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Not necessarily. That's why you need to pay for good health insurance, before and after Medicare. My wife and I retired about 10 years ago. Three years ago I got hit with close to a $380,000 hospital bill. With Medicare and my supplementary insurance I paid $1,700 out of pocket.
I get a lot of "Suggested posts" from facebook that are retirement-related, many from AARP and many of those with comments from people who didn't plan very well. One whined that she hadn't bought a Medigap policy because it was too expensive and-surprise!- she ended up with an expensive health issue and her 20% share was even less affordable than the Medigap premiums. I personally know contemporaries who quit at 62 and started collecting SS but have come close to depleting their savings (one went with her husband on their dream trip to Europe and figured they'd be OK on SS alone- and recently she told me she was waiting till she had the money to fix the crack in her car's windshield).
People who think they're well-prepared and who ARE well-prepared are not the same thing.
By the way, I retired 5 years ago on "only" $2.6 million in a LCOL area and my net worth has been increasing at 2.5% annually AFTER withdrawals and I live a life that's pretty darn good by the standards of my friends who are working for a living. If I had $5 million I'd just leave a bigger legacy, even under the scary nursing home scenario.
It’s a matter of living much lower than your current lifestyle. Just because you are alive doesn’t mean it’s not a crisis
Quote:
I have always said this "retirement" crisis was waay over exaggerated. now I do admit that my circle of trust is not that big but as I am approaching retirement I've seen basically that most retirees are living the life they had pre retirement.
the ones that are struggling are the ones that were struggling prior.
I do not know 1 person who retired and all of a sudden are in financial crisis. I think it's a bunch of crap that the financial industry is selling that you need millions of dollars to retire.
How much do you have in terms of total assets as you look to retire?
For those that don't believe in a retirement crisis, what are your views on current wages? All these comfortable, well to do retirees had to fund all this "abundance" somehow.
Estimates show that many have not saved enough to offset declining Social Security benefits and rising costs due to greater longevity and health care inflation, just for starters.
Social Security benefits have never been declining, so that's a false claim.
Social Security indexes wages to the National Average Wage Index, which it publishes in late November or early December every year.
That $20,000 you made in 1984?
What $20,000?
Social Security doesn't use that. Indexing your 1984 wage to 2017 that $20,000 is now $60,375 and $60,375 is what Social Security uses to calculate your benefits, not the $20,000.
And, the Primary Insurance Amount increases every year. This year, it's 90% of the first $926, instead of 90% of the first $895.
Plus, there's annual COLA increases.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ChessieMom
Due to a number of factors, the financial health of the Social Security trust fund has been declining. According to the 2018 Trustees Report on Social Security, the fund will be depleted by 2034. That is only 16 years away.
That's called "yellow-journalism" but I'd expect that from Forbes.
Congress always waits until the last second to act, and anyone who doesn't know that can't be very intelligent.
And, there is a Bill pending now that will solve all of Social Security's problems, and it's quite likely to pass.
It will raise the FICA tax in the exact amount I have always said it needs to be increased, and it will eliminate the wage cap for income in excess of $400,000, and it will increase the Primary Insurance Amount, and it will incorporate a new scheme for those who don't have 35 years of work.
More importantly, it will make Social Security solvent through the end of this Century and beyond, since the ratio of Workers to Beneficiaries will never change once it reaches a certain point.
But, continue to fan the flames of inflammatory yellow-journalism if you want.
Social Security benefits have never been declining, so that's a false claim.
Social Security indexes wages to the National Average Wage Index, which it publishes in late November or early December every year.
That $20,000 you made in 1984?
What $20,000?
Social Security doesn't use that. Indexing your 1984 wage to 2017 that $20,000 is now $60,375 and $60,375 is what Social Security uses to calculate your benefits, not the $20,000.
And, the Primary Insurance Amount increases every year. This year, it's 90% of the first $926, instead of 90% of the first $895.
Plus, there's annual COLA increases.
That's called "yellow-journalism" but I'd expect that from Forbes.
Congress always waits until the last second to act, and anyone who doesn't know that can't be very intelligent.
And, there is a Bill pending now that will solve all of Social Security's problems, and it's quite likely to pass.
