Adults Make Riskier, More Inconsistent Decisions As They Get Older, Study Finds

schliz writes "People aged over 65 make poorer financial decisions and more inconsistent choices than younger individuals with the same IQ, an international research group has found. The study (abstract) had 135 healthy participants aged 12-90 make a series of decisions: for example, choosing between gaining $5 and the chance to win $20 in a lottery. On average, over-65s earned 26-39% less than all other age groups, including adolescents — a finding that could partially explain their susceptibility to problem gambling and scams."

Comments

They've got money to burn

[BenSchuarmer]

and they have to get rid of it somehow.

Re:They've got money to burn

[CanHasDIY]

OR, they're more worried about fiscal security at the end of their lives, and fear of things like being shoved in a crappy nursing home and having all their possessions sold off frightens them into taking risks they wouldn't otherwise consider.

Not all people over 65 are rich, you know; fact is, most are quite the opposite.

Re:They've got money to burn

[ebusinessmedia1]

"On average, over-65s earned 26-39% less than all other age groups, including adolescents — a finding that could partially explain their susceptibility to problem gambling and scams."

Might this have something to do with the fact that age discrimination is ripe in the workplace. Try landing a well-paying corporate gig if you are over 60, no matter your skill set. It's nigh impossible. And, with decreasing job opportunities for workers over 60, one can imagine that some significant minority of them become more desperate to the point where they begin to consider irrational alternatives to making ends meet. Of course, this doesn't eliminate the fact that very senior individuals - some with excess money to burn, use that money to fill the ever-increasing, yawning gap of boredom and disconnection in their lives brought on by the social isolation of the elderly in our culture. So, I think this is more of a structural problem.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Because of gambling problems and scams.

Re:They've got money to burn

[yagu]

... Might this have something to do with the fact that age discrimination is ripe^W rife in the workplace ...

FTFY

Re:They've got money to burn

[h4rr4r]

A lot of that isolation is self enforced. Of course no one wants to visit great-grandma when she just wants to scream racist gibberish about the president and homophobic crap about your cousins. Old people often have beliefs that are simply not compatible with living in a modern society. You can't take them into public if you fear they may call your waiter the N word or go on a tirade about the jews when you are trying to get groceries.

Re:They've got money to burn

[TWiTfan]

...or their memory goes, they get confused more easily, and they get targeted by con artists who specialize in bilking the elderly. Saw it happen to my grandpa. We finally had to lock down his accounts and appoint my uncle as a conservator. He was signing over his pension checks to every gypsy that came to his door. Then he would call his sons up, confused that his checks were suddenly bouncing.

Re:They've got money to burn

[pla]

Might this have something to do with the fact that age discrimination is ripe in the workplace.

No. No, it might not. Know know I can tell you didn't even make it all the way through the FP summary? :)

TFA means that number as only in the context of this one experiment, not as a generalization about the incomes of the elderly.

Re:They've got money to burn

[realityimpaired]

My (german) grandmother has advanced alzheimer's, and is has reverted pretty much to her childhood. On a good day, she's in her 20's (which covers the period from 1939-1945). She has been known to wax poetical about Hitler, and has interesting ideas about homosexuals, gypsies, and the jews.

I still visit her. I leave my girlfriend at home when I visit her, and smile politely when she tries to introduce me to men she knows (knew back then). One time, she tried to hook me up with my uncle. At family events, my GF is "a good friend who didn't have anybody to visit" for the benefit of my grandmother. You may choose to sweep the elderly under the rug, I choose not to. We can still be compassionate in how we treat them, and there are constructive ways to deal with people who hold beliefs that we disagree with.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Not all people over 65 are rich, you know; fact is, most are quite the opposite.

Your "soap line" America where the elderly eat dog food is a fiction that exists in the minds of dupes that swallow the lamentations and whining of pressure groups. The US elderly are the wealthiest class of people in the history of the species. They've voted themselves a nice suite of bennies to offset the cost of their fifth wheels, boats and cabins. Today, as in Oct. 1, 2013, they've managed to bridle their grand-kids to fund even more healthcare; a cost they did not pay for their own elders.

Erratic financial decisions are a symptom of excessive disposable wealth.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

They are talking about earning less on this test. I doubt that the test had anything to do with workplace discrimination. They were all taking a test where they could chose things like "take $5.00 now" and "take a chance on winning $20.00 but get nothing if you don't win". This was where they were earning. So there is no way anything to do with real workplaces factored into it.

Re:They've got money to burn

[bitt3n]

OR, they're more worried about fiscal security at the end of their lives, and fear of things like being shoved in a crappy nursing home and having all their possessions sold off frightens them into taking risks they wouldn't otherwise consider.

The study says fogies prefer less risk.

Compared to other age groups, older adults tended to prefer to lock in guaranteed earnings over gambling on a bigger win.

Now you can turn your theory around to make it about how the poor elderly are fearful of losing what little they have etc. etc., should work just as well for you.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Money to burn indeed, as evidenced by John McAfee.

Re:They've got money to burn

[macraig]

You didn't interpret even TFS correctly: the "earnings" were from the game to which the participants were subjected. It nothing at all to do with their employment prospects.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Dr. Sheldon Cooper]

You can't take them into public if you fear they may call your waiter the N word or go on a tirade about the jews when you are trying to get groceries.

I have had both of these things happen to me on more than one occasion. Each time it was as if the world went in to slow motion and I could not get my mother out of the area fast enough. At one point in a particularly awkward situation I seriously thought someone was going to punch my 73-year-old mother in the face. No matter how many times I try to explain to her that she MUST stop speaking that way, she just doesn't seem to get it, or she just doesn't care.

Re:They've got money to burn

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Also, Soylent Grey tastes lousy, so they don't even have that going for them.

Re:They've got money to burn

[h4rr4r]

There are beliefs we don't agree with and then there are people who would rather see you dead.

Imagine if your grandmother found out about your girlfriend, what would you do then?

Re:They've got money to burn

[CanHasDIY]

Fair enough.

Re:They've got money to burn

[lgw]

You may have odd grandparents. On the whole, I find there's as much to learn from previous generations as there is to discard.

There's this growing, worrying tendency on the left side these days to simply dismiss out of hand anyone who says anything against orthodox beliefs. Yes, it's perfectly possibly that someone who thinks gays are bad has valuable insights to offer in unrelated areas of life, if you can keep an open mind about cultures different from yours.

Of course, the right has always had this problem (and how!), but there at least for old people it's balanced by the natural tendency of conservatives to value "old ways". We could really do without the close-mindedness in both camps, but it's somehow more disturbing on the left.

Re:They've got money to burn

[skids]

...though that could have been a pun on the aged. Or half a spoonerism.

Re:They've got money to burn

[icebike]

Just as likely, the older folks saw thru the research and a painless way to bet on a big score, something they seldom actually do in
real live.

As for unacceptability to scams, you really only see this in people new to the internet or who never had to deal with dishonest merchants before, perhaps because a deceased loved one took care of that for them in the past. Unless there is an under lying dementia problem old folks are harder to fool than kids, or even 20-somethings.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Not all people over 65 are rich, you know; fact is, most are quite the opposite.

Your "soap line" America where the elderly eat dog food is a fiction that exists in the minds of dupes that swallow the lamentations and whining of pressure groups. The US elderly are the wealthiest class of people in the history of the species. They've voted themselves a nice suite of bennies to offset the cost of their fifth wheels, boats and cabins. Today, as in Oct. 1, 2013, they've managed to bridle their grand-kids to fund even more healthcare; a cost they did not pay for their own elders.

Erratic financial decisions are a symptom of excessive disposable wealth.

Dude, i am as pissed about what the baby boomers have done to this nation as any other person not in that generation, but seriously, stop being an asshole. It is not a myth that their are many poor to lower middle class folks (particularly women and minority) folks over 65 that have to worry greatly about how they are going to end their days. I am only 45 and doing decently and I am panicked about it, and my poor mother is doubly so (while my rich asshole father is happily frittering his days away and donating to tea party assholes).

A lot of folks over 65 were just as screwed by the fat cats that made sure their retirement was going swimmingly while passing the cost on to others. There is significant desperation even amongst the baby boomers and for the same reasons. Only they are less able to distract themselves, if only because they are literally less physically able to do so. Why to you think old age alcoholism and suicide are such issues? Is it because they are so rich that the worldly ennui is killing them, or is it maybe that they can no longer deny how fucked they are? appreciate your youthful self confidence while you can, it gets harder as you get older, unless you are one of the lucky rich ones.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

As a member of the over 65 set, I have only one word for your drivel: Rubbish!

Re:They've got money to burn

[h4rr4r]

Actually I was speaking about inlaws, but whatever.

I think I did not explain adequately, they don't want to talk about anything else. They only want to discuss what that seekrit mooslim ursurper has done now to hand over the country to the devil or how your friends and family will rot in hell for being gay or whatever. They have no interest in discussing valuable stuff, just whatever they heard from similar nuts.

I never mention I am an atheist for example, I don't want to fight about it, but they have to start trouble with these other topics.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

> The study says fogies prefer less risk.

I don't know what you mean by "prefer".
The summary/title of the /. article says they take more risk.

Re:They've got money to burn

[icebike]

Mod parent up.

That's pretty much the way I read it too.

Old folks don't necessary look at the world as a place where you buy a few shares of Apple or Google and wait for it to grow, or where you throw money into a gambling addiction expecting your luck has to turn someday.

The author tries to spin simple fiscal conservatism as something irrational. But older people know the odds are always in the houses favor, and are less willing to play that game. Sounds like the people with gambling addiction were the people writing the story.

Re:They've got money to burn

[ShanghaiBill]

The study says fogies prefer less risk.

