Home » News & Events » Why not enlist an army of volunteer retirees?
by Daniel Pink for the Washington Post
Why not establish a robust national service program for people over 65? The contours of such an initiative are already in place. It’s called AmeriCorps Seniors, part of AmeriCorps, the federal agency that promotes service and volunteering. Each year, about 143,000 AmeriCorps Seniors volunteers, all 55 and older, serve local communities in a variety of ways: delivering food to the homebound, tutoring students, even assisting military families with their tax returns.
Examining AmeriCorps Seniors’ scope, though, can be frustrating. The program’s 143,000 volunteers is a meaningful number, but it represents less than one-fourth of 1 percent of the nearly 80 million Americans over 60. AmeriCorps Seniors’ annual budget is about $235 million — not peanuts, but about what the federal government spends on Social Security every 90 minutes.
Imagine boosting the funding to the equivalent of, say, 90 hours of Social Security payments. That would be enough for AmeriCorps to connect nearly 8.5 million volunteers with local nonprofits meeting local needs.
If scaled wisely, a remade and expanded initiative — call it the Silver Service Corps — would deliver at least three benefits.
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Visit the JCA Volunteer webpage to see the many ways you can become a volunteer.
