Too old to work? Some Americans in end-of-life work bristle at calls for Biden to step aside

NEW YORK — A large portion of Americans watching President Joe Biden are seeing something beyond debate stumbles and prime-time missteps: themselves.

The debate over the 81-year-old Democrat’s fitness for another term is resonating especially with other older Americans who, like him, want to stay in office.

“People told me I should retire too,” says D’yan Forest, 89, a New York comedian. “But you have to keep working no matter what.”

Forest stumbles over the occasional joke and finds it harder to memorize his lines. But she’s busier than ever, attracting audiences and laughing a lot with obscene jokes and songs played on the ukulele. She dismisses Biden’s debate performance as a “point” and is irritated that a single night would cause people to ignore all the benefits that age brings.

People aged 75 and over are the fastest growing age group in the US workforce. Overall, about one in five Americans aged 65 and over is employed, according to the Census Bureau.

Many older adults are afraid of seeing a colleague left out because of their age and, like Forest, insist that it is up to each individual to decide to leave the workplace.

“He has experience,” she says. “He has judgment. He saw everything.”

Even among the growing population of older workers, however, some want Biden to give up.

“Forget it! The party’s over!” says Betty Ann Talomie, an 81-year-old from Seneca Falls, New York, who was born just weeks after the president. “Some people can’t face that it’s time.”

Talomie worked her last shift as a waitress in January. She still valued her regular customers, loved her co-workers, and loved having something to occupy the boring winter days. But she started to feel more tired towards the end of the shift and knew the time had come.

“It’s like anything at this age: It’s twice as hard to do anything,” says Talomie.

She plans to vote for Donald Trump, as she did in 2020, but says he is also ready to retire.

“I think they should both sit on lounge chairs,” she says.

Biden insists he is not moving away. Trump, 78, has escaped similar questions about his age. If he is elected and serves a full term, he will eventually supplant Biden as the oldest president in US history.

Eli Trujillo, an 87-year-old barber from Cheyenne, Wyoming, sees age taking its toll on Biden, but he knows he doesn’t cut his hair as quickly as he used to, nor does he put in as many hours.

Who is he to judge the president’s decision?

“If he thinks he can still do it,” Trujillo says, “I don’t hold that against him.”

Older employees see rampant age discrimination In workplaces and for those who remain in employment, being asked about retirement plans is a constant aggravation.

“They look at me and say, ‘Why don’t you retire? You can take it easy,” says Paul Durietz, a 76-year-old teacher from Gurnee, Illinois. “I just like teaching,” he tells them.

Durietz, who teaches seventh grade social studies, may come home a little more tired than before, but says working late is no longer a big problem.

Polls show that older Americans are more likely than younger Americans to have a favorable view of Biden and are less likely to say he should withdraw to allow another candidate. But even among seniors, Biden faces strong skepticism.

Six in 10 people over 70 were in favor of Biden withdrawing from the race in a survey released Wednesday from the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

Harriet Newman Cohen is one of them. Although she will vote for Biden if he remains, she finds his appearance painful and worries that he has lost all sense of self-awareness.

“What’s happening now,” says the 91-year-old lawyer, “is giving old age a bad name.”

Cohen says he hasn’t slowed down and has found that old age has brought him “more acuity, more insight, more energy.” Even though she bristles at the idea of ​​anyone suggesting she retire from the work she loves, she believes the time has come for Biden to step aside.

“I was very lucky,” says Cohen. “But the president wasn’t so lucky.”

While many young people cannot imagine working longer than necessary, older workers often say they cannot imagine not staying in a job.

Although some who work until they are 70, 80 and beyond do so because their finances force them to do so, many others do so out of preference. Research consistently shows job satisfaction increases with age and for those who love their work, deciding to give up is a difficult decision.

Jim Oppegard, a 94-year-old school bus driver from Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, is struggling to decide whether to return to work next month as a new school year begins.

He loves the kids and has extra money to give, and he continues to pass annual exams to make sure he’s up to the job. Guinness World Records certified him earlier this year as the the oldest bus driver in the worldan honor that made him reflect on his future.

He has thought about retiring before, but always came back. This time could be different.

“There’s something to be said,” says Oppegard, “for getting to the top.”

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Matt Sedensky can be reached at msedensky@ap.org and https://twitter.com/sedensky

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Associated Press writer Linley Sanders in Washington contributed to this report.