> Much of that is economic. Our society places no value on most people that age. this feels like a theory in search of facts. are your friends hanging out with

> Much of that is economic. Our society places no value on most people that age. this feels like a theory in search of facts. are your friends hanging out with you simply because of your economic value to them? or weirder, hanging out with you because of your economic value to your employer? there might be a correlation between someone's "economic value" being zero, and them being lonely, but there are a lot of ways that can happen, and direct causation probably isn't one of them.