258 RüdigerKunow
residential care, "age" has found its place, or, rather is being placed.
Christine Brook-Rose's novel Life, End Of(2006) summarizes the
spatial trajectory of later life in the neat phrase: "House to flat to room
[inacarefacility],tobedtocoffintourn"(qtd.inHartung16).
The pervasive and stable association, not just in U.S.-American
culture, of "age" with living in care facilities is, however, evidence of
the wide-spread ignorance among large segments of society about the
actuallivingconditionsandarrangementsofseniorpeople.Infact,only
aminorityoftheelderlycohortintheU.S.livesthere.85percentofthe
65+ population live alone or with spouses, and of the 75+ segment the
figure is 75 percent (Harwood 119-26), only among the 85+ do the
numbers conform to public expectations and media images.^88
Nonetheless,if notalwaysmaterially thenatleastin public imagination
is residential care a constitutive factor of elder life, and with the
longevityrevolutioncontinuing,wecanexpectthatstableassociationto
standunchallenged.
The history of this location which might in some cases be called a
carceral institution dates back to the poorhouses and hospitals of the
Middle Ages (Achenbaum,Old Age60-68) and cannot be retold here,
except for mentioning that these "institutions made visible the social
presence of the elderly" for the first time (Katz,Disciplining Old Age
58),andnotmuchhaschangedsincethen.IntheU.S.today,residential
care hasbecomeafield in whichcultural,politicalandmarketagendas,
altruism and the profit motive, meet and compete. With total costs for
long-term residential care of approaching $200 billion in government
subsidies alone, as the Congressional Budget Office has pointed out
(United States,RisingDemand3-4), care, like so many other activities
associated with people in need, has become a business, and a fast
growingbusinessatthat.By2050,oneinfiveAmericansisexpectedto
liveinresidentialcare,sotheCDCestimates(UnitedStates,Long-Term
Care3). But residential care is a place that is, as I suggested, highly
charged with emotions. Few people enter such a facility with ease and
ontheirownaccount,manytoolatefortheirownbenefit.Itisestimated
(^88) According to official statistics, in 2014, long-term care provided services to
about 9 million Americans, ca. 1.4 million in nursing homes, 840.000 in
residential care communities. Among persons 85 and older, 52 percent live in
residentialcare,47percentinhospices(UnitedStates,Long-TermCare35-36).