Not quite. The study found that geezers are less willing to take a risk to win, but more willing to take risks to avoid a loss. In many cases they were avoiding good risks and taking bad risks. Overall, they were making worse decisions than younger people when either accepting or declining risks.

Re:They've got money to burn

[steelfood]

No, both TFA and you are conflating two different issues. Actually, there are three issues at play, two of which are mutually exclusive and the other two are related but not exactly the same.

Over 65 is retirement age. You're not socially expected to work anymore (though you may still need to). So the fact that seniors take more risks has nothing to do with age discrimination, which has the greatest effect on people between 55 and 65, i.e. below 65. Falling for a con is not the same as gambling, but the elderly are more susceptable to being conned as well.

The second line of thought is more reasonable: it's psychological. They're not interested in the losses incurred from risk, but are more interested in the off-chance of a reward. Because face it, the safe way has been done for 65 years already, i.e. they're bored with their life so far. In fact, that's pretty much how they got to retirement age. So they're more willing to incur a big loss if it also means a big reward.

The fucked up thing is that like all other things, it's easier to recover from a loss when younger than when older. So it's actually better to take these types of risks in youth, especially financial ones. What people calculate in their heads to largely stem this however, is that if they take a life-changing risk at 35, they could be living for 50 more years with the consequences of the risk (or 0 more years if the consequence is death). However, if they take the risk at 65, not only are they only going to live with its consequences for only 20 years, a 30 year reduction, they'd have lived 30 more years consequence-free (alive, in the case of death).

But I'd also say it's largely a product of natural selection. Early risk takers don't always survive to have children. So with every generation, only the less-risk prone members of society remain to pass their genes on.

Re:They've got money to burn

[TWiTfan]

After what they did to my grandpa, I guess they'll just have to suck my dick then.

Re:They've got money to burn

[cayenne8]

You can't take them into public if you fear they may call your waiter the N word or go on a tirade about the jews when you are trying to get groceries.

I have had both of these things happen to me on more than one occasion. Each time it was as if the world went in to slow motion and I could not get my mother out of the area fast enough. At one point in a particularly awkward situation I seriously thought someone was going to punch my 73-year-old mother in the face. No matter how many times I try to explain to her that she MUST stop speaking that way, she just doesn't seem to get it, or she just doesn't care.

So, I'm guessing there were a bunch of blacks around you when she started saying the word nigger, and you were afraid of them punching her? Was she not aware of her surroundings at the time?

Re:They've got money to burn

[ShanghaiBill]

Not all people over 65 are rich, you know; fact is, most are quite the opposite.

The typical U.S. household headed by a person age 65 or older has a net worth 47 times greater than a household headed by someone under 35. This wealth gap is now more than double what it was in 2005 and nearly five times the 10-to-1 disparity a quarter-century ago.

Re:They've got money to burn

[jeffmflanagan]

LOL, you just reminded me of how my grandmother was. There was no stopping her going on about the Jews at home or in public. I do not miss having to take her shopping and to the doctor.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

That happened to one of my elderly relatives. The correct answer is: nothing because they won't remember tomorrow. For a while, we passed the point of spite and would let her know what happened and she would go off and the rant was almost word-for-word identical every time. Then it transitioned to pity. But now there is some solace in the fact that, even though many people her age are racist, homophobic, etc. at least she doesn't bow to societal pressure and keep her mouth shut. Speaking your mind is something I can respect.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Hoi Polloi]

I've already taken that into account with my death plan, whore-house heart attack.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

taking a knife and cutting some real balls off should guarantee the warm house that his/her pension scheme did not.

Re:They've got money to burn

[h4rr4r]

Speaking your mind is fine, being hateful is not.
If you don't like group X then don't associate with them, no need to be hateful.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Reading comprehension: What part of "has advanced alzheimer's" did you not understand? If she found out, it would be inconvenient for at most the remainder of that visit. I think your bridge is calling you.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

interesting I cannot imagine any of my old folks (grandparents and my parents) talking nonsense like this. OTOH I had friends that would start talking such nonsense without being provoked into it and this after years when I did not even suspect them to be so. My aunt was like this albeit she would not go around voicing her views on jews etc.

It is not modern times that changed - being an asshole was a good fun for some and still is, only the methods and who is being generally abused changed slightly. This and access to education for those who would not know better on their own.

Re:They've got money to burn

[wes33]

"Actually, there are three issues at play, two of which are mutually exclusive and the other two are related but not exactly the same."

I am intrigued by your mathematics

Re:They've got money to burn

[mdielmann]

There are beliefs we don't agree with and then there are people who would rather see you dead.

Imagine if your grandmother found out about your girlfriend, what would you do then?

Your statement might be interesting in the general sense. In this specific instance, your point is moot. What would you have her do with a person who is literally stuck with a mentality of half a century ago, no rational discussion will change her attitude (especially once she forgets the conversation), probably doesn't remember you half the time, and quite likely has no capacity to do you harm? You would be just as wise to be outraged at her clear promotion of incest...presuming she had any awareness of the nature of her 'crime', which you clearly are.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

This reminds me of the center where my mother spent that last 18 months of her life. There was a woman who kept chanting "Nine, nine, nine!". It was like a surreal version of that awful Lenon-influenced Beatles song, only not as pleasant on the ear. One day I asked, "what's special about the number nine for her?" The answer of course is, "Nothing. It's German for 'no'". It was nein not nine. An emphatic and repetitive "no" is an almost universal response to living in such a place, even if it isn't expressed so loudly by everybody.

Re:They've got money to burn

[X0563511]

Oh? Just what did they do to your grandfather that has anything to do with the culture as a whole?

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Hunky here: I call BS. You're only offended by that which you choose to be offended.

TLDR: Fogd be a szád, rohadt cigány

Re:They've got money to burn

[bored]

Your article points out much of that gap has to do with house prices.

Which I agree with, and would like to point out that the housing market is similarly fragmented. There are a lot of places in the US where the house values continue to decline, and others where the house values are exceeding the pre bubble values. But the one trend everywhere is that the houses in the upper 1/4rd of the desirability scale are the ones going up. Its the white flight syndrome but it seems to have more to do with "class" and the ranking of individual schools and other factors than race. Basically those that were rich are even richer without any effort while everyone else is busy trying to scramble over each other to get there.

Re:They've got money to burn

[bitt3n]

so it would seem that younger people are less susceptible to loss aversion

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

The Rising Age Gap in Economic Well-Being

As per their training, the old think they're poor . That's why they have zero hesitation imposing whatever burdens they're told they deserve on whomever they're told can afford to pay.

There is nothing to worry about. Today. The regime is secure and the bennies will flow.

Right up until the currency folds.

Then the cutbacks; the PIIGS found out what that's about.

None of this is real. The whole damn nation is one giant ponzi scheme of vote buying, and it has a expiration date.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Look for a book on permutations and combinations, and you won't have to rely on wes33 anymore...

Re:They've got money to burn

[firewrought]

The typical U.S. household headed by a person age 65 or older has a net worth 47 times greater [boston.com] than a household headed by someone under 35. This wealth gap is now more than double what it was in 2005 and nearly five times the 10-to-1 disparity a quarter-century ago.

Isn't that as it should be, after working and saving all your life? Net worth includes possessions, house, savings for retirement, etc. Also, take the aging one-percenters (or the 0.1%) out of the numbers (or use median instead of mean) and I bet the disparity growth is a lot flatter. Fundamentally, there's a difference b/t being well off because you worked hard all your life and being well off because you (1) owned the means of productions, (2) bought off legislators, and (3) found a way to exploit others.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Not all people over 65 are rich, you know; fact is, most are quite the opposite.

But every Young Republican thinks they will be :)

Re:They've got money to burn

[grumpyman]

Good point. Also, $5 is much more substantial to 12 than a 65.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

That's quite offensive to Romani, you know. Gypsy is just as racist as nigger and kike...

Hardly. Most people don't even know that the Gypsies are (mainly?) FROM Romania. Gypsies are just the people who live in wagons, like a circus, but without scary clowns and cool animals. Known to be thieves of course, but so is every other large group.

Re:They've got money to burn

[QRDeNameland]

OR, they're more worried about fiscal security at the end of their lives, and fear of things like being shoved in a crappy nursing home and having all their possessions sold off frightens them into taking risks they wouldn't otherwise consider.

Well, just as an anecdote...my Mom and Dad both retired circa 1999-2000. They moved most of their retirement funds out of stocks pretty much at the peak of dot-com bubble, which in retrospect was a brilliant move as they effectively cashed out just before the market tanked.

Fast-forward to 2007-2008, and they had a good portion of their funds in stocks and got burned quite a bit in the crash (they had a substantial holding in WaMu, which didn't help). When I asked my Dad why he didn't stay in more conservative investments, he simply replied "low interest rates...the safer investments yielded squat."

I suspect that story is far from unique.

Re:They've got money to burn

[timeOday]

Isn't that as it should be, after working and saving all your life?

You ignored: "This wealth gap is now more than double what it was in 2005 and nearly five times the 10-to-1 disparity a quarter-century ago" even after you quoted it! Some disparity is desirable (since people bulk up savings for retirement) but why has it grown so fast and so large?

I can tell you this, my dad worked at a company extremely similar to where I work, and he is enjoying a retirement I will never have, at least without extreme sacrifice now which he did not do. He got a full pension and pre-medicare healthcare benefits - both things that my employer has cut since after I hired on here. I tell him about it and he's kind of surprised. I can't blame him personally. But in general old people are just cruising along assuming nothing has really changed and "what's the matter with kids these days" that they're racking up college debt and not settling down, seemingly oblivious to the fact that they're sucking up everything in sight just by honoring the promises they made to each other back when, while failing to set enough aside to pay for them.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

That's quite offensive to Romani, you know. Gypsy is just as racist as nigger and kike...

