Why Do They Think Older People Can Just Keep Working until they are 70+?

I am beginning to thing that most older people in this country are going to really be in trouble. No one has a pension any more. Lots and lots of people who have worked all of their lives have nothing now. Some have 401k plans - but a lot of people borrowed against them to get houses.

I have a lot of friends that are now in their early 60's. They had all planned to work as long as possible - well into their 70's. But their health just ins't holding up.

One of my good friends has cancer and if she loses her job it will be pretty bad. She has worked all of her life but she worked rather low paying jobs in banks (like a whole lot of women do) so her social security isn't all that much. And if she has to start getting it at 62 it won't be a lot of money to live on each month.

Another good friend is a hair dresser - has worked all of her life. But her business is just falling apart because people don't want to go to a 60 year old hair dresser.

I had to quit work in my late 50's. I just couldn't do it any more. Couldn't compete with the up and coming young people in my field. Couldn't go as fast, didn't have the stamina. And my memory isn't as good as it used to be. I started my own business and it is slowly taking off but if I hadn't had back up money I would probably be a bag lady now.

I just don't think the future for the boomers is looking all that good. We may all be out their on the streets.

Reliving our glory days in the 60's and 70's, only with adult depends. Oh well...

We could all meet up in San Francisco and wear flowers in our hair.

We could smoke pot and drop acid and just sort of live in the park.

Wouldn't be such a bad way to go.

and get it right.

I am part of the hippie generation and I can't help wondering how much we
could have accomplished it we weren't all smoked up most of the time.
Good intentions carried us just so far.

Maybe we are being offered a chance to get it right this time.

If we started to lead in more determined, creative way I believe that most
of the young people of this country would follow.

doing a thing "right" entails doing it without drugs.

However, I certainly agree that should I end up on the street it will be without my drugs - the idea of being able to afford seven prescription meds every morning, just to stay alive, will be but a fond memory of days passed. I wouldn't last long on the street, I think. When that time comes, I'll just drive to the nearest trailhead, hike into the wilderness a few miles, find a comfortable old growth conifer to prop up against, and wait for the cougars to recycle this sorry flesh.

Where the fuck is abbie?

The chances of the geezer rebellion 'doing it without drugs' is nil. We will all have one chronic illness or another.

It's interesting that a group of people who profess such outrage at the idea of evolution would have such a survival-of-the-fittest mentality.

they don't care.

tanks and other policy making institutions have no idea what actual work is like. I'd like to see them spend a day scrubbing toilets when they're 67 years old!

working on a computer 10 hours a day.

Arthritis sets in. I can't even see the screen very well now that I have bifocals.

And people who have done physical work are just completely worn out.

this year. Luckily I got a job with a county government at 61 yrs of age. If I work here for 5 yrs and pay in $200 a pay period I will get $1,000 per month for life starting at age 71. That and my social security will be $3,000 per month. If I can save up money between now and then I can draw down another $1,000 per month. My wife is 17 years younger than I am and will work for 17 years after I retire.

We are selling our house and buying a much less expensive one were we will only have to pay about $600 a month plus utilities.

I may retire at 66 or work until 70 if I'm able to do so. I don't think I could stand to stay home all day and I surely don't want to join the guys at the donut store every morning and sit there until Judge Judy comes on.

or so they say and he being the saint that he was and all if its good enough for him then its good enough for us :sarcasm:

you know I made some mistakes as I wandered through life and one is I didn't really prepare myself for when the chickens come home to roost so to say but I'm not sure that after this criminal mal-administration if the ones who did save will be any better off than me for it. I know if I had lost a lot of money in an enron type deal I would be very bitter so as to make life hard to enjoy now.

feel. All those years and absolutely nothing to show for it. And all the time thinking they had done the right thing for their retirement.

Awful.

Retirement age would be one of them. These basically new problems aren't just going to go away. We don't have any type of previous example to go by either.

You can either raise the "official" retirement age from 65 to something else. You can go down a mass immigration road, but that will impact whatever country you're pulling people from to keep our system going. You can have another baby boom, but that won't happen tomorrow. You can raise taxes, but with fewer people pumping energy into the system, where does the tax money come from? You can eventually lower benefits, but who's going to go along with getting less? You can get the money back from corporations, but they're global, and India and China have billions of people who want more stuff, so the American consumer won't have the same impact as they once did. I'm sure there are more on the list of things.

If we're living longer and healthier though, people won't be able to retire at 65. Physical reality still gets in the way of our plans for everyone to live lives of luxury. That's not going to happen, and if it does, our environmental problems will only get worse.

