Tis the season for the giving of gifts, and I like many of you am on a budget, so I take advantage of any discounts I can get, and I use or try to use senior discounts. I remember a few decades back, and I was going in to get my driver's licence renewed and I was asked by the clerk what my hair color was and I said brown with a touch of grey. She laughed and put down grey. I was 36 at the time.
I soon realised that with my grey hair, I was being offered senior discounts for various activities I went on, shopping, movies, etc. I was amused, and then a bit upset and then I gradually came to realise that I should and could take advantage of these while they last.
If I am not offered a senior discount, I now ask if the store has one and usually, they do. However, the time of the senior discount is fast coming to an end. There are just too many of us Boomers, Sonic or otherwise out there.
A few years ago, there were not as many seniors and giving a discount was seen as a way of giving back to the few who survived to an older age. But with the Boomers reaching the senior discount age, stores and other facilities, that offer discounts are rethinking their position and many authors such as Ann Brenoff, writing at Huffington Post earlier this year, stated
I soon realised that with my grey hair, I was being offered senior discounts for various activities I went on, shopping, movies, etc. I was amused, and then a bit upset and then I gradually came to realise that I should and could take advantage of these while they last.
If I am not offered a senior discount, I now ask if the store has one and usually, they do. However, the time of the senior discount is fast coming to an end. There are just too many of us Boomers, Sonic or otherwise out there.
A few years ago, there were not as many seniors and giving a discount was seen as a way of giving back to the few who survived to an older age. But with the Boomers reaching the senior discount age, stores and other facilities, that offer discounts are rethinking their position and many authors such as Ann Brenoff, writing at Huffington Post earlier this year, stated
”Seniors aren’t the poorest among us anymore. The national poverty rate, according to the 2014 Census, is 14.8 percent. For seniors 65 and older, it’s just 8.7 percent, while for children under 18 it was 21.1 percent. Maybe it’s children we should be offering discounts to?As more of us age, you will start to see the off season for holiday resorts become shorter, Boomers who have retired can travel when we want and are no longer restricted to peak season. One of the joys of being a Boomer who is at the head of the curve is that I and my friends can and do take advantage of discounts offered and off seasons where prices are cheaper and there are fewer fellow tourists around. But my fear is that these perks of retirement will no longer be around for the younger boomers and the younger generations.