Hardly. Most people don't even know that the Gypsies are (mainly?) FROM Romania. Gypsies are just the people who live in wagons, like a circus, but without scary clowns and cool animals. Known to be thieves of course, but so is every other large group.

Oh, and on that:
http://www.googlefight.com/index.php?lang=en_GB&word1=gypsy+thieves&word2=gypsies+and+thieves

Gypsies and thieves (aka 2 different groups) appears ~10x as often as gypsy thieves, so they're basically just the Euro-trailer park group - poor and unwanted, but unwanted mainly because they're poor.

Re:They've got money to burn

[garyoa1]

Boomers? You haven't taken a look at congress lately.

Re:They've got money to burn

[dcollins]

I fear that I'm developing Alzheimer's, because I can't tell if this thread has been Godwin'd or not.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Dcnjoe60]

The study says fogies prefer less risk.

Not quite. The study found that geezers are less willing to take a risk to win, but more willing to take risks to avoid a loss. In many cases they were avoiding good risks and taking bad risks. Overall, they were making worse decisions than younger people when either accepting or declining risks.

This is consistent with what we are taught. Look at retirement accounts. When you are young you are encouraged to take more risk and invest heavily in equities. By retirement, you are encouraged to be heavy in fixed income. Normally that is a safe position. However, since you are no longer diversified, if something happens to interest rates, you face a significant decline in value.

It has nothing to do with age and everything to do with training.

Re:They've got money to burn

[ShanghaiBill]

This is consistent with what we are taught.

No it isn't. There is no logical difference between taking a risk to win $20, and taking a risk to avoid the loss of $20. Either way, you net $20. Old people are not taking more risk or less risk, they are just taking dumb, illogical risks.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait 12 minutes until she forgets

Re:They've got money to burn

[turbidostato]

"No"

Exactly: no.

TFA is easy and clear. Conclussion: we get dumber with age.

Re:They've got money to burn

[AK Marc]

The study says fogies prefer less risk.

The study says fogies prefer *more* risk, when it comes to losses.

But when it came to gambling on a loss (where you can choose between say, a $5 loss or a chance to lose either $0 or $8), older adults took significantly more risks.

But I got that from TFA, and not the actual study, so manybe the study says something different.

Re:They've got money to burn

[AK Marc]

The author tries to spin simple fiscal conservatism as something irrational. But older people know the odds are always in the houses favor, and are less willing to play that game. Sounds like the people with gambling addiction were the people writing the story.

It indicate to me that the older people align desires differently from the laws of probability. And sometimes that means less risk, but sometimes more. What they didn't break down was that elderly are less risk tolerant for gains (one in the hand is worth two in the bush), but are more risk tolerant for losses (I don't know a good parable for here).

It isn't about fiscal conservatism, but inconsistent application of probabilities. And it's that inconsistency that was interesting.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

spoke as a true outsider, for something you don't understand you seem to be making alot of assumptions.

Re:They've got money to burn

[smart_ass]

Which makes total sense since they have less time to "win it back"

Seems fairly logical.

Re:They've got money to burn

[AK Marc]

I've had a granny say things like "you can't trust those people" when insisting I count the change handed to me by a clerk. I always did just fine by looking at the person who was being insulted and shugging my shoulders. Hopefully conveying the idea that I've educated Nana as much as possible, and she insists on acting in the manner she does. I've had more knowing looks than angry, all by acknowledging the comment to be inappropriate and my inability to do anything about it.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Spoken like someone who has never watched a loved one lose their mind to Alzheimer's.

Most people keep their hateful, racist, discriminatory, and otherwise hurtful thoughts to themselves. They do their best to bury those tendencies and be better than the environment they were raised in.

But dementia destroys that filter. People that were normal, nice, average-joe people become hateful, angry, violent monsters. They do and say horrible things. And if you confront them about it, it's like talking to a brick wall. They don't understand what they just said, much less why they shouldn't have said it. They hate everyone that looks, thinks, or even smells different than they do, and you're one of them , so get out of their sight before they chase you down like the animal you are and kill you with this hatchet! (Nevermind the fact that the "hatchet" is a rolled up TV Guide. Or that they're likely to fall flat on their face when they try to take a step, which is why they're strapped into a wheelchair with a seatbelt and an alarm pad under their butt. Or that their hateful rants are the saddest thing you've ever witnessed in your entire life.)

It's great to speak your mind, but when you've lost your mind, you're just speaking.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Fogies, geezers .... what's wrong with using a nice neutral term for the old?

Like coffin-dodgers ...

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

we now have a consumer-society, people stopped saving and started getting into debt in order to afford optional luxuries like exotic travels, a new phone every year, etc

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

You're probably american. Elderly people get free money from the government in all those weird countries outside America. Kinda hard to be poor when your "salary" does not depend on doing actual work, and there's no way of firing you.

Re:They've got money to burn

[WhatHump]

You are lucky - it sounds like your grandmother is quite gentle. My grandmother spent her last two decades of her life in the fog of dementia (she lived to be 94). She was not so gentle. Even though she was only 4 1/2' tall she was physically violent toward other nursing home residents. She would accuse them of stealing her stuff and would attack them, sometimes striking them with whatever object she could grasp, leaving them bruised and bleeding. She did not recognize her own children and did not see the need for using a toilet. While I had a lot of sympathy for her situation, I stopped visiting her after she threw a glass of juice at my father. I wonder if I will end up the same way - my aunt is beginning to show some symptoms, but my father so far seems to be okay (touch wood).

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Ouch ... did I just say that.

Hey smart_ass, guess what a question mark is for? That's right - it's a not-so-subtle hint that you use them when asking a question.

Now; tell me what's wrong with your sig. Hmm?

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Not quite folks (I have Nursing Experience)! Old folks have the following things happen to them. (Get ready it will happen to you)
(1) They realize that they are not going to live for ever so they tend to lose interest in those forever things like investments and such
(2) They start finding that they get touched less and loved less and generally withdrawn from the world of the living so they reach out trying to get back
(3) The also tend to judge things by what happened a long time ago and they don't realize the new processes and things. This is like modern debit vs checking of old times.
(4) Fun becomes harder to get and more important.
(5) They are denied the most important human right to be usefult to themselves and to others as they retire and this makes them seek to be involved in things that make for at least the feeling of contact.
Now this has to be foreign to the /. types. It is fact and it is well documented and well known. The best illustration was a Lady brought in to our nursing classes to talk to us. She was stunningly happy, most friendly and energetic about spending time with her family and doing good with others. She had terminal cancer. She remarked that all those things that worried her like the Mortgage didn't matter any more. She wasn't going to live but another 2 or 3 months. What on earth did a 30 year mortgage mean. It was a fiction.

Now there are stunningly important things to learn here about our national politics as well as our national ideas about how to interact with business and such. I will not fill these all in but we need to consider these deep issues. Not everything is the "hottest app" or that killer new technology. Maybe a lot of things are human.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Notabadguy]

I don't think that age has anything to do with this, but rather it's a generational and educational issue.

The CURRENT old timers (and those through the 90s) fall victim to phishing, scamming, etc because of their educational, knowledge, and savvy. The generation of mostly tech-savvy people who snicker at Nigerian Princes are going to grow old, and at the ripe age of 70, when the Prince of Nigeria offers them money, they're still going to snicker/wheeze/chuckle/tell him to get off their damned lawn.

Re:They've got money to burn

[X0563511]

The only "gypsy" I've met is a wonderful person, so you can fuck right off.

Re:They've got money to burn

[TheCarp]

> less risk tolerant for gains (one in the hand is worth two in the bush)

"No guts no glory" and "You can't take it with you" both seem apt.

> It isn't about fiscal conservatism, but inconsistent application of probabilities. And it's that
> inconsistency that was interesting.

Is it really inconsistent? I mean yes, changing, but, is the change necessarily inconsistent, perhaps they are entirely consistent with a different model of risk, one which takes into account things like the fact that they could be dead or disabled in a few years? Or like the fact that they don't have to worry about losses in other areas....a retired person doesn't have to worry about getting fired.

If I go out and get too drunk to work the next day, or pick up HIV, I have to worry about losing my job or dealing with lifelong medical consequences, they will not be effected income wise, and lifelong may only be 5 or 10 years, with no guarantee that they will be healthy enough to make this "bad decision" again, whether they do it or not.

Risk is not the same for all people at all times. Is a person who can't afford to gamble choosing to not gamble, inconsistent when he gets a better job, can afford it, and does? I would say thats actually consistent application of risk analysis.... output changing with input changes is not inconsistency.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Just as likely, the older folks saw thru the research

Us older folks know how to spell "through", as in "I threw the ball through the hoop". You dumbassed kids would write "I thru the ball thru the hoop." It really looks retarded to a geexer's eyes, kid. Just a heads-up.

As for unacceptability to scams, you really only see this in people new to the internet or who never had to deal with dishonest merchants before

They get taken by phone scams as well, and they've had phones all their lives. What's different is that these days, the 1% have taught youth that stealing and lying are perfectly all right, science doesn't matter, spelling doesn't matter, math is useless and all that matters is how much money you can steal, whether you steal it legally or illegally. We geezers haven't figured out that honesty is as out of fashion as spelling.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

In engineering, "Thru" is often used as a replacement for "through."

Re:They've got money to burn

[mcgrew]

Neither you, nor the submitter, nor the editor actually bothered to RTFA apparently. Rather than making riskier decisions, TFA says we geezers are risk-averse, and part of the reason is so many of us are fucking BROKE. Haven't you seen that bumper sticker "RETIRED... no food, no gas, no money. Haven't you heard the phrase "why do they call it a fixed income when I'm always broke"?

By the time you've lived over half a century and been crushed like a bug under a shoe numerous times, you're going to be more careful, too.

That said, of I have more money than I did when I was 25. You've never gotten a raise?

