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Again everyone needs to look at their own set of variables and there are many that we often miss. If by delaying your SS you can reach a point where your SS and if you have one a pension is more than enough to live on that affords you the opportunity to let your investments sit and continue to grow with any RMD's going into taxable accounts. I was with some relatives yesterday and several were living off of their pensions and not using their SS benefits even though they had filed. They didn't want to wait because of longevity questions etc etc.
I have seen an increasing number of stories in the media about how many people who reach retirement age are continuing to work. I always wonder if this is a form of social engineering on the part of powerful forces within our government, media and the investment industry, to try to convince older Americans to keep working.
I do not believe people in good health between 55-70 should just quit their jobs and sit around all day doing nothing, but I wonder if America really needs people in their 60s and 70s working full time when there is so many younger workers looking for a job.
Who is promoting Americans working full time into their 70s, and why?
I don't see any sort of conspiracy. But I do see that the media is chock full of people who are chock full of nonsense.
Investing, retiring, buying cars, parenting - it seems that no matter what the subject there is always someone with no experience willing to give instructions. The Pope (for God's sake) is willing to give out marriage advice!
The media can print whatever they wish. The Constitution gives them that right. Once in a while I read something that makes a little sense.
But not very often.
People do the best they can. They don't need some kid with a degree in journalism to advise them.
the problem is these are people who are journalists . they are not retirement planning researchers or experts . they parrot others and many times they parrot the wrong people and wrong facts.
i think more than 3/4's of the time i spend on city data is de-bunking the crap we hear or read pertaining to retirement planning .
Lucky is the man that can retire at 50 and live the lfe he wants! But most people would have to live a life they don't want to do that, or its not a choice at all. Never ever seen any "conventional wisdom " that stated the above. In fact, "conventional wisdom " normally is to find a vocation you enjoy and is fulfilling so work is not a chore at all, but a source of mental and/or physical exercise and social interaction, that also pays well and assures you a rich retirement on your terms.
Of course that's the ultimate work fantasy......dreamed of by many but attained by very few. Even people who start a career and go into it wide eyed and enjoying it get jaded & sick of it after 25 - 30 years....it becomes rote work where you're doing it for a job but not enjoying the job you're doing. Again, I'm sure there are a very few exceptions who love their jobs and don't want to ever leave but that's a rarity.
the problem is these are people who are journalists . they are not retirement planning researchers or experts . they parrot others and many times they parrot the wrong people and wrong facts.
i think more than 3/4's of the time i spend on city data is de-bunking the crap we hear or read pertaining to retirement planning .
Another problem is many people doling out advice would benefit themselves if you followed it.
I recall reading an article on saving and investing in the American Legion magazine that stated the importance of saving at an early ages for expenses that come up in the future besides retirement.
The " blow hard" was saying one expense you must save for when your daughters are born is paying for a wedding as.................." the average wedding in the United States cost $35,000.
actually in our area a typical wedding is way more than 35k . my sons was close to 80k years ago and we split that 3 ways .
my daughter had so many friends to invite that they had almost 250 people so to cut it way down she had a destination wedding in the dominican republic and that ran about 25k .
like every thing else folks do what thy can afford or what they want . our other son didn't even want a wedding . they just did a restaurant thing .
I have seen an increasing number of stories in the media about how many people who reach retirement age are continuing to work. I always wonder if this is a form of social engineering on the part of powerful forces within our government, media and the investment industry, to try to convince older Americans to keep working.
I do not believe people in good health between 55-70 should just quit their jobs and sit around all day doing nothing, but I wonder if America really needs people in their 60s and 70s working full time when there is so many younger workers looking for a job.
Who is promoting Americans working full time into their 70s, and why?
Show me 6 different "experts" and I'll bet you get 6 different opinions.
It's just all so subjective and is another YMMV and one pair of pants does not fit all.
If they didn't write about this stuff, they'd be the ones sitting around all day doing nothing.
There has got to be a peak on the age thing. And, I think, a reversal at some point. Maybe we won't see it. The world is just getting too populated for governments to keep up, health care will suffer. Agriculture advances won't be able to keep up and food quality will suffer. Obesity etc. I think ages will start to decrease at some point down the road.
My Mother lived till 91 though the last couple of years weren't pretty. Her Mother till 93, again the last few years were terrible. But both of them had substantially different lives than me. Totally different food, totally different lifestyle in terms of physical activity, far less exposure to toxins.
I hardly think that my life span will be the same. Its just not.
The things you speak of will not have impact, if at all, until Gen X and Millies are old. Boomers still have it relatively good longevity-wise.
I don't know, to each his own. I'm one of the many who would never have been able to retire at age 50, even if I had wanted to do so. At that age I figured I had 16 more years to go for full retirement. I'd have thought that was more the norm among working folks, although from reading this forum it seems that many retire relatively early- or those are the folks we hear from, maybe.
Actually, at age 50 I was downsized from the job I had at the time, and was lucky enough ( and skilled enough, there is that) to find another full time job at which I remained for the next 14 years, and retired from that job at age 64. I might have worked for another couple years at that job, but had a number of family and job-related reasons for retiring when I did. I started collecting SS at age 65, after I figured the break-even point with taking it a year before I was fully eligible didn't make that much difference, or so it seemed.
The way it looks, maybe it's more like lucky is the man who can retire, whatever his age?
Most of the early retirees you see posting here worked for dot.gov or for old school companies that still offered pensions at a time when most companies were already pension-less (or never offered them to begin with).
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