What’s the Best Term for Referring to Old People? - The Atlantic

What’s the Best Term for Referring to Old People? 

Joe Pinsker writes in The Atlantic​:

"Calling someone old is generally not considered polite, because the word, accurate though it might be, is frequently considered pejorative.

"It’s a label that people tend to shy away from: In 2016, the Marist Poll asked American adults if they thought a 65-year-old qualified as old. Sixty percent of the youngest respondents—those between 18 and 29—said yes, but that percentage declined the older respondents were; only 16 percent of adults 60 or older made the same judgment. It seems that the closer people get to old age themselves, the later they think it starts.

"Overall, two-thirds of the Marist Poll respondents considered 65 to be 'middle-aged' or even 'young.' These classifications are a bit perplexing, given that, well, old age has to start sometime.

"'I wouldn’t say [65] is old,' says Susan Jacoby, the author of Never Say Die: The Myth and Marketing of the New Old Age, 'but I know it’s not middle age—how many 130-year-olds do you see wandering around?' ...

"So if 65-year-olds—or 75-year-olds, or 85-year-olds—aren’t 'old,' what are they? As [Ina Jaffe, a reporter at NPR] suggests, American English speakers are converging on an answer that is very similar to old but has another syllable tacked on as a crucial softener: older. "The word is gaining popularity not because it is perfect—it presents problems of its own—but because it seems to be the least imperfect of the many descriptors English speakers have at their disposal. ..."