Re:They've got money to burn

[mcgrew]

Try landing a well-paying corporate gig if you are over 60, no matter your skill set.

I'm 61, I retire next year. I don't WANT to work, a young guy can have my job. That said, I do know guys older than me who were working under the table (not paying taxes) and will have to work until they're dead.

Of course, this doesn't eliminate the fact that very senior individuals - some with excess money to burn, use that money to fill the ever-increasing, yawning gap of boredom and disconnection in their lives brought on by the social isolation of the elderly in our culture.

What social isolation? Even my parents aren't socially isolated. Geezers aren't treated as pariahs in our culture, what are you blabbering on about? If you're infirm you may be socially isolated, but that has nothing to do with age.

Re:They've got money to burn

[mcgrew]

Of course no one wants to visit great-grandma when she just wants to scream racist gibberish about the president and homophobic crap about your cousins.

You make the very mistaken assumption that everyone dies of alzheimer's, when most geezers do not, in fact, get that disease.

Old people often have beliefs that are simply not compatible with living in a modern society.

And you make the mistake of thinking that old folks haven't seen radical change all of their lives. My grandmother was born 3 months before the Wright brothers took off, in a world where most people lived exactly like they had a thousand years earlier, and hers was the first generation of radiacl change. When she was 5 few had seen an airplane, there was no radio (except morse code), most people had never seen an automobile, and the Cubs won the world series. before she died she'd ridden on airplanes, owned cars and radios and TV sets and microwaves and all those things that simply didn't exist in her youth. Just because you're old doesn't mean you don't keep up. My mom's 84 and has a computer and a cell phone and a flat screen TV.

You can't take them into public if you fear they may call your waiter the N word or go on a tirade about the jews when you are trying to get groceries.

Again, your view of the elderly is really fucked up. Most simply aren't like that. Yes, racism was rampant in their youths and they were as racist as the rest of society when they were young, but guess what? My dad, who thought nothing of calling a man a "nigger" when he was your age stood up in court shortly before he retired and testified against his employer for a co-worker who had filed a discrimination lawsuit.

Times change and people change with them. Read this book and see how much different the world was in 1930 than in 1920.

Re:They've got money to burn

[AK Marc]

Is it really inconsistent? I mean yes, changing, but, is the change necessarily inconsistent,

The actual paper is paywalled. The impression from the article is that it's mathematically inconsistent, but could be, as you point out, psychologically consistent. Elderly are gain averse (less likely to play the lotto), but not loss averse (willing to lose $5 to prevent a small chance of a $20 loss). Mathematically, one should be both, or neither. Psychologically, there's no "need" to be both or neither.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

"Dumb" is such a broad, useless term. The study shows that aging changes the thermostat on your ability to evaluate risk and reward. It's a very specific change in your cogitation. It may lead to suboptimal decision-making, but it's hardly the same as a general intellectual decline.

Re:They've got money to burn

[mcgrew]

Dude, i am as pissed about what the baby boomers have done to this nation as any other person not in that generation

"The older generation had certainly pretty well ruined this world before passing it on to us," wrote one of them (John F. Carter in the Atlantic Monthly, September, 1920), expressing accurately the sentiments of innumerable contemporaries. "They give us this thing, knocked to pieces, leaky, red-hot, threatening to blow up; and then they are surprised that we don't accept it with the same attitude of pretty, decorous enthusiasm with which they received it, way back in the 'eighties."

F.L. Allen, Only Yesterday, chapter V (1931)

Re:They've got money to burn

[turbidostato]

""Dumb" is such a broad, useless term."

You are right. I should have been more precise.

"The study shows that aging changes the thermostat on your ability to evaluate risk and reward."

There I go: "we get more stupid with age."

Stupid: [2] Tending to make poor decisions or careless mistakes.

Re:They've got money to burn

[novium]

Roma does not equal Romanian, just FYI.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think you understand dementia...

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

What is even more scary is the internet has stripped away much of that filter (e.g. Youtube).

You go on facebook and the comments are usually fairly normal polite junk. Youtube is a whole different ball game.

Pretty much people live by the say if you do not have anything nice to say dont say it. But apparently they ignore that on the internet.

To the topic on hand. Take my father in law. He spent a decent amount of money on a ponzi scheme. Straight up ponzi. I saw it a mile off. No one would believe me. I said 'fine' here is 100 dollars to put into it. I knew I was going to lose that money (within a month it was 100% gone). However I did it to prove yeah stay away from stupid junk like that. But why did he risk nearly 5k on this thing. Some multi millionaire guy he knew 'invested in it'. People are willing to risk capital they do not really have without taking into the picture what is their risk portfolio. He fell into a trap of risk/reward. He risked much because someone who was basically risking what would be to you and me a trip to mcdonalds did so. Then once he was in he was chasing bad money after good.

I have seen many people who should know better risk it all. As you get older you get a lot more very expensive bills or wanting of 'my family to be safe'. So you take more risk on. Not good risk either. Quick turn risk which is almost always a bad idea. Like putting 1000 dollars into the lottery. When the win anything rate is 3%. Yet you could put it in something which made 3% a year. And still have your 1000 plus 30 bucks. I have seen many people do it. Usually it is almost directly correlated to how bad off they are financially. You push them on it and it is almost like they do not care. It is as if their risk level is out to lunch to what they earn. If you are getting a steady income of 100 a month. Risking 10 bucks is little as you will have 190 by the end of month 2. But if all you have is 100 bucks 10 bucks is 10% of your net worth.

People have little correlation of recurring income and net worth.

And yet I still buy that lottery ticket and put my money into the stock market. However, I am now going to move into being a landlord. There is now a whole generation brainwashed into thinking 'renting is good'. For one off things usually yes. For items you use every day buying is better. Also my skills are apparently 'useless' after 40. So I need a new job.

Re:They've got money to burn

[Anonymous Coward]

Might actually have been true at that time. Took later generations to rebuild it and build upon it.

And now the destruction begins again?

Re:They've got money to burn

[TheLink]

It's not inconsistent at all. A lot of these silly academicians clearly don't take into account that people don't live forever.

If you are old, are virtually unemployable, have no income other than from your life savings, but still need enough money to last maybe another 20 years or more it sure makes sense to be risk averse - lock in on sure wins and try to avoid bigger losses.

To take things to an extreme for explanation, if your budget is only 8 bucks a day, assuming it's a one time thing do you take a 5 buck sure loss or risk a 50% chance of a $8 buck loss (and 50% losing nothing)? With the latter there's a 50% chance that you don't get to eat anything at all for that day. With the former you can get something to eat, not much but more than nothing. Now if it's going to happen every day for the rest of your life, maybe it makes sense to go for the 50% 8 buck loss, but that also assumes you have enough savings to survive a few days or longer without money for those losing streaks - which are likely to happen assuming it's really random. Heck if you are risk averse and have found a way to survive on 3 bucks you might still prefer the 3 buck a day, than risk starving to death or going into debt. And in the real world getting into debt can be bad if it's a middling amount.

Another example: if your goal is to have tens of millions of dollars but if you are:
1) dirt poor
2) Living in a society where social mobility is low
3) Not educated with not much skills
4) Don't have that much "energy" (some people can go full tilt whole day, others not so).
Then it actually makes sense to gamble on those big lotteries!

Because the odds of you achieving your goal _within_your_lifetime_ by say working 50% harder are even lower! You can say start your own business but the ugly fact is very many new businesses fail, it's only the successes who write books and talk about their failures and final successes. And guess how long it takes for a poor person to build enough capital. There are just so many wipeouts you can recover from in your lifetime.

Now whether it makes sense to want to have tens of millions of dollars that much is a different thing. Then there's also the psychology of it (hope etc).

Re:They've got money to burn

[AK Marc]

It's not inconsistent at all. A lot of these silly academicians clearly don't take into account that people don't live forever.

It's mathematically inconsistent, but not necessarily psychologically inconsistent.

Um

[irright]

Are you supposed to wait until after you're dead to blow all your dough?

Who does these studies?

[Anonymous Coward]

Do they get paid for their "findings"? I'd like to get paid to make common sense observations, where do I sign up?

Re:Who does these studies?

[JazzHarper]

Psychology undergraduates. No, they don't get paid.

Re:Who does these studies?

[dgreer]

Hmmm... so people with no practical experience in life are judging people with massive experience on the quality of their decision making abilities. What could POSSIBLY go wrong?

Re:Who does these studies?

[Anonymous Coward]

Psychology undergraduates. No, they don't get paid.

EVER.

Psychology majors get a degree with the next lowest earning-potential , following liberal arts.

Cut the kids some slack.

Re:Who does these studies?

[Anonymous Coward]

Where does it say they are "judging" anyone?

Re:Who does these studies?

[Dr. Sheldon Cooper]

Psychology undergraduates

Dude, they judge EVERYONE.

Re:Who does these studies?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who they are or how much experience they have is irrelevant to whether or not their conclusions and/or arguments are wrong.

Re:Who does these studies?

[Anonymous Coward]

They're not being judged. They did objectively worse on the test.

Re:Who does these studies?

[turbidostato]

"so people with no practical experience in life are judging people with massive experience on the quality of their decision making abilities."

No, they aren't.

They are metering their scores on a game and studying the correlation between scores and ages.

And if all that mattered were that correlation, the one that modded you insightful would be at least 200 year old.

You reach a certain age and...

[skids]

...someday you say to yourself "Look, for my entire life I've done the 'right thing' and even now it doesn't help my joints stop aching or buy me a bowel movement, so what the hell, let's try something else."

Re:You reach a certain age and...

[h4rr4r]

I am pretty sure you can buy a bowel movement. Heck, I can sell you one right now. Would you like it shipped UPS or Fedex?
Corn or no Corn?

Re:You reach a certain age and...