So yes, the longer people are alive, the longer people will have to work. Unless we have more people. If we had a global state, and the few billion people who aren't or are barely connected to the socio-economic system were fully integrated into it, you could probably lower the retirement age(fat chance, but in theory at least). That said, if you think our global warming problems are serious now, implement that plan and see what it gets you.

People forget the retirement age was set at the traditional 65 long ago - it was over the median life expectancy at the time! Now we have young people expected to live comfortably into their 80s. How can it be economically feasible that the following generation of workers support them for so long, unless we have substantial population growth focused on working age individualswhich itself will cause other problems?

We used to work most of our lives, then retire for maybe a decade before, on average, dying. Now it's more like two decades, and it's only going to get longer (assuming the economy doesn't collapse like it's probably going to) as medicine advances.

My generation, assuming trends continue, may live healthy and hale for well over a century. That would mean that my ability to work will also be approaching the century mark. I'm 31, by the way.

So how am I suppose to work from, say, age 22 to age 67 (45 years), then save up enough money or contribute enough to society to be able to retire for 50 years?

The longer we live, the longer we're going to have to work.

Our current problem is that we're extending lifespans more than we're extending workable lifespans. At least right now. But if we ever get our act together on stem-cell research, we'll be able to fix that.

What will most likely happen is that, after 30 or 40 years of work, people will take a sabbatical, using up some of their retirement savings for a couple-three years, before going back to work. During that sabbatical, they might go back to school and start a new career or their own business or something.

"What will most likely happen is that, after 30 or 40 years of work, people will take a sabbatical, using up some of their retirement savings for a couple-three years, before going back to work. During that sabbatical, they might go back to school and start a new career or their own business or something."

Would people take sabbatical shifts? Would it all be planned out decades in advance? When you're born? Would the parents have to fill out forms before they had the kid? "Alright, we have we have 5 spots left between 2057 and 2060. You can apply now, but we...oh, sorry, last spot was just taken by a couple in Britain. We have a number of spots after 2071 though. Lets just get your signature..."

I guess we could automate enough of everything that people could be a little more free to take time off as they see fit. Although it doesn't seem like time off when you'd be going to school so that you don't become obsolete the moment you take a break.

If you work for 40 and take a 4-year break, then you're working 91% of the time. Or, rather, 91% of the people will be working at any given time.

Of course, that might be something we can incorporate into Social Security. At age 65, you get a 5-year cut of retirement money (sabbatical payments), then you get cut off again until your "real" retirement at age 110 or 120.

have to take a fresh look at communal living which will allow us to pool our resources and achieve a better standards of living than we would have individually. I'm already doing this to a very small extent. My best friend, who had 5 children and very low-paying jobs, retired a little over 2 years ago. It would have been absolutely impossible for her to survive on what she gets with SS so I invited her to move in with us. But I've been thinking about my own retirement and going in on some property with other boomers. Property that would be self-sufficient. We had a good idea in the 60's. I think it's worth taking another look.

Especially given how many aging single people (especially women) living alone we have in this country, without family, this is a really intriguing idea.

I have a lot of single friends who are growing older as I am.

Maybe co-housing or communes are the answer. We could rent a big Victorian house, buy groceries and cook together, share the chores.

pollution and over eating modified polluted food will do that to you.

so less and less people will not be able to work or can only work part time.

and that includes the illegals.

I've always said, go to Iraq and come back dead, disabled, and/or sick.

it's getting to be the same here in the 'homeland'. christ, I hate that word.

Some of his friends retired and 2 of them shortly there after. Plus my Dad always worries about money, he doesn't need to any more but thats just who he is.

"we don't care which and we don't care when"

--the post-NAFTA owners of Amurka

doesn't mean that they are well enough, or alert enough, to keep working for years and years.

That and the fact that the younger people coming up seem so eager to just push the older workers out.

"you'll HAVE to work until you die, or starve and die. If you don't like it, who cares? Now shut up or I'll give your jobs to some newbies off the truck from Guatemala."

--Management

from my inheritance and my husband's IRA, but I don't count on it at all. I've lived on very little most of my life and the day may very well come again. I'm glad my kids like me because I may need their help before this is all over.

she was 62 when I went to work for her. Some 5+ years later she was still there working but she didn't know what she was doing with the computers. She faked knowing how to run Excel and Windows.

She came from a lineage of people that lived to be close to 100 years and she figured she'd live to be that old too.

