I got bad news this week. My kids’ long-time dentist passed away. But what made the news even more tragic was he retired earlier this year and died a few months after that.
He was in his 80s but felt, for what ever reason, that he had to keep working.
Unfortunately, many of us may be following a similar work route. I got two reports this week from two different organizations and the news is bad for individuals who don’t want to work until they drop dead.
* The MetLife Report on Early Boomers: How America’s Leading Edge Baby Boomers Will Transform Aging, Work & Retirement found:
— Those born between 1946 and 1955 will transform the American concept of retirement by forgoing the tradition of a leisure-filled life. Instead, their financial obligations among other things will encourage many of them to remain in the workforce, some indefinitely.* The Sloan Center on Aging and Work at Boston College and Families and Work Institute reports that:
– Workers in their 50s and 60s are redefining “retirement”
– 75% of workers aged 50 and older expect to have retirement jobs in the future
– Many are working to stay active (31%) or to contribute and be productive (18%)
– Less than one in five report working in retirement due to insufficient income
The full Sloan report will be released next week.
Are you planning on working until you drop? What do these reports say about our society?
October 4th, 2010 at 10:23 am
Such an interesting topic. Didn’t the dynamic of “retirement” only come onto the scene in the past century as the result of people leaving their homes to work, organizations offering pensions to promote employee loyalty and all of us living longer?
We all need to position ourselves and develop our skills in such a way that we can work indefinitely. To me the goal is that my retirement will give me the luxury of continuing work that I enjoy. We also need to manage our personal cost of living so that we are not covered in debt as we enter our later years.
The distressing piece of the statistics is that one side says that we will all have to work forever but the other side tells us that the workplace is becoming less and less welcoming to older people.
October 4th, 2010 at 2:10 pm
I like the idea of retirement. It must be great to have nothing to do for a change. Don’t get me wrong, I love my job and want to be productive til I drop, but it would be nice not to have to worry about whether my job will be able to cover the bills when I’m in my 80s.