Intergenerational Economic Justice

Zera Yacob taught that reason reveals our interdependence; no person is an island. In your 50s and 60s, you hold power over resources that will outlive you. What legacy do you leave? Intergenerational economic justice asks: Are your financial choices sustainable or extractive? Do you hoard or share? Do you pass wealth to kin while climate and inequality intensify? Do you model sufficiency or endless wanting? The pre-retirement decade is when these choices crystallize. You might ask: What would teach younger generations about dignity, work, and enough-ness? How can your resources support those with fewer advantages? What practices contradict the values you claim? Yacob's rationalism applied here suggests that building wealth while ignoring its social costs, or hoarding for heirs while systems crumble, is not merely selfish but irrational—a failure of the reasoning that should guide a dignified life.