The jobs you pine away for were killed by the unions you admire. In the 1980's a kid with a high school diploma could make $100k a year with OT putting hubcaps on Buicks. The unions fought efficiency improvements and automation which could have reduced costs and saved some jobs, instead those jobs first went to the non-union South and then overseas.
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Don't know why you're fixated on older people. In the US the median age is 39 in Germany it's 48. Germany is a manufacturing powerhouse with strong unions, why is Germany succeeding where the US failed? I've lived and worked in Germany. Germans are notoriously thrifty, live in rented flats and families own one car.

You don't need to travel to retirement communities to see the shift in US consumer attitudes. Ever heard of the death of bricks and mortar retailing?  On the mainland malls are converting vacant retail space to food courts and health clubs. Your "silver crowd" is using malls as gyms because mall owners want them to.