It will raise the FICA tax in the exact amount I have always said it needs to be increased, and it will eliminate the wage cap for income in excess of $400,000, and it will increase the Primary Insurance Amount, and it will incorporate a new scheme for those who don't have 35 years of work.
More importantly, it will make Social Security solvent through the end of this Century and beyond, since the ratio of Workers to Beneficiaries will never change once it reaches a certain point.
But, continue to fan the flames of inflammatory yellow-journalism if you want.
What on earth are you going on about?? I posted a couple of links, and just a few sentences from each...to show that you can find plenty of examples of perspectives on both sides of this issue. Fanning flames my foot.
Location: Formerly Pleasanton Ca, now in Marietta Ga
10,350 posts, read 8,567,170 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pyewackette
This. This is what happened to me. I was software engineer and I was GOOD at my job. Then I started to have memory problems. I thought it was "just stress" so I decided to take a couple of years off and build myself a home in a rural area. Well it wasn't just stress. It was something neurological. I have no sense of passing time. I can't tell how long ago something was, last week? No, that was TWO YEARS AGO. People can talk to me and 10 minutes later I have no memory not only of what was said, but of having been in the presence of the other person AT ALL.
I made good money back then. DAMM good money. Saved a crapload of it. That was all sucked up in the early stages of "figuring out what is wrong with me". If it hadn't been for my son, himself a grad student at the time, who took me in, I'd have been homeless long ago, AND I'd be dead by now because I think its pretty clear by now, regardless of whether or not someone is going to be able to get the drop on me (and at 5' 2" that's pretty nearly everybody) I'm going to get in their face if they get in mine. Which, on the street, will get you stabbed or beaten to death in nothing flat.
It took nearly 4 years for me to stabilize at a somewhat higher level than I had been at my worst, but still not "normal". It took THREE years for me to get disability and I had to go before a judge to do it. When he saw me, he was appalled. It took 5 minutes to approve my application, I was that badly off. I could barely track for years.
Even though I've improved to the point where I can drive again (at least some times) and more or less effectively live on my own, I am still virtually unemployable. My hands don't always work right. My balance is shot. I have vertigo. Lots of pains that are mostly minor and ignorable, but can't stand or walk for long periods of time. Can't be relied on to remember what I've been told. Can't be relied on not to skip important steps. I get confused at times. I not only can't go back to my job as a software engineer, I can't even remember how to work a cash register. I tried. I'm not proud. Work is work, and I needed to contribute to the household funds, my son was supporting me on like 10k per year. Got a job in a local grocery store and I could not remember half of what I needed to. I had a notebook that was full of notes about what was supposed to be done when, and directions for how to work the cash register.
I'm educated. I'm intelligent. In fact, historically, I've been HYPERintelligent.
But I'm living on the high side of poverty now - which, however you slice it, is a vast improvement over being homeless - only because my son rescued me when I was at my worst, because I finally DID get disability income, and because I'm just plain tough. Because I AM a getinyourface type of person, even when "you" is "me" and my failing body.
If any one of those resources went away, I would not only have ended up homeless, I'd have ended up dead.
Man that was tough. I hope things get better for you in the future. I think many people don’t realize how something unexpected can up end your whole life.
I do not know 1 person who retired and all of a sudden are in financial crisis. I think it's a bunch of crap that the financial industry is selling that you need millions of dollars to retire.
I definitely agree with this. But the median net worth of a 65 year old is something less than 300k, and that includes home equity. That's clearly not adequate.
I can tell you if you have $5 million in the bank, you can withdraw a lot more than $24k even if you just put that $5 million in CD.
Correct. An ultra conservative 3% withdrawal rate from $5M is $150k per year, plus annual inflation adjustments. That's more than enough for the vast majority of people. A merely conservative (works 95% of the time over 30 year periods) 4% withdrawal rate allows for $200k per year, plus annual inflation adjustments. This money can be invested in fairly boring mutual funds like Vanguard Balanced Index (60% U.S. Stock Market / 40% investment grade bonds).
Let's assume you have 5 million dollars in the bank. That is a bit over $2k per month.
mighta dropped a zero there bro-ham
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Fanning flames my foot.