[GerardAtJob]

I'm pretty sure it's the exact opposite :

You take the same turn for 30 years now : YOU KNOW IT, so you optimize it a little bit (without thinking of course... it's a natural event here)... optimize it so much than it became inconsistent and risky... optimize it too much and... you know what I mean ;)

Re:You reach a certain age and...

[Anonymous Coward]

Corn please, and extra smelly.

Re:You reach a certain age and...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's that "WTF Moment".

Assuming you live long enough to be old, there are unavoidable consequences i.e. you will all require signifcant health care intervention at some point in your life.

Regardless of your political/economic/social perspective, generalizing about people is intellectually lazy and contempt for entire generations is simply bigotry.

"Feeblemindedness"

[TWiTfan]

That's what my dad used to call it when it happened to grandpa. Grandpa went from being a shrewd businessman to being someone we had to keep an eye on at all times (he would fall for every con artist who showed up at his door). That why "Travellers" in particular prey on older people.

Re:"Feeblemindedness"

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, the same thing happened with mine. From astute oil and agriculture, to get rich gold mining "investments" that depleted capital while he claimed it didn't. It was the "attention" and "respect" of the same sort of "Travelers" that seemed to falsely persuade them of their honesty, while he believed his children were just after his money.

Re:"Feeblemindedness"

[Anonymous Coward]

My grandpa wasn't like that. He believed everyone was a crook and was out to get him. "They're all crooks, I tell you, they're all crooks" he used to say. I hope I turn out the same way.

Re:"Feeblemindedness"

[bitt3n]

"Travellers"

if saying you got gypped is now socially unacceptable, is it OK instead to say you got traveled?

Re:"Feeblemindedness"

[bitt3n]

Grandpa went from being a shrewd businessman to being someone we had to keep an eye on at all times (he would fall for every con artist who showed up at his door).

What's his address? I've got some great pills that will help him with that.

Re:"Feeblemindedness"

[ninlilizi]

Myself being a Rromani Traveller.

I would like to point out that all such racist stereotyping is unacceptable. Regardless weather you employ "cute" usage of quotation marks around proper nouns or not.

At no point should it be acceptable that /anybodies/ ethnic or racial background be a synonym for 'criminal'

(please don't mod me deep beneath the abyss... This needs to be said)

Re:"Feeblemindedness"

[hazah]

It's not the ethnicity, it's your culture. Even if HALF the shit I've seen is true, then I'm sorry to break this to you.... the 21st century has arrived, you've missed the boat, and you NEED to catch up. Pride, in this case, is detrimental to survival.

Re:"Feeblemindedness"

[Belial6]

Maybe we can move to removing the crime of "Vandalism" from all of the law books.

Re:"Feeblemindedness"

[turbidostato]

"At no point should it be acceptable that /anybodies/ ethnic or racial background be a synonym for 'criminal'"

Racial? for sure it shouldn't make any difference but, ethnicity?

Sorry if it doesn't sound politically correct to you but ethnicity and culture go hand in hand and, therefore, is perfectly possible to define an ethnicity as criminal (by others' standards): Huns, for instace, were definitely criminals by everybody else's standards. Do you find that to be unreasonable?

Re:"Feeblemindedness"

[Anonymous Coward]

No one cares.

Re:"Feeblemindedness"

[Jedi Alec]

At no point should it be acceptable that /anybodies/ ethnic or racial background be a synonym for 'criminal'

Sorry, but when I see, say, a pretty girl with a Roma appearance in a major european city approaching tourists, the odds are heavily in favor of her being a pickpocket. You might call that ethnic profiling, I call it reality.

Fuck it. Gonna be dead soon any way.....

[Anonymous Coward]

Might as well bet the farm.

I think they were just bored

[GrumpySteen]

"Each participant were faced with 320 decisions: for example, choosing between gaining $5 and the chance to win $20 in a lottery."

After a few dozen questions like that, I'd be so bored that I'd start choosing randomly without thinking about it just to get it over with. There's no way in hell I would seriously think about each and every question out of a list of 320.

Re:I think they were just bored

[h4rr4r]

Did they correct for income?

Kids and young folks are more motivated to get $5 since they have low resources. If you are retired, why not take the chance on $20 vs a sure $5 you don't need?

Re:I think they were just bored

[bgarcia]

For that matter, I think that once I reach age 65, I'll start to also become bored with life and start taking some chances here and there.

Call it "Walter White Syndrome". :-)

Re:I think they were just bored

[dgreer]

Not income, wealth. 60+ has one of the lowest income brackets, but it's the wealthiest. They already made their money, now it's time to have fun, hence playing the lotto.

Re:I think they were just bored

[Krishnoid]

"Each participant were faced with 320 decisions: for example, choosing between gaining $5 and the chance to win $20 in a lottery."

After a few dozen questions like that, I'd be so bored that I'd start choosing randomly without thinking about it just to get it over with. There's no way in hell I would seriously think about each and every question out of a list of 320.

Sounds like someone's running low on blood sugar. Seriously, though, I wonder if they considered having to correct for that effect.

Re:I think they were just bored

[Dopefish_1]

If you are retired, why not take the chance on $20 vs a sure $5 you don't need?

But TFA says exactly the opposite occurred--"older adults tended to prefer to lock in guaranteed earnings over gambling on a bigger win".

The noteworthy part of the study is not simply that the elderly made less money, but that their decisions were inconsistent and irrational.

Re:I think they were just bored

[Lynal]

Did they correct for income?

Kids and young folks are more motivated to get $5 since they have low resources. If you are retired, why not take the chance on $20 vs a sure $5 you don't need?

Yes. They would need to.

The idea is this:

Would you take $1 or a coin flip for $2?
Would you take $5 or a coin flip for $10?
Would you take $10 or a coin flip for $20?

An `irrational' person would answer (Yes, No, Yes), or (No, Yes, No). Someone that answered all Yes or all No would not be inconsistent, nor would someone who answered (Yes, Yes, No) or (No, No, Yes), those people would be labeled as risk averse then risk loving.

As someone who has to sit through a lot of talks about research like this, GrumpySteen got it right in saying:

After a few dozen questions like that, I'd be so bored that I'd start choosing randomly without thinking about it just to get it over with. There's no way in hell I would seriously think about each and every question out of a list of 320.

A great paper on the topic is the 2001 paper "GARP For Kids", which asks the same question about children, and does a good job arguing that inconsistencies decrease with age going from young to college.

Re:I think they were just bored

[bitt3n]

Did they correct for income?

Kids and young folks are more motivated to get $5 since they have low resources. If you are retired, why not take the chance on $20 vs a sure $5 you don't need?

Except the study says fogies prefer less risk.

Compared to other age groups, older adults tended to prefer to lock in guaranteed earnings over gambling on a bigger win.

Re:I think they were just bored

[skids]

An `irrational' person would answer (Yes, No, Yes), or (No, Yes, No).

Actually those answers could be perfectly rational depending on how hungry you are, how much cash is in your wallet, and which fast food restaurants are within walking distance.

Re:I think they were just bored

[arobatino]

The article and the abstract didn't specify the probability of winning the $20 (the full paper is paywalled). In any case, the article said that old people were more likely to play it safe when gambling on earnings, so I'd guess that the probability was higher than 25% and they chose the $5 anyway, not the $20.

Re:I think they were just bored

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly to take this to the extreme i might be perfectly rational for me to risk $1 to make $2 because $1 really doesn't effect me at all. but it would argue for me it would not be rational to risk 1 million dollars to make 2 million dollars because 1 million would have a huge effect on me. This point of not making sense to risk it would be different for everyone.

Re:I think they were just bored

[Stormy Dragon]

If the questions were presented in random order, you could look for a regression linked to how far into the test a particular subject was when they got to that question.

Re:I think they were just bored

[Anonymous Coward]

age 65 /snip/ Call it "Walter White Syndrome

I'm 50

Re:I think they were just bored

[Lynal]

An `irrational' person would answer (Yes, No, Yes), or (No, Yes, No).

Actually those answers could be perfectly rational depending on how hungry you are, how much cash is in your wallet, and which fast food restaurants are within walking distance.

I'm not sure if you're being pedantic, I'll assume you're not. Yes, that's true, rationality (complete and transitive preferences) is different from what they're testing. They're saying inconsistent without providing a baseline. The example I gave is one equating rationality to having a monotonic marginal utility for wealth gains, which is a pretty weak assumption as economics goes, I think it's weaker than the example given in the news article, which is an argument for prospect theory.

Re:I think they were just bored

[ducomputergeek]

This operates the opposite. When you are older chances are you have a fixed income. If so, don't have time to take a chance because if you take that chance and it fails to pay off you don't have time to earn it back. You are better to go for the $5 that is safe. If you are younger, if the chance doesn't pay off, you still have the chance of maybe earning it back down the road.

Although I recently saw this happen with my own father. Who, in the words of my cousin who is a certified financial planner, is the "most conservative man I've met when it comes to money." He started to saw things and was looking at doing things with his money that made no sense.

For instance he was holding onto over $1M in cash in his money market not doing anything with it. Then there was wanting to buy and put a trailer down on the farm because hotel bills were adding up. I mean he spent about $800 on motel/hotel rooms. It would take a lot of years to justify spending $40k on a camper or used RV. Also this was his idea incase of an economic collapse. As a man who was a life long registered democrat some of he things he was saying sound even more far right wing than I am. And I maintain a few guns, a water purifier and an electric generator with 20 gallons of fuel and a couple weeks worth on non-periable food. We do live in an earth quake zone and we've been known to have storms that can take out power for a week at a time. Doesn't happen very often, but it can and does.

I thought it was odd, but the man earned his money in his life and I wasn't going to say or do anything about it. If he wanted to waste $40k that was his money and right to do so.

