Some individuals believe that it would make a good investment of government money to spend on training old people to use computers. Personally, I completely disagree with this view for reasons that are explained in this essay.
The first argument against this opinion would be that senior citizens tend to suffer from many health problems due to their age. The most prevalent yet severe issue might be declining memory and cognitive function, which almost all old people experience regardless of their fitness. This would significantly limit their ability to learn and remember new things, especially given the fact that using computers is actually a difficult and complicated activity due to their numerous functions and complex settings, which might be overwhelming for people of such old age. Thus, teaching the elderly this skill would be extremely difficult and require an excessive amount of money to be successful. Moreover, in the worst scenario, if this idea were put into practice, many people at 65 or above might even die from old age while still learning, wasting all the government resources spent on teaching them.
Furthermore, government money could be utilized in more needed areas that would directly make old individuals’ lives better. This is because elderly people are mostly “digital immigrants” and some even do not use digital devices at all, their need for computer knowledge and skills is not notable. Meanwhile, these people often need healthcare services and nursing homes, where they can get help from staff to stay physically and mentally healthy. Unfortunately, due to the ageing population, these institutions often get overwhelmed, and many elderly people cannot seek help from them when they are in need, leading to a reduction in their health. Therefore, allocating money to this area would be more beneficial for old people since it caters to their fundamental needs instead of teaching them a skill that has almost no use for this demographic.
In conclusion, I disagree with the suggestion that the government should pay for the elderly to learn to use computers, as this would be overwhelmingly hard to succeed due to their chronic health problems, and the government has better priorities to allocate money to. As healthcare and nursing significantly help senior citizens stay healthy, spending on these areas would make better use of the government’s money.