out after 12 years (remember, even today the average term is below 12 years), then maybe that's a problem less with the representative of the voter and more with the voter.

That's the big problem here. Political leadership is pretty miserable, but who is electing them? They're just a reflection of society. Kick them out and it is more of the same.

Proposition 140, an initiative narrowly passed by California voters in November 1990, imposed sharp limits on the terms of California legislators.1 These limits will have a dramatic impact on that legislature as an institution. Internal structures such as leadership, committees, parties, and staff will be weakened or made external. This weakening of legislative structures will force most external players, including interest groups, to expend substantially greater resources for a return diminished in effectiveness and predictability. Put simply, the cost of doing business will increase while the return will decline. This combination is likely to advantage groups with both resources and a stake in state government but to discourage participation, divert efforts elsewhere and encourage cheating by others.

Here's an abstract. This stuff is pretty easily Googleable if you are interested.

Also more newsy:

http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/op-ed/bill-whalen/article31032...

[erentz]

I suspect the reason people don’t kick out politicians anymore is increasingly its difficult to do. This seems to be a fairly reasonable interpretation of the above data too. In the past politicians were unseated more frequently leading to shorter average terms. Now they’re rarely unseated leading to longer terms.

Seats aren’t contested enough because of the massive amount of party support or funding required to beat a sitting person. And we’ve seen how these two parties are corrupted and need to care less about the public opinion now. Less options means less choice for voters to do what you suggest.[1]

Of course I think the real solution to that is election reform with single transferable vote (STV).

[1] though we seem to be seeing some backlash in the past year against this such as with the Justice Dems movement.

[labster]

Agreed that term limits have not been a force for good in California politics.

Imagine you had a law that no programmer or engineer could work at your company for more than 6 years. You could keep them employed, but they'd have to transfer to a difficult department, like sales or legal. Also your product is over 20 years old. Does this policy sound helpful?

[lele92n]

That’s the flip side of term limits. Doesn’t mean the advantage isn’t worth it

When they say “weakening” that seems like an emotionally overloaded choice picked for cultural resonance.

Is it really a weakening or just a new model to acclimate to and tweak as needed to ensure outcomes?

Why is giving any ground or change always coming along with “we won’t be strong in the same way!” rhetoric

Duh but that doesn’t negate the argument for change given other data over here

We’ve yet to discover a unified theory of reality

I highly doubt our system of social governance has found an equivalent

It has to change. It will change if history is any indicator

Better to have the conversations ourselves then leave it up to experts across the world

[imjustsaying]

The problem with 2-term limits is that the official has more of an incentive to loot as much as he possibly can as soon as his second term begins because he doesn't have to worry about spinning the looting to voters anymore.

However, I do recognize that the looting probably occurs anyway without fear due to the high likelihood of incumbent re-election.

[ekianjo]

> An enforced retirement age for elected officials would be in public interest.

The problem with elected officials is not with age: most of the time their actions are motivated by self-interest (what benefits them or their cast at the end of the day). I would rather want to see complete transparency of their actions/lives/bank accounts and enforce some level of responsibility for everything they do.

[jcadam]

Bah, I still say service in Congress should be like jury duty. Anyone who meets a certain minimum set of criteria (age, criminal record, education, etc.) is placed in a lottery and names drawn at random from each district. It should be something undesirable that you do because it's your "duty."

You serve one term and then you go home.

[Analemma_]

Yes, because what we really need in Congress is people with even less understanding of the issues they're regulating than the ones we have now. Have you ever watched a reality TV show? That's the "median American" that you're proposing be put in charge of Congress.

[greedo]

A variation on Cincinnatus...

[fredley]

To counter that argument: with age comes experience. People who are 65 have witnessed a huge amount more history than people who are 35. They have seen the cycles of the World turn more times, they have more understanding of human nature and how people respond in irrational ways to policy.

(However, I do agree with you that there should still be a maximum age, how you would introduce it - especially to a political system where it would cause almost every elected official to lose out - is beyond me)

[rubicon33]

It's almost as if - gasp - we need a balance of power!

Perhaps a system in which a "House of Future", and "House of Past", compete for resources (votes) would help promote a government that was conscious of making investments that support not JUST the aging generation (house of past).

[fredley]

This is overcomplicating the underlying truth: in the US and other places we have representatives that are not representative.

[aphextron]

>To counter that argument: with age comes experience. People who are 65 have witnessed a huge amount more history than people who are 35. They have seen the cycles of the World turn more times, they have more understanding of human nature and how people respond in irrational ways to policy.

