Introduction

Seven years from now, the oldest members of America's largest generation will turn 65, and soon after, our elderly population will begin a dramatic expansion, doubling in size during the next two decades. This coming gray revolution will not only be the baby boomers' last act, but will mark the beginning of a permanent, structural change in our society. These realities will require a major cultural adjustment, challenging not only our mental picture of aging, but also the assumptions upon which our "old age" institutions were built.

So far, the debate in Washington has focused on the money that will be necessary to meet the health and retirement needs of the growing number of older Americans, with a focus on ensuring the continued solvency of Medicare and Social Security. This is obviously critical, but it is just as important to start thinking about how we can tap the growing resource that this better educated, healthier, and more active class of elders represents.

For more than a decade, the Progressive Policy Institute has been at the forefront of the effort to make national service a civic rite of passage for America's youth by advancing innovative short-term civilian and military service programs, and by connecting participation in these programs with greater educational opportunities. In this policy report, we hope to jumpstart a new debate about creating a second civic rite of passage, designed not for the transition from youth to adulthood, but instead focused on the transition from a full-time career to an active retirement.

During the last six decades, steadily increasing lifespans combined with greater levels of health and activity have slowly changed the way Americans approach the later years of their lives. While most Americans continue to see their 60s as a time to bring their full-time careers to an end, there is also a growing number of Americans who are interested in a more active retirement mixing work, leisure, and service. By targeting this pool of active retirees, a large-scale national service initiative could play a critical role in how we take on the challenges of an aging society in the decades to come by enlisting baby boomers themselves into civic projects tackling the problems that their numbers create. Building on America's successful but limited experiments with senior service -- such as the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program (RSVP), the Foster Grandparents program, and the Senior Companions program -- this large-scale national service initiative would focus on meeting three critical needs.

First, by bringing recent retirees into civic projects focused on the needs of the old and infirm in their community -- such as providing homecare services to support the informal efforts of family members and coordinated care efforts to help improve the health of the growing number of seniors with multiple chronic conditions -- this national service program will help usher in a system in which younger retirees across the country serve the needs of older community members. Then, as this younger group ages, it will be served by the new class of recent retirees that takes their place in these civic programs. As such, this service system will help relieve the strain on our society created by an aging population.

Second, by increasing the number of recent retirees serving in civic projects focused on the needs of younger members of their community -- such as tutoring and mentoring efforts and work supporting charter schools and other educational innovations -- this national service program will help engineer a reciprocal transfer of the experience, skills, and talent of older Americans to younger generations. By raising the educational achievement of America's youth, this program will also help ensure that our country has the skilled workforce and strong economic growth it will need to support our existing old-age institutions in the decades to come.

Finally, both through their own service experience in these civic projects and their efforts to coordinate the participation of additional elder volunteers, these service members will help dramatically raise the level of civic engagement and social connectedness among older Americans, which research shows makes for longer, healthier lives.

Specifically, we propose to:

• Create a Boomer Corps for recent retirees 55 years and older to serve 25 hours per week for one year or more in innovative, grassroots civic projects focused on: 1) home care services and coordinated care; 2) tutoring and mentoring work and educational innovation initiatives; and 3) efforts to organize and coordinate the volunteer activities of other community elders in these projects.
• Provide service members with a tax-free stipend of $400 per month to supplement their retirement income during their year of service, and the choice of either a $4,000 education award that can be used for their own continuing education or to send a child or grandchild to college, or a $4,000 health care voucher.
• Reach the maximum number of recent retirees by including Call to Service cards with information on joining the Boomer Corps with every American's first Social Security check.
• Scale up this new national service program during the next eight years to 1 million members by 2012, so that more than one in every five baby boomers will be able to mark their transition into an active retirement through national service. Recruit 12 community volunteers for every Corps member, so that an additional 12 million elders will continue to serve five hours per week or more as part of an active retirement.

This report examines the details of the coming gray revolution, discusses the challenges to successful aging that have emerged, and presents a blueprint for creating a Boomer Corps that helps ease the strains created as our society ages by translating the civic energy of elder boomers into civic action.