Posted on July 8, 2008 by Kathy McManus in All, Ethics, Law, Senior Citizens Comments (9)
Too Old To Be Responsible?
There’s an age when society expects people to be responsible—usually about 21.
But is there also an age when people are no longer expected to be responsible?
How about 73? That’s the age a California widower named Robert Pyle, was when he made a series of decisions that triggered a financial freefall, resulting in the loss of his $650,000 home and $500,000 life savings.
Now 81, Mr. Pyle is suing the financial institutions and various people he trusted with his money, claiming he should be compensated because he is too old to bear full responsibility for his actions.
“I still make pretty good decisions about most things,” said Mr. Pyle, a retired aerospace engineer. “But for others, I guess I’m not as sharp as I was before, and people take advantage of that.”
Mr. Pyle is part of a growing trend of older Americans filing lawsuits against people and companies they say defrauded them of precious financial resources. Their argument is the same: because they are older they should not be held responsible.
According to the National Center on Elder Abuse, protecting senior citizens from financial victimization—even when it’s caused by their own mistakes—is now critical. “If we don’t solve this,” said a spokeswoman, “millions of older people will suddenly be reliant on their families or the government.”
After Mr. Pyle’s loss, he was forced to move into a small room in his stepdaughter’s house. “I guess I’m just kind of waiting for the end,” he said.
But allowing people to void contracts, get refunds, and abdicate responsibility simply because of advanced age is unfair, critics insist. One of the defendants in Mr. Pyle’s lawsuit says “There is no business on earth that can function if its customers can say, ‘I’m tired of abiding by this contract, so I want out because I’m old.’”
Tell us what you think: Is there an age when we should no longer be held responsible for our actions? Should elderly people be exempt from responsibility if they make bad financial decisions?
Comments (9)
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Legally Responsible
I like this blog because I like the concept of personal and social responsibility. So I find this wording, from the NY Times article, ironic:
“It’s clear he was living beyond his means, and he might not be able to afford this loan,” said Mr. Dyer of Jett Financial. “But legally, we don’t have a responsibility to tell him this probably isn’t going to work out. It’s not our obligation to tell them how they should live their lives.”
Mr. Pyle was defrauded by people who obfuscated the truth about the loans from him. The question is not about a legal age when we are no longer responsible for bad decisions; the question is about the responsibility institutions have in being truthful about lending.
RE: Legally Responsible
Absolutely right!
Completely true. There are older adults who are sharp as a tack at 90, and some who lose it when their 50. I don’t think there should be a designated age when a person is no longer considered responsible. That would be unfair to those who are. There should certainly be legal ramifications for institutions who take advantage of the elderly and exploit them for profits sake.
There are separate laws
There are separate laws to protect consumers from predatory practices and elders and others who have become incompetent.
If an elder is unable to act properly on their own behalf in fiscal matters, guardianship proceedings should be instituted to protect them.
If a business is engaged in fraudulent practices they should be shut down by the appropriate authorities (attorney general’s office, SEC, etc) or sued for damages. Neither of these solutions is ideal and may be of no use to this gentleman who may not even live long enough to see justice done but it is how our system works. Hopefully it works as a deterrent to the next crook.
Blurring these lines is discriminatory against the elderly and is a slippery slope. At 75 should an elder have to get their kid’s permission to spend their own hard earned money? Should children be able to decide that Mom and Dad’s deluxe trip to the Greek Isles is too overpriced and send them to Peoria for the weekend instead? Will the elderly become 2nd class citizens with reduced civil rights in a gray period between their intellectual and functional peak and when they have dementia? Who will decide how diminished their capacity is?
The system needs improvement and greater protections but not added laws that will change the rights of our elders.
RE: There are separate laws
Well stated
Well stated comment and exactly what I was thinking. But I must add that these issues of incapacity to contract must be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.
RE: There are separate laws
Good Post!
I liked BJ McArtney’s take on this. At age 85, I realize that there are matters on which I am not quite current and financial instruments I do not understand (apparently I am in good company on this issue, as shown by the billions of dollars the banks have lost).
My solution to this is to do more careful research and consulting professionals I trust. It also helps to remember that there is no such thing as a free lunch.
Who is responsible for actions of third graders
I have taught in secondary schools in Alabama, Tennessee, and Georgia for over forty years. If we stop and think, the fact that we are questioning whether or not the parents are responsible for this kind of behavior is alarming. Why would they not be? Is it their fault, entirely, is another question.
