A few weeks ago, I posted about New York Times columnist David Brooks’s request for stories from folks older than 70, a series he’s calling “The Life Report.”
Yesterday, Brooks summarized the responses he’s received. He also has 
been running an essay a day on his blog. Some of Brooks’s observations:
Born in the 1920s and 1930s, most of them learned work habits in an age of scarcity and then got to explore opportunities in an age of growth. Unlike later generations, many of the men went through a phase in which they did physical labor in a factory, even if later they went on to become professionals.
Many of the women were born with limited aspirations and only saw their horizons expanded with feminism. By middle age, people of both sexes were moving freely, assuming there would be a decent job wherever they settled.
Some of my correspondents were influenced by the social revolution of the ’60s.