ABSTRACT
A hallmark of the politics of retrenchment has been the tendency by many policymakers to scapegoat the poor and the elderly as “causes” of the “fiscal crisis.” Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid have been among the programs most under attack for “busting” the federal budget. This chapter argues that the era of fiscal conservatism in the United States has led to a new and more virulent form of victim blaming, with the elderly constituting a key target of attack. Substantial budget cuts in programs affecting the elderly provide a classic example of the evolving of a less costly “solution” to a problem which, in times of fiscal conservatism, is redefined to become a more limited and hence more manageable one. The declaration of fiscal crisis on the national level detracts attention from such analysis of the root causes of the “aging problem.”