Parents are responsible for the actions of their children until the offspring reach maturity. This is an idea that was taken for granted in the past, but now young parents seem to think that it is debatable. The first thing that must be done to solve these kinds of problems is to make it emphatically clear that parents or guardians are responsible for the behavior of their minor children. Regardless of the actions or circumstances, parents must again take for granted that they are responsible. Then, we can address the problem of who is at fault for outrageous, unacceptable actions.
We, as a human community, must realize that the advancement or decline of any society is the responsibility of all of its citizenry. Who is then at fault for these kinds of shocking incidents created by what we like to believe are innocent children? Everyone is, including the children themselves.
What, then, must we do to discourage this kind of behavior repeating itself or, heaven forbid, increasing in frequency? As adults, the most effective thing that we can do is to model the kind of behavior that we want to perpetuate and to avoid the kind of behavior that we want to prevent. It may seem that this answer is to simplistic to be effective, but if the majority of all of us did this on a daily bases, we would be closer to developing the kind of society that is becoming more civilized and less violent.
TWO TOTALLY DIFFERENT THINGS
When an older citizen is taken advantage of, that is one thing. But when an older citizen make a choice that wasn’t a good one, they should be held accountable for their actions. They should not be allowed to say “Hey you cheated me!” When in fact it was their mistake that got them to that point in the first place.
Fault and responsibility
Most folks, as they get older, refuse to believe that they are growing incompetent. They believe that they are still ‘sharp as a tack’ when in fact, they may have been sharp about some things, but have not kept up with the times nor the different breeds of con artists who can take them for everything. Is it their fault? Sadly, yes, it is. It is their responsibility whether they have $10 or $150,000 – to ensure that their investments are safe, that their eyesight is still good enough to drive, that their reaction time in traffic is still good enough to be aware of sudden dangers and to avoid them. They can deny responsibility; even try to foist it off as ‘someone else’s fault’ but the fact is that it IS their fault.
So many elderly go on the local television stations and complain about the con artist who convinced them to withdraw all of their savings and trade it with them for an envelope that is later found to be stuffed with newspapers. Whose fault is it? The one who believes that a stranger has their best interests at heart. The elder who buys cheap property in Mexico to retire – and then finds out that the property has no structures, no infrastructure, and that they can’t legally own property in Mexico anyway? It’s their own fault – because they should have researched it. The ads in the Enquirer or World News Daily that promise “For $75 and all of your information, I can get you the money the government owes you!” – and then the advertiser turns out to be wanted for fraud in 3 states, with multiple addresses and a knack for cleaning out his “clients” bank accounts. Who’s at fault? The one who gave the thief their social security and bank account numbers, no one else.
People of any age who trust strangers with their money, either for a get-rich-quick scheme, investments, or repairs on their house, are at fault for their decisions. Having been a caretaker of just such an adamantly, insistently ‘knowledgeable’ person, they won’t let you have power of attorney even after three or more incidences of gullibility. They are determined to ‘keep their independence’ until it beggars them – and then point the finger at someone else.
There are con artists, thieves, liars, manipulators, and get-rich-quick schemers all around us. When one does not have the ability to discern such things, one is at fault for what befalls them. That is not to say that we should excuse the dupers and con artists – they should always be prosecuted as being responsible – but the fault lies with the ones who are out there who, over and over again, trust them.
When a child commits a crime, it is his fault – but the parents’ responsibility to make restitution for that crime, as well as to see that the child is a part of making that restitution.
And therein lies the similarity between “fault” and “responsibility” – those at fault must share the blame with those who were responsible for perpetrating the fraud. They are both guilty – and they should both pay the penalty for their decisions to either be a victim or to be a predator.
What Can Be Said,
Never in the history of time, have there been so many scary new ways to get rich quick, as in schemes.
I get many e-mails daily telling me, that somebody left me money from Africa, or some other area in the world. I get people who call be and offer me a trip, providing I pay a certain amount, and am not told up front about other hidden charges. Where are facts about these seemingly simple abusers of society?
People are paying for the lack of decency, a letter or caller with discreet information about anything dealing with money, should be reported to the police. This is not a little matter, with little consequences, this is a horrible breech of trust and the law. People should be able to ratify easily to some extent what financial papers are saying, even when there is risk involved. Otherwise a quick phone call to The State Attorney Generals Office will be necessary for further investigation. Greedy individuals unfortunately survive well under many manifolds, it seriously is up to the consumer to exercise caution or “buyer beware” confidence, in light of some exceptional language, and sensible talk about dishonest business. Sick, them Fido, prosecute these slimy types to the hilt, and let them resolve to know they were busted.