I laughed aloud at "We could build a better society just around making writers' jobs more difficult."

yes, my 84 yr old mother, had a stroke in her eye and lost most of her sight in that eye, still drives no matter me telling her often not to. How she keeps her license seems to revolve around Doctor shipping, as the oldies all know the doctor to go to to get their license renewed.

She'd never take public transport if it was at her door, so you'd need something better than just good public transport, like banning everyone over 75.

or make meth to pay for cancer treatment

Nah, the narrative will then be "just wait it out, they'll be dead soon, crisis over" ignoring the generation getting old right behind them

But then all the n words and mayheehans will steal the transportation! —boomers

Yeah, just give them the nuclear codes and they can go straight to fucking shit up.

Japan has passenger trains.

It will be much worse.

Japanese dashcam videos are a preview of what horrors to come.

Throwing down a terrible stereotype here, which in my 60+ years, has turned out to be more true than not, ..but older Japanese men and women are notoriously bad drivers.. esp. the old men in hats.

Holy hell, do not EVER wear a hat when you drive. It sucks the ability to control a car right out of you.. God's honest, I have seen that one play out over decades and it's frightening and it's real and I do not know why.

You're absolutely right. I have a whole long list of specific health issues that mean I absolutely should not be driving, but holy hell, the amount of people (of all ages) pressuring me to get a license like I'm just lazy or refusing to 'grow up and become an adult' is BONKERS!

These are people that see how extremely often and ridiculously I full-on run into or sideswipe things while walking. They see how often I pass out, or my vision goes black. They want me behind the wheel of a speeding two ton death machine!? Car culture is wild.

I do feel awful being a burden on those around me who can drive, though. We don't have any public transportation or a walkable city (not that I can walk far anyway, lol.) Trust me; if I could drive, I fucking would!

Also... Both my parents have seizures (that are NOT under control) and continue to drive, even though they definitely shouldn't. My father has had them while driving and woke up in a ditch multiple times. They're not boomers, either.

Hell yeah. Maybe even put a figurehead on the basket and go full pirate ship.

Those scooters look fkn fun

My grandma moved closer to people that could help her and where she was more mobile without a car.

My girlfriends grandma is 90 and she rides her e-bike almost daily. But we have some bike lanes and a grocery store is nearby.

Maybe locally organised carpools?

If you live somewhere that you have to drive to take care of yourself and you can no longer drive, you can no longer take care of yourself.

You move to where you can either take care of your self or be taken care of.

There's a few options: you drive for her, she moves into a senior community, she moves in with you -- which is how it used to be -- or none and a fender bender (or worse).

My dad stopped driving at 80 but he remained living on the farm.
If he needed to go somewhere, there was always a neighbor happy to help out.

Dad went to the car dealership and spent $10k on a reasonably good 2nd hand car that he never drove - it would only get used if he needed someone to drive him somewhere.

Using his own car that he pays all the running costs and maintenance on made it much more comfortable for him to ask a neighbor/friend/family for help.

has she gotten into accidents? i know people almost 70, already a couple accidents this year alone, mostly at nighttime. i notice they also drive ALOT slower on the freeway too,

There is always the possibility of the end of humanity.

And a friendly reminder that boomers own far more than billionaires and as such are very much invested in the system. Your poverty allows them retirement.

I love it in when so called leftists ignore the huge petite bourgeoisie class that has voted for more and freer capitalism for decades. Sure, just ignore class traitors. I'm sure it will work out.

Would it make you feel better if it was actually because she was wealthy?

Why are you lot allowing your insurers to deny claims? Round here if you cause an accident, your insurance has no choice but to compensate the victim's damages.

Uh-huh, like it hasn't already under Dumpster Fire? Groceries are up, gas is up, healthcare is up, etc.

Public transportation can absolutely go into the suburbs. In fact, I think it should. Every time they have tried to extent a tram line or set up some light rails, people protested because "not in my backyard" and "everyone will just go to the city, this place will be deserted". Every time they actually went through, the suburb became more sought after and local commerce actually increased.

Public transportation is great, but they don't go into the suburbs. I suppose Uber and Lyft are the solution there,

No, not living in the suburbs is the solution here

My dad (and his wife) are still about 10 years away from addressing the problem of needing people to drive them, but when the time comes I won't mind pitching in driving them places. We do that currently for my wife's grandparents, who, to their great credit, gave up driving because they knew they were getting too old; they even kept their car so that whoever was helping them drive places wouldn't take on the expense of using their own car.

Back to my dad and his wife, there are three of us children (six between them) within 45 minutes of them, and another two within 2 hours. Problem is they are talking about picking up and moving literally to the other coast 3,000 miles away. The sixth child (hers) lives on that coast, but still eight hours away from where they bought property.

We're currently in California, so they are tempted by the difference in property values, which I can see making sense on paper. Of course, it doesn't work in reverse, once you sell in California, you can't buy your way back in. You've spent that equity. And when you leave behind the entirety of your support system to save $300 per month, what's the plan?

Capitalism

While true, the problem is the "American Dream" urbanism, or lack thereof. Socialism would never offer such an insane waste of resources like car dependent detached housing.

People don't want to accept it, but we really should be testing drivers more frequently. We don't, cuz car brain society, but we should.

The last thing we need is government-paid private drivers so the people that most need public transport (that also for some reason have the most political power) will never vote to get public transport.

The word you're looking for is "chauffeur."

Not my boomer parents they can rot far has I am cocern.