Well then he had a stroke that landed him in the hospital earlier this year. After the MRI it revealed he had been having small strokes in the area of brain that affects reason and critical thinking probably over the past year - eighteen months.

It started to make a lot of sense. Since the more serious, still classified as a light, stroke I've met with the trustees and made them aware of the situation just incase he did start doing strange things with the money we could step in and stop it taking the executorship away from him if we had to. Thankfully he's come around to see some things differently about the farms realizing he can't really go down there anymore for a few days at a time and bush hog or spray or do the other things he enjoyed doing on the tractor. He doesn't have the stamina anymore.

I saw my grandmother squander $180,000 on sweepstakes when she got older. Granted having Parkinson's likely altered some of her decision making processes. Thankfully unlike her, something my father had the forethought of doing was putting everything into trusts with clauses that would allow the trustees and myself to step in if something happened.

Many people aren't that lucky to have someone that savvy with legal and financial matters.

Re:I think they were just bored

[Anonymous Coward]

Would you take $1 or a coin flip for $2?
Would you take $5 or a coin flip for $10?
Would you take $10 or a coin flip for $20?
An `irrational' person would answer (Yes, No, Yes), or (No, Yes, No). Someone that answered all Yes or all No would not be inconsistent

Maybe not inconsistent, but rational? If an "A or B" type question allows a Yes/No answer at all, the only rational answer to each question is "Yes". "No" means you refuse the sure money and the chance for more money.

Re:I think they were just bored

[AK Marc]

The irrational were no, yes, no, and no, yes, no. That implies that you are willing to risk $1, and $1,000,000, but not $1000. That's irrational.

Re:I think they were just bored

[skids]

Actually the amounts are $1, $5, and $10.

If I have enough money for the $1 bus fare to a taco bell with a $4 special on beef-testicle burritos, am standing in a restaurant where I could buy a meal for $7, and only have $5 in my wallet, and so do not have $10 to risk on the third bet, then the answer is rational. Winning the $2 doesn't help, I'd only have $6 and have to eat beef testicales anyway, might lose and not be able to eat, but if I care to wager going hungry against a better meal...

Re:I think they were just bored

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course you would get bored. You old people are too busy being lazy, posting on Facebook and watching Fox News.
Your best years are over, geezer.

What do you have to lose at EOL?

[medv4380]

If you figure you only have 5 to 10 more years left why not take a little more risk. When you have 50 years left to regret the choice it makes more sense to take less risk.

Re:What do you have to lose at EOL?

[Anonymous Coward]

or.....

"gotta spend it now, the damn kids aren't getting a penny!"

Re:What do you have to lose at EOL?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you figure you only have 5 to 10 more years left why not take a little more risk.

Then why do the elderly often drive so slowly and cautiously?

With your logic, I would expect the elderly to have fun and drive fast and furious, since they have less to lose.

Re:What do you have to lose at EOL?

[GauteL]

If you figure you only have 5 to 10 more years left why not take a little more risk. When you have 50 years left to regret the choice it makes more sense to take less risk.

Because rather than being moderately comfortable, you may end up spending your last 5 years desperately poor and struggling, with no chance of digging yourself out of that hole. You are at the end game and you have no more room for "learning experiences" when it comes to your finances.

Spending your last few years in abject poverty is a legitimate fear for many. When you are 35 and make a bad investment, you at least have 30 years of active work left to dig yourself out of the hole you got yourself into.

Re:What do you have to lose at EOL?

[Swave An deBwoner]

To avoid wrecking somebody else's life perhaps?

At this point they fully realize that a collision can hurt others, not only themselves.

Earning less

[Anonymous Coward]

On average, over-65s earned 26-39% less than all other age groups, including adolescents — a finding that could partially explain their susceptibility to problem gambling and scams."

Or maybe it could be that they are retired and living off of their savings, supplemented by a very small fixed income?

When you might only be years away from death..

[ickleberry]

It makes sense to say "feck it!" and live whats left of life to the fullest. Young people would have it in their mind that they are going to be around for another 50-100 years. As I get older myself I find it more and more tempting to try something just to see what happens. When you are young you start off nice and naive and with little to lose so you make risky decisions, spend a couple of decades as a boring risk-averse PHB type who worries about absolutely everything but then after a while you will get tired of that too.

The world is ruled by grey-haired folk who are still a good bit away from retirement, have lots to lose (career, assets, life). Which explains why the world is getting more boring by the day.

Re:When you might only be years away from death..

[roc97007]

Oh, good point. Maybe old people make riskier decisions because they have less to lose.

Well that explains alot

[halfEvilTech]

I may get flamed for this but screw it. This would explain a lot of the issues we see from the Congress Critters.

Take a look at Congress

[Anonymous Coward]

Prime example if old fart way passed their mental prime.

Re:Take a look at Congress

[X0563511]

It appears you've yet to reach yours...

Now I understand!

[Anonymous Coward]

That explains the current partial shutdown of the American Government and the state of politics in many countries.

The end of life sooner or later reaches

[parcifal32]

Unfortunately, all people reach a point in our lives where we were obsolete. Once we got to that moment we realize that as the business world beyond us and must give way to the youth and retire honorably.

explain me warren buffet and george soros then

[Anonymous Coward]

there are plenty of old ass dudes who are good with money...this is just more ageist bullshit from people who want to put the baby boomers out to pasture.

Re:explain me warren buffet and george soros then

[GameboyRMH]

They're not senile yet or have people to manage their money for them. For example Rupert Murdoch is known to run his supercars out of gas. This isn't the kind of forethought that would let him keep his money, if he were managing it himself.

Maybe not

[djupedal]

Maybe it's just that the olders have more to lose (and more experiences, good/bad/otherwise, to pull from) so the risk goes up.

This explains...

[Anonymous Coward]

My father's newfound obsession with guns.

Sad but True

[superid]

My dad is an engineer and has an MBA. He's 79 and been retired for a while. He could be the case study for this article. He has made horrible financial decisions for the past 15+ years despite a career of doing exactly the opposite.

Re:Sad but True

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless your father has lost his marbles, it's entirely possible he's like most of the rest of the USA: he got ripped off by two asset bubbles that were orchestrated by the Federal Reserve and Wall Street with a complicit Congress.

People didn't have to have lost their edge to lose their asse[t]s in 2000 and 2008.

Yoots

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

Old people? Those late-nite ads for the new-style bidding web sites ate scams directed at young people. They are mathematically indistinguishible from gambling and should be treated as such.

Pay a dollar to bump up the price by 1 penny? Oop, someone else bumped it up another penny. You still lose your dollar. Guess who keeps all the dollars?

Re:Yoots

[GameboyRMH]

I can't believe people fall for that. Just another tax on being bad at math, bring 'em on.

Well, thanks.

[roc97007]

I was reading this in my car on the way to the payday loans place and I got so outraged that I drifted out of my lane and hit a parked gasoline tanker. So I figure I might as well park here and finish reading the thread. There's a lot of smoke but with the windows rolled up it isn't too bad.

Re:Well, thanks.

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL! WTF are you trying to say?

Re:Well, thanks.

[roc97007]

I'm saying there's absolutely no truth to the rumor that old people make bad decisions. Gee, the smoke is getting really bad.

Cognitive Biases

[the eric conspiracy]

This sort of thing is in the general class of cognitive biases. Another example of this class is the Dunning Kruger effect.

Cognitive biases have a large negative effect on the financial performance of the general public. In particular if you want to be a successful investor it's very important to be aware of this issue.

Daniel Kahneman (a psychologist) won the 2002 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics because of his pioneering work in the field of Behavioral Economics.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Kahneman

Speaking as a 30-something year old....

[Anonymous Coward]

No fucking shit, because once you get past a certain point in life you realize you won't always have until tomorrow to find something better.

Did nobody learn anything from Breaking Bad? The principled or honest stand will only get you fucked by the end of your life, but if you can walk the thin line between dishonesty and criminal conduct you can become a weathy pharmaceutical magnate with everybody loving you and lots of 'paltry' philanthropic expenses which make everybody love you like you're freaking Jesus come to Earth.

While the previous paragraph was mostly intended in jest and not as a path to a successful life, I'm sure plenty of you know people RL who fall into the Gretchen and Elliot mold: wealth by screwing those closest to them. And the benefits quite often outweight risks.

What was an avg math or logic course like in 1941?

[metric10k]

I really think a bigger factor is education and how long since they've been in education. Consider the worst cast in the study, a 90 year old. They (on average) graduated from high school 72 years ago in 1941. Statistics and probability curriculum probably wasn't what it is now, especially pre-Sputnick (1957). Not to mention the 72 to years spent not using those skills. That is, if you hypothetically had someone who was locked at 18 and didn't age, you would still expect them to forget those skills after 72 years. So in the end, I'm sure aging plays a factor, but I suspect other factors play a bigger role.

Does this jibe with peak finance = 53?

[istartedi]

I read about another study where they found financial ability peaked, on average, at 53. Before that you don't have enough experience. Then cognitive decline sets in. YMMV of course.

Age or culture?

[gmuslera]

Maybe this TED talk of James Flynn about why we could have higher IQ than our grandparents is relevant. What about the financial decisions of those old people when they were young?

Correlation does not equal causation!

[Anonymous Coward]

Also all individuals always act rationally and in their own self interest, thus this study is invalid.

Re:Correlation does not equal causation!

[Anonymous Coward]

where did you get such an incorrect idea?

Re: Correlation does not equal causation!

[Anonymous Coward]

any reputable economist knows these truths to be self evident.

I'm sure the NSA would flame you.

[Anonymous Coward]

But their /. control agents were considered non-essential.

Slanted demographic?

[macraig]

So once again a behavioral study whose subjects all came only from developed First World nations, and likely only those whose first language was English? What could go wrong?

