We work longer. Our retirement is about as long as before.
So says a new StatsCan study that considers an older workforce. The study, released today, finds that a 50-year-old worker stayed in the labour force three and a half years longer in 2008 than in the mid-1990s.
But what's also interesting is that -- because we live longer -- delaying retirement doesn't actually mean that we spend less time in retirement. "As a percentage of total life expectancy," the study authors write, "the expected length of retirement from the age of 50 was about the same in 2008 as it was in 1977."
This isn't necessarily good news. For too many Canadians with limited savings and ongoing financial obligations, retirement is postponed because they can't afford it.
But many people are delaying retirement by choice -- and good health. In part because of the "high-tech, high-expense" medical revolution, our expectations of life have been transformed.
Star quarterbacks throw touchdowns into their 40s. Seniors populate the country club's greens -- and also the House of Commons and the Supreme Court. Retirement, once seen as a brief interlude between work and death, spans decades for some. Old age has been redefined. Just 40 years ago, any British citizen who reached his or her 100th birthday was personally congratulated by the Queen. Today, there are so many people joining the centenarians' club in the United Kingdom that civil servants draft the congratulatory notes.
A similar trend exists in Canada and across the Western world. Aging is largely a modern phenomenon. When Hamlet opened at the Globe in the early days of the 17th century, only one in 40 people were age 65 or older. Today, about one in seven people in the Western world are 65 or older.
We spend much time in our country worrying about our health-care system, and with good reason. Health care eats up more and more money from our provincial budgets; it is unsustainable with an aging population.
But we should never forget that this is -- in the overall scheme of things -- a good problem to have. And that's something to consider, for those of us in our working years, and those of us in our long retirement years.
Leo W. Gerard: Mourning in America: Death of the Middle Class
Delayed retirement more common
Pension Freedom Further Away - New Towers Watson “Pension Freedom Index” Shows ...
Here is an examination of how demographic changes will impact future real estate values:
http://viableopposition.blogspot.com/2010/12/next-housing-bubble-is-this-perfect.html
We may have no choice but to postpone retirement.
Something like 80% of medical expenses are incurred in the last 6 months of life. So the grey haired group has contributed to the medical plan for a good many years. However, if your visits to the doctor are increasing take note. The magic number is 85. If you make it, get ready for Assisted Living. If you don't, you really haven't missed much. However, you can decide how many years you want to call your own without having a boss to account to.
they made their earlier livelihoods. These are usually part time and are in fact keeping
the younger job seekers out of making even a minimum wage job. Look around your
community and you will see them. For the next five months you will probably not
see them. Why? They join the group of people called snowbirds taking their dough
down to the USA. But they will be back to get those jobs back because they make no
employee benefits demands. And I bet they even bargain a deal where there is a certain under the table payments to avoid the taxman. I suppose it comes under something called free enterprise. But it sure as hell stifles the aspirations of the young.