To counter this, these people's life experience is entirely of the 20th century. A world of linear growth and clearly defined national boundaries where information can be controlled. I think because of this that anyone's "experience" is now not only completely irrelevant, but a liability. We live in a whole new world which absolutely no one understands yet, and the only traits which should be desired in a leader are adaptability and the ability to innovate. Something which old people necessarily lack by definition.

[RcouF1uZ4gsC]

> We live in a whole new world which absolutely no one understands yet, and the only traits which should be desired in a leader are adaptability and the ability to innovate.

You could have made that same statement with justification in the 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries.

The hard part of running a country, is not managing technology and ideas, but managing people. While technology may be fast changing, people are much, much slower to change. No matter what the technology landscape, a lifetime of experience in dealing with people will always be helpful.

[danso]

> We live in a whole new world which absolutely no one understands yet, and the only traits which should be desired in a leader are adaptability and the ability to innovate. Something which old people necessarily lack by definition.

I'm interested in where you've found the definition of "old people" to necessarily mean a lack of adaptability and innovation.

[greedo]

What a crock. This would be like me discounting my grandfather's experience in 1980. My grandfather started flying biplanes, then moved on to Pan Am Clippers, finally retiring after flying the 707. The idea that his experience would be a liability is nonsense on stilts.

[maxxxxx]

"Something which old people necessarily lack by definition."

Where does that definition come from?

[dragonwriter]

> To counter this, these people's life experience is entirely of the 20th century. A world of linear growth

Er, no. An earlier spot on the same exponential curve, but there hasn't been a “world of linear growth” in the West since the Industrial Revolution. Maybe, more properly, the preceding Second Agricultural Revolution.

> and clearly defined national boundaries where information can be controlled.

Not really; the breakdown of that feature was recognized and commented on widely throughout the 20th Century, notably in the context of:

(1) the rise of international revolutionary communism,

(2) the rise and increasing dominance of multinational corporations,

(3) the rise of international Islamism

[fredley]

To counter this: that's exactly what someone with relatively little experience would say!

[nostromo]

I wonder if Berkshire Hathaway should have forced Warren Buffett to retire at 60, 17 years ago.

For reference: he's more than quadrupled his investors' money in the years since he turned 60.

[maxxxxx]

It would have been prudent of him to train a replacement much earlier. He still could advise but the risk of him dying suddenly and leaving the company leaderless increases with age.

[aperrien]

Berkshire Hathaway is a private business entity, not a public government with whom we all are required to interact with.

[AQuantized]

He's 87, so that would be 27 years ago.

[nostromo]

Thanks for the (huge) correction.

It's interesting that the vast majority of Warren's wealth came after he turned 60.

[Shounak]

Maybe inflation is part of the reason for this

[toddsiegel]

Everyone deserves representation, even the older folk (if 60 is even old anymore). I don't think 40-year-olds understand very well the needs of these people (and vice versa, as you point out).

Term limits is a much better solution.

[scottlocklin]

Term limits make more sense to me. Ideally a term limit of 1 term. Also the Athenian method of picking representatives by lottery.

[spc476]

My girlfriend is a former US government employee and she's afraid of term limits because then the power will shift to the non-elected bureaucrats who know the system ("Oh, don't worry! I've worked for the previous five Congresscritters before you. Here's what you do ... ")

[DanAndersen]

If the concern is politicians without skin in the game, how about we instead forbid electing anyone without children? If someone is just an individual without a family or looking toward leaving a legacy for their future offspring, perhaps they're more likely to be over-individualist and not even think about coming generations.

[ClassAndBurn]

I agree. Their knowledge and insights would be better as advisement to a new generation of leaders so there can be a continuous learnings and new ideas in government.

[danso]

As the median age of Americans grows [0], having an age limit would make it increasingly difficult for the demographics of Congress to match the general population.

[0] https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/07/us/graying-of-america-is-...

[maxxxxx]

I think 60 is a little early but I would definitely force-retire them by 70 or 75. I would also set a max age for being president. There is already a min age so why not a max age?

But I think your point that old age doesn't make people think about the future is not correct. I don't see a difference in behavior between different generations regarding tax policy, deficits or environment.

[SonicSoul]

Interesting idea and points but I can think of this judgement point age event horizon varying +-15 yrs each way for individuals so maybe there is another way to determine when someone has passed it ? Sort of like a driver test for policy makers :)

[imjustsaying]

Older people objectively know more.

[kickopotomus]

To a certain extent, sure. However, as you age, mental acuity and memory both decay. People in their late 60s+ are not as mentally capable as they were decades prior.