The old "economic rationality" fallacy

[Anonymous Coward]

How much is one's peace of mind worth? What is a "rational" depreciation factor? I would much rather have $10,000 now than $100,000 in ten years because I don't know if I'll still be around then, and if I am I will probably have inherited by then so I won't need the money. Whereas now it makes a huge difference whether I have to work for other people to earn money, or whether I'm free to do what matters to me. Go ahead, call me irrational.

Painfully Obvious

[Dialecticus]

This is just the difference between short and long term investment strategies. When one is young, it makes sense to use long term strategies that minimize risk and go for gradual growth. When one is elderly, long term investment makes no sense anymore. Look backward and see missed opportunities; look forward and see an approaching dead end. The chance to make it big gradually is gone, and the only hope one has left to live one's dreams is explosive growth. It's now or never, so short term, high-risk strategies dominate. Shouldn't this be obvious?

It's the equivalent of the question "What would you do if Earth was going to be gone tomorrow?" Even young people would be unlikely to reply "Invest in 20-year bonds."

Re:Painfully Obvious

[JazzHarper]

That is exactly the opposite of what courses in portfolio theory and risk management teach. The amount of risk that someone can reasonably tolerate is directly related to one's time horizon. Younger investors are wise to invest in assets that have higher risk, because their performance smooths out over time. On the other hand, older investors have a greater need for stability, since they will be drawing upon those investments much sooner--they cannot afford to have a large proportion of their portfolio in asset classes that may underperform for 5-10 years. In the long run, the higher-risk assets (like equities) have average growth rates that will always outperform low-risk assets (like bonds), but an older investor does not have the luxury of time to wait for them to revert to the mean.

A desperate older investor who tries to catch up by making high-risk choices is playing a very dangerous game, with low probability of success.

Why not?

[Strange Ranger]

Heck when I turn 75 I think I might try heroin, start smoking cigarettes again, and have unprotected sex with 28 year old hookers. Why the hell not?

Re:Why not?

[dkleinsc]

Relevant quote from Little Miss Sunshine:
"When you're young, you're crazy to do that shit [heroin]. Me?! I'm old! You get to be my age -- you're crazy not to do it."

Re:Why not?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have fucked about 30 women in my time and never used a condom. When I was separated from my wife we both fucked at least 5 different people and never used condoms while still fucking each other (we were still spouses, of course). Neither of us caught anything. I still have nothing. Not even HPV... Am I just lucky or do I choose clean partners? And think about it... they let me get away with not using one, so surely they have a bunch of unprotected sex with other people as well.

Condoms = overrated

Re:Why not?

[Capt.DrumkenBum]

You just described my retirement plan.
Except you forgot 28 year old Thai hookers.

Re:Why not?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey the coin toss came up tails 9 times! The 10th time it will be tails too.

Reality sets in

[Anonymous Coward]

And you realize that you've worked your whole life for the man, paid your exorbitant taxes, got fuck-all in return for them and generally just got fucked out of every other dollar you thought you had earned and save by your corrupt government and so you make one last ditch effort to try to get something other than cat-food for your next 10 years worth of meals.

Age and retirement

[Todd Knarr]

Some of it could be due to attitudes changing after retirement. Before retirement the idea of having to put back savings for retirement and be careful not to blow your money because you're going to need it later colors your thinking. After retirement you don't need to save up for retirement, and you become very aware that you do not have an entire lifetime ahead of you to worry about anymore. That changes your evaluation of risk.

Car surfing

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess that's why we see SO MANY elderly car surfers and base jumpers!

The world of yesterday

[Anonymous Coward]

Is nowhere near the world of today. Seriously, do we expect everyone to adapt perfectly to our rapidly changing way of life? No forces in nature tell us how to juggle with health insurances, tiny fine print, and purposeless paperwork.

Is it age or a generational issue?

[gameboyhippo]

I hardly believe it's an age issue. You would have to demonstrate that the same person made different decisions at different points in their life. It would be like saying, "The older you get, the more likely you'll not know how to use a cell phone." It's just not true.

The reality is that you have generational cultures. For example, I'd bet older people smoke more too. Doesn't mean I'm going to do it when I get old. I know better now than they did at my age.

Re:Is it age or a generational issue?

[AthanasiusKircher]

The reality is that you have generational cultures. For example, I'd bet older people smoke more too. Doesn't mean I'm going to do it when I get old. I know better now than they did at my age.

This is a crucial point. People who are 65 or over now are a generation who have had to deal with the uncertainties and complexities of investing in IRAs and other retirement accounts to save -- something their parents probably didn't have to do in the same way, since they had often had pensions. Their parents likely could throw something in a savings account or savings bonds and gradually watch the growth over the decades, but the current older generation was told to put money in mutual funds in their IRA, and they watched their money do giant roller coaster rides in 2001 and again in 2008.

Basically, everything they probably learned about finance from their parents' generation (put money in the bank or savings bonds, depend on your company pension) was becoming irrelevant by the time they retired in the past few years. And the alternative -- socking money into the market only to watch it whip around like crazy every few years as their retirement approached -- would very likely skew their perspective on risk. Particularly, given how much many of them probably lost in 2001 and/or 2008 as they got near to retirement, I bet many would be predisposed to make "bad" decisions just to avoid losses (as discussed in the article).

For the generation who lived through the Great Depression, keeping money as cash or very stable investments was common. They saved up money in cash before buying things. The retiring generation now has had to deal with very different issues, with debt proliferation, loss of pensions, and the need to deal with new kinds of investments just to retire. By the time the next generation or two retires, there will probably be various other issues.

Post score filter?

[Twinbee]

Where's the post score filter? I love being able to hide or semi-hide all posts below a certain threshold.

That's just stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

That's just stupid. I do not make any "poorer decisions".

Now stay on my lawn!

135 participants in the study?

[Anonymous Coward]

that's kind of a small sample, isn't it? especially since the elderly part of the U.S. pop (yes, U.S.-centric here) is increasing...

Also explains...

[PortHaven]

Why our IRAs/401Ks perform so poorly. They're almost all invested and managed by over 65 folks.

Re:Also explains...

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, if you invest then do it yourself, it's not rocket science. Anyone that trusts someone else to manage their money is like asking a god to hand you the next winning lottery ticket. Managers of funds are not only old people, it's mostly a mix of people who don't give a shit about you. They care to have you to "trust" them while they rob your account with lots of fees. I stopped several years ago trusting others to grow my hard earned IRA/401K. They lost value or only grew a small amount. After doing self management the my investments have rocketed with fucken after-burners on full. There are stupid young people and stupid old people. Being older doesn't make a person stupid who wasn't stuipd to start with. You can't fix stupid but you can get smarter.

This isn't exactly surprising

[tsotha]

As you get older every system in your body suffers some degree of degradation. We know people suffer cognitive decline starting in their 40s, so it's really no surprise people over 65 don't display the same ability to make intelligent choices they did when they were younger.

Age and Finances

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not that they make poor decisions; it's that their financial know-how is antiquated.

lawn

[Tablizer]

"Get off my lawn or I'll file for bankruptcy!"

Risk/Reward/Cost

[trongey]

As we get older we start realizing that we have less opportunities left to succeed and less time to suffer the consequences of failure. We also come to realize that losing isn't as painful as we always thought it would be, and in the worst case we could end up dead - in which case we won't care. It just makes sense to take more risks. Falling for scams comes from a host of other age-related factors that include both physiological changes and changes in attitude.

Age

[Anonymous Coward]

The study's methodology is flawed. The results are absurd.

I feel like I just watched this play out on TV

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, Breaking Bad was a good TV series, but it's over now. Do they really need free advertising on Slashdot?

Psychologists are bad at math

[Anonymous Coward]

Woof. The example problem FTFA implies that, of the two choices "definitely lose $5" and "50% chance of either $0 or lose $8" the old folks choose the latter. But the expected value for that outcome is $(0+-8)*50%, or -$4. Which is greater than -$5. Which means the old fogeys got it right. Stupid young whippersnappers.

--Sent from my LeapFrog

Grandpa: Which will it be ...

[PPH]

... when I pull up to the school crossing in my Cadillac? The brake or the gas?

Old fogey hatred

[Ol Olsoc]

Yet more of the hatred toward Boomers and what they have done.

As a person on the tail end of the boomer generation, I saved a lot of money from my paychecks, I retired at 56, and am living quite comfortably.

We get surely a lot of hate. We're Selfish, entitled, and now foolish. Bloody fucking hell - I don't even collect SS for many years yet. I am not costing you poor abused, persecuted, and robbed of your entitlement everyone elses a damn thing, You want my fucking bank account or something?

Perhaps a different perspective is in order.

I started my career, back in the 70's, and immediately began saving. Pretty conservative investments. A lot of people I worked with at the time said that was pretty stupid. I had people making 3, 4 times as much who saved nothing, Whatever.

Young people have their chance to do the same as long as they have a job . But many don't want to. Just like many of the folks I worked with way back then. Right now interest rates are not that good. But history shows they will eventually go back up. Inflation was the big excuse not to save when I was young. Now it's interest rates. Ignore that. Save. You'll be an idiot for a few years. After that, not so much.

Now for a dose ot truth.

We are at the point, where people who haven't planned well, or people who don't really intend to plan well, resent and hate those who did. But if you are successful in your efforts to make those of us who did plan well poorer, that will not make you wealthy. You'll still be poor, you'll just have more company.

So if you really really gotta hate on us, go ahead. Tha'ts the only thing you'll have though - your hate, and the prospect of trying to live on Social Security. Save your money - no one owes you anything.

Re:Old fogey hatred

[Anonymous Coward]

You're obviously not a typical boomer. You even point this out yourself, with the comments on how the people you worked with were telling you that it was stupid to save.

I've got no problem with boomers like you. It's boomers like you worked with that are the problem, and they rather outnumber boomers like you. Sorry, but it's like the old saw about 99% of lawyers giving the rest a bad name.

