Is There a Bridge Across This Gap?
Age is having a moment.
Globally, people over 65 make up roughly 10 percent of the population. In the U.S., that number is closer to 17 percent, up from 10 percent in 1970. Society and companies are clearly recognizing the impact and buying power of the baby boomer generation.
My Medicare card only just arrived this month, but the longevity revolution that is happening all around us feels, in many ways, like fortunate timing.
At the very same time that age is being celebrated in one part of our culture, I am watching something very different play out much closer to home. Intellectually, I knew I would be here. An older mom, I had my son at 39. I always understood that one day I would be stepping into Medicare and Social Security just as he was getting started. But being in this moment, the overlap, and how it feels on so many levels, is unexpected. It gives me pause.
My son, like so many of his peers, is finding today’s job search process extremely challenging. He followed the path we guided him on. He went to a remarkable local academy that did more than educate. It shaped him, teaching him how to think, how to write, and how to carry himself with a sense of responsibility to others. He went on to Miami University, built real skills, took internships seriously, and graduated ready to work. He stepped into a structured and demanding role as an assistant bank examiner, gaining valuable experience, even if it was not the right long term fit. And then he kept going.
He earned his MBA at Cleveland State University, completing a program that can take more than two years in just 12 months. He graduated with a GPA high enough to be inducted into Beta Gamma Sigma, an honor reserved for top business students. He also completed a sales training certification through Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, focused on selling skills and sales operations.
If there were ever a version of doing things right, this would be it.
And yet, here we are.
He is trying to find his footing in a job market that does not feel like the one our generation stepped into. It feels less like a ladder and more like a wall. Or maybe more accurately, a roadblock.
I have been reading more about this, trying to understand what is different. One thread shows up consistently. Traditional entry points are more elusive than they used to be. Fewer true starting roles. Higher expectations from day one.
When I was starting out, there was a path. It was not always easy, but it was visible. You got in somewhere, you learned, you proved yourself, and you moved up.
Today, that first step feels less defined. More selective. Sometimes harder to even find. And there are so many candidates vying for limited opportunities. Job search platforms and algorithms have reduced human connection in the process. If your resume or LinkedIn profile is missing the keywords the system is looking for, it may never even be seen. Roles that once served as training grounds are fewer, redesigned, or absorbed by technology.
Meanwhile, there is a separate but related reality.
A growing recognition that a significant concentration of wealth, power, and influence is held by older generations. Top publications, Fortune, The Atlantic, The Washington Post, WSJ, and New York Times are buzzing with articles and op-eds highlighting the fact that Americans over 55 control 70 percent of the country’s wealth, and a large share of power and economic influence.
Fashion is leaning into this moment as well. Another recent piece in The Star described how older women are gaining visibility and relevance, from magazine covers to campaign imagery to fashion runways. It described a recent cover of Vogue featuring Meryl Streep (Devil Wears Prada 2) and Anna Wintour (Vogue’s long tenured and celebrated Editor-in-Chief), both in their seventies. Luxury brand runways tell a similar story, with women in their fifties, sixties, and beyond, gray hair, minimal makeup, unaltered.
Clearly, we are not going anywhere, or “Elsewhere.” If you’ve read or seen The Giver, you know.
At the very same moment I am watching my son try to break through, I am stepping into a phase of life where I am part of a generation sometimes described as having too much, or remaining in our homes too long, not freeing them up for young families.
I also have the good fortune to have the time, curiosity, and energy to learn something entirely new.
Artificial intelligence.
I find myself drawn to it. Energized by it. Working hard to understand it and even build with it in ways I never would have imagined a year ago. And if I am being honest, there is a tension there I did not expect. I cannot ignore the possibility that some of the very tools I am excited to embrace may also be part of what is making that entry point more complicated for my son and his peers. A recent WSJ article pointed to this very phenomenon. The unknowns around the AI revolution are a bit unsettling for all of us.
So we are left to figure this out in real time.
What it looks like. How it works. How one generation makes space while still having something meaningful to contribute. There is something refreshing about the honesty of this moment. But it also reinforces the reality. We are still visible, still relevant, still holding space. And that comes with responsibility.
This is not a clean handoff. It is overlap, maybe even compression.
My son is trying to find a way in. I am part of a generation that is still very much inside. And somewhere in the middle, I am learning tools that may be part of both the challenge and the opportunity.
Those of us standing on the inside have a role and a duty to widen the path. Making space where we can. Pulling others forward when it is within reach. Trying, in whatever ways we can, to make sure that doing everything right still leads somewhere.
Meanwhile, young people are figuring it out, forging their own paths, and still looking to us to meet in the middle. The bridge is not something that will magically appear on its own. It is something we build, intentionally, imperfectly, and together.
Not someday.
Now.