As it turned out, she finally retired and died about 2 years later of cancer. I'm sure the hefty pension she briefly drew was nice but was it really worth it?

I don't think so. :(

:kick:

I am also collecting social security. There is no way that I could exist solely on social security. I have a 401K, but do not have a lot built up. So, I will be working until I drop. Luckily, I have a cushy job. I am a copy-editor and just stare at the computer all day and read articles.

the older generation had their chance. Now, it's time to step away and let the younger generation have their first jobs. It's the way it used to be. It's the way it should be. There should be a mandatory retirement age of 65 (coupled, of course, with decent social security and free extended care facilities).

That is how I and most of the other workers felt about the supervisor I mentioned. Everyone was wondering when the hell she'd retire and move over and let someone younger with far more skills have the job.

No one dared say it to her face though but many thought it that was for certain.

She was making big bucks too ... another factor that sort of p/o'd many of the younger more experienced workers that were earning about 1/2 of what she what bringing in and were working twice as hard.

but then again :wtf: is it that you read about Native Americans is ever correct?

unless he was speaking from beyond the grave.

working. Keeping the younger ones out of the legitimate work force so that becoming cannon fodder as part of our military is their only option.

They are salivating over the prospect of millions of desperate, hungry old people to hire as cheap labor!

money to wall street.

Not a thing. They just wish we would die and get out of the way so that none will remember what freedom was and they cn get on with their Penultimate and Final Solutions to the Liberal Problem.

if you don't get killed the first time hang on a minute and they'll send your ass back for another chance of them blowing your ass off. These people making the decisions in america today have no shame, every one needs to be tarred and feathered and then rode out of town on a rail. they are traitors

I'm 44 and have worked my butt off all my life. I have had to cash in the little that I had in retirement savings in the face of increased fuel costs and all the cost of living increases we have incurred lately just to stay afloat.

As it stands, if nothing changes, I'll work until I die. End of story. :(

we had to cash out Hubby's 401k, etc. to get him medical care. Now, at 60, he probably has less than a year to live (renal failure/heart failure). I am 49, and after everything I have been through, my only hope is getting SSI (mental health) disability until I turn 67. I don't have enough work units to get SSDI. Working in any kind of a stressful environment is simply out of the question, if I wish to stay somewhat sane. Oh, and the shrink just upped one of my meds.

Even if you have experience and are dedicated they are not interested . They focus on the youth and face it at 59 I can't keep up with the labor or the fast paced technology . A high school grad has had years of modern prep I will never have and the old fall back on a trade is dead now days .

we have been weeded out and discarded .

I used to go to an old hardware store where most of the employees where there 30 years or more , one day the entire store had going out of business signs and the empty shelves were very similar to the looks on these tossed out older employees faces , they were lost and sad and worried . It was a sad thing indeed , they lost their entire life in seconds and their entire community ties .

I have seen this over and over again at an accelerated pace .

Just too old.

I always figured I would work until I was at least 65 but that didn't happen.

People these days need to be ready to take care of themselves by the time they hit 50. Since there are no pensions anymore you just have to keep socking money away over the years.

I've applied for jobs that I'm literally like the most qualified person in my city for and never gotten a call back.

Fortunately, I had the skills this company was looking for. I am now 68 and must keep working for a couple more years. But if I had to go out now and find another job at my age, I doubt that I would be hired. Maybe as a WalMart greeter.

my mother came out of retirement.

Wasn't it once said that offshoring was OK because older people would retire and lots of jobs would open up and as a result we'd have a LOT of openings and everything would improve?

"Another good friend is a hair dresser - has worked all of her life. But her business is just falling apart because people don't want to go to a 60 year old hair dresser."

Durn, if she was in my town I'd go to her.

But she isn't the only one I know facing bad job news just because they are nearing 60.

Another couple of my friends always made good money - he had a good job with GM for years - they have a nice house, expensive cars. They are not what I would call wealthy but they did just fine - upper middleclass probably.

He lost his job at GM and he just passed 60. No work out there for 60 year olds. No one wants you at that age. So he has tried a couple of self employed business things but I don't think that is working well at all. They are facing a pretty scary future.

I'm thinking offer her services at retirement homes/communities on site. I'll bet an 80 y/o would be FINE w/ a 60 y/o hairdresser!

when he was in his late-forties. He was looking at making investments and socking away money because, according to him, stylists lose business when they are older because younger people don't think they will be up-to-date with styles and skills.

And then there is that "little" thing about what that kind of work does to one's feet and back after a couple of decades. :(