Re:Old fogey hatred

[Anonymous Coward]

> Young people have their chance to do the same as long as they have a job .

> as long as they have a job .

> as long as they have a job .

> as long as they have a job .

Flawed research

[LostMyBeaver]

Offer $50 or a chance to win $200 on a lottery.

$5 or $20 means nothing in 2013. If you already have your budget planned, $5 or $20 won't make a big difference. The $5 doesn't even cover the additional cost of eating at a salad buffet instead of a cheap pizza buffet for two people. $20 however can mean eating steak tonight.

$50 however means a much better month. $200 is better, but $50 as a sure thing is the best.

Most comments seem to miss the point

[GauteL]

... possibly because the summary does a very poor job of representing the article, by leaving out the most important part of it.

The elderly are not overall more willing to take risks, it is just that the risks they are taking are different and less consistent. If faced with potential earnings, they'd rather take smaller guaranteed earnings than larger and riskier earnings; exactly the sort of stereotype of the cautious elderly you'd expect.

But if faced with losses they'd rather take the risk of a much bigger loss than the guaranteed loss.

My interpretation is that they are so afraid of losses they'll do anything to avoid them, even irrationally gambling to avoid loss. This sort of fits with the stereotype of keeping money in your mattress to avoid losses in bank charges and taxes, despite the fact that one single fire or robbery would ruin you.

No control for date of birth

[Anonymous Coward]

OR, old people that were born a long time ago are better educated about finance than they were when they were younger, but not as well educated as the young people of today, who were born into a finance-obsessed age and one with many more complicated products and choices. These young people in turn might be even better at making financial decisions when they get older.

Financial know-how might be positively correlated with age and also strongly positively correlated with date of birth. Since age and date of birth were very strongly negatively correlated for the participants in this study, the researchers didn't control for date of birth, and so we'll never know.

A study reveals that the media...

[Anonymous Coward]

consistently fail to report that a study is fairly meaningless, it is through repeated study that we get at the truth, giving further evidence that clicks and unit sales are more valued than journalistic integrity, the public good or science.

What the FUCK are you babbling?

[denzacar]

Sorry if it doesn't sound politically correct to you but ethnicity and culture go hand in hand and, therefore, is perfectly possible to define an ethnicity as criminal (by others' standards): Huns, for instace, were definitely criminals by everybody else's standards. Do you find that to be unreasonable?

One... Where does it say that ethnicity and culture "go hand in hand"?
What does that even mean? In like... you know... scientific terms?
That there is a strong positive correlation between one's ethnic background and one's cultural leanings?
An entire culture and an entire ethnic background have leanings to certain actions or objects?
So Irish people are predestined to be potato-eating, jig-dancing, bar-fighting terrorist drunks?

Second... You seem to imply some... deeper, more general relation there. Cause you're ascribing that bullshit to an ENTIRE ETHNICITY.
HOLY SHIT! Generalize much? Like in your spare time?
When you're not busy performing whichever it is nasty stereotype that fits your ethnic heritage?

And seriously? Huns? 4th century CE nomadic tribe is your standard for cultural attributes?
Well, shit! Then you have to include that by EVERYONE ELSE'S 4th century CE standards (and for a long time after that) - Africans are complete savages.
And so are American Indians. Australian Aborigines too. Same goes for Asians.
And let's not even start with those fucking Vikings.

Re:What the FUCK are you babbling?

[turbidostato]

Did you payed attention to what I wrote instead of what you wanted to believe that I wrote?

Of course not.

Re:What the FUCK are you babbling?

[denzacar]

Well, while it may seem like something else to you, what you DID wrote was:

1. ethnicity and culture correlate somehow,

2. based on that, somehow, ethnicity can be defined as criminal.

Which is really fun, cause you've never established that definition previously, for the premise you base your argument on. What was the name of that... does not follow... Ah yes! Non sequitur.

To make it more fun (I guess) you added a "(by others' standards)" to the non sequitur above.
Which is just a weaselly way of saying "Hey, maybe, somewhere, in the desert, there's a guy, with a frog in his pocket and a cardboard box on his head... and he may not like that thing you do... and you know... he may think that's criminal... I don't know... we can't rule it out... it's possible... he may be authority... of some kind... theoretically..."

But the really fun bit is where by adding those weasel words to your non sequitur you transform it into a rootin'-tootin' STRAW-MAN! Pam-pam-Paaaam!
Up until that, you could argue "Oh, I forgot... crime is implied in the culture because my grandma told me to watch for those people listening to the devil's music. They're all criminals."
But that weasel there really clinched it.

But! One strawman was clearly not enough for you! So you add another one. In the form of:

3. The Huns! As a cultural standard of comparison, from 4th century CE.
Which is not only funny cause nearly all cultures did the same shit to everyone else back in the day, but because that "were definitely criminals by everybody else's standards" crap that just BEGS for comparison with what "EVERYONE THOUGHT" back then about Africans, Asians, later Americans and basically every tribe not directly related to their own.

But let's give you the benefit of the doubt, cause this is in'rnet, the most generous and loving place in the world, and say that you were satirizing the whole concept of attaching criminality to culture and ethnicity.
Huns are a joke, weasels are there on purpose (for fun), just like that non sequitur.
It's all a big joke.

That you're playing on someone whose arguing those same points but as a real, actual, problem.
Which is where you choose to turn their points into a joking matter. You must be a real hoot at parties.
I'd love to see what you could do with child molestation and prison rape.

Re:What the FUCK are you babbling?

[turbidostato]

"Well, while it may seem like something else to you, what you DID wrote was:
1. ethnicity and culture correlate somehow,"

Ethnicity or ethnic group (from Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_group): ...is a socially defined category of people who identify with each other based on a perceived shared social experience or ancestry.

So, yes, ethnicity and culture correlate somehow. Do you have a problem with that?

"2. based on that, somehow, ethnicity can be defined as criminal."

Given that, obviously, some societies can and have been seen as posing criminal traits, like huns, and that ethnicity can be rooted to a society, at least in some cases, then yes, it is at least theoretically possible to consider an ethnicity as criminal. And then, I went stating that ancient huns are a practical example of that. Again, what's exactly the part from what I written that you disagree with?

"The Huns! As a cultural standard of comparison, from 4th century CE."

Are you implying that somehow 4th century Huns can't be considered an ethnic group? Is it the case that ethnicity was not "invented" till the twentieth century, or something like that?

But, hey, if you have a problem with 4th century, here comes something to your delight: I left it out on my first comment just to give Mr Godwin a chance but, since it seems you are longing for it...

German nazis are an ethnicity since they are "...a socially defined category of people who identify with each other based on a perceived shared social experience or ancestry." Do you have any kind of problem considering the German nazis, considered as a whole, to be criminal?

Re:What the FUCK are you babbling?

[denzacar]

Ethnicity or ethnic group (from Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_group): ...is a socially defined category of people who identify with each other based on a perceived shared social experience or ancestry.

You still fail to grasp, even though you're linking to it, that culture alone does not correlate with NOR does it constitute ethnicity.

From the very article you linked without understanding it:

Membership of an ethnic group tends to be associated with and ideologies of shared cultural heritage, ancestry, history, homeland, language or dialect, and with symbolic systems such as religion, mythology and ritual, cuisine, dressing style, physical appearance, etc.

Note ALL those other share attributes. Now imagine sharing SOME of them, but not all of them.

Here, try this.
A person of American culture. But of Irish ethnicity.
A person of American culture. But of German ethnicity.

Ethnicity and culture do not determine each other nor is there are an obligatory unidirectional or bidirectional relation between those two.
That's why you can pick and choose your culture, mesh cultures together, import into it elements of foreign cultures and export your own culture to others.

That's why white people can enjoy "black music".

The rest of your argument, hinging on "culture==ethnicity", is simply invalid.

Re:What the FUCK are you babbling?

[turbidostato]

"A person of American culture. But of Irish ethnicity."

And, where that "Irish ethnicity" comes from? Sharing DNA with Molly Malone?

See: the point is that you want to impose *your* definition of "ethnicity" to just mean "of a geographical or biological ascend" and, of course, you point out that being of a given geographical or biological ascend can't be a criminal trait on itself (nor impose any kind of ethic), which is obviously true.

Problem is that, no matter how many times you try to call a true Scotsman to your side, ethnicity, as you yourself point out, "tends to be associated with and ideologies of shared cultural heritage", therefore, as long as you can find *any* cultural heritage that by its own definition can be considered criminal, it forcibly will make criminal the ethnicity it belongs to or it is identified with.

Well, there's your problem right there...

[denzacar]

Sorry, but when I see, say, a pretty girl with a Roma appearance in a major european city approaching tourists, the odds are heavily in favor of her being a pickpocket. You might call that ethnic profiling, I call it reality.

Ah... Ye olde "excrement is in the eye of the beholder" situation.

I'm gonna make a wild guess here and make an assumption or two.
One, you can't really describe that many cases of what you are mentioning there. The whole schtick. Girl. Gypsy. Tourist. Pickpocket. You. Witness. For realz.
And two, you have acted in some way, whether by stopping the said criminal act, calling the police or by informing the tourist in... shall we say... oh... NEVER.

Just a guess.
Please, if I'm wrong, do provide an extensive list of your encounters with tourist pickpocketing gypsy girls.
I'm sure everyone would love to read about that. Particularly all those cases where you didn't inform the police immediately.
Something-something failure to report something-something.

Then later on, we're gonna have a fun example of what "the odds are".

Wisdom-experience undermines youthful certainty

[Anonymous Coward]

I used to know everything, now I don't. But I still have to make decisions, believing the same things that caused problems. Therefore, I doubt the old certainties. Therefore I get more inconsistent. Maybe more on target, maybe not.