The Nasty Business of Aging

Hartog, Hendrik. 2012 . Someday All This Will Be Yours: A History of Inheritance and Old Age . Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press. Pp. 353. $29.95 cloth. This essay explores the contribution of Hendrik Hartog's Someday All This Will Be Yours to an understanding of old age policy and the aging experience more broadly. It starts by discussing how Hartog's study contributes to a modern understanding of the legal structure surrounding old age. It then discusses how the narrative is colored, in part, by looking at the cases from a caregiver's perspective, and explores the implications of this perspective. Finally, it suggests avenues for building on Hartog's work by using modern legal cases to explore how courts today perceive the moral and legal obligations surrounding the duty to provide care.