If you retire early, you could be harming your health: new study

[Dash man]

Just sold enough today to collect more than $1500 in option premium. Heh heh heh...

I did about the same with covered calls today.
Tomorrow maybe I’ll ask this new AI chat thing everyone is talking about to write a proposal requesting $100M from the government to study how aging contributes to our deteriorating health.

 

[old medic]

Not when your job can kill you!... Exposed to deadly diseases and virus's, assaults or hit by distracted drivers... Ill take my chances being retired.

 

[ncbill]

According to the abstract they measured people aged 60 and above, so I think that doesn’t qualify as early retirement - unless the alternative is work ‘til you die. They had a good sample to study, as the rural pension system was implements at different times around the country.

The study also mentions an earlier US study
We discussed that study here back in ‘14 (here) . It seems to me both come to the same conclusion, which is leaving work results in lower social engagement, which in turn leads to cognitive decline.

I think it’s a spurious correlation at best.

Mandatory retirement at age 60 for men (decided back when life expectancy was around 50 in post-WWII China)

Most workers are covered, but payouts are low:

https://clb.org.hk/content/cracks-china’s-old-age-pension-system-begin-widen

At current exchange rates the average pension of 153 yuan mentioned in the above article is under $25/month.

 

[W2R]

Cognitive decline? What total BS. Some of the most intelligent people online are early retirees on this forum, IMO. That's a big part of why we keep coming back, to engage in intelligent conversation with others on the forum.

 

[ElizabethT]

Oh for freaks sake!.

Today I walked nine miles along the coast. Yesterday was six miles along hills. In between was bridge, guitar, reading, and Spanish practice, plus some good old fashioned chores. But sure, tell me all about the risk of cognitive decline, as opposed to sitting in front of a computer all day, or worse, stuck in mindless meetings.

 

[scrabbler1]

I have posted in this forum many times how being retired helped me greatly after I was released from the hospital 7.5 years ago. This was because I could devote 100% of my time and effort to getting better.

I surely do not blame my being in the hospital on being retired. I had health issues due to being old (50s) or due to heredity.

I do credit being retired for improving my mental health. Also as I have posted many times in this forum, the main reason for retiring (and, 7 years earlier, semi-retiring) was the commute which I so greatly despised. Reducing it when I semi-retired was helpful, but insufficient to fully counteract my despair at still having the awful commute, even a few days a week.

 

[Alex The Great]

Since I retired at 59.5, not really early, am good, no harm to my health

Good for you. But how would you define early? For example is 56 early enough, or one must retire at 55 to qualify?

 

[SecondAttempt]

pre covid I would have thought retiring early meant less stress at job = lower chance for stroke, also lower time commuting = lower intake of smog and lower chance of getting in a car accident.

Now with so many working from home, not sure.

I play a lot of online games which I think helps the cognitive part. I also read about 10 books a month.

I am not retired but I think there could be some substance behind this. I've been an "intellectual" all my life, but not a snob about it. About 20 years ago I took a few years off to get a PhD. While I was still engaged intellectually I was focused on a very narrow topic. I also spent a lot of time exercising and being disengaged intellectually.

When I returned to work I definitely felt like I had a lot of catching up to do. So I certainly agree that the brain can shift and forget skills very quickly. Fortunately things came back fairly fast when I began to work more broadly in my field again. Although I kept it to myself and was able to fake it, it was embarrassing the technical skills I had lost in just a few short years.

Fast forward to COVID and working from home for almost 3 years. I was engaged with colleagues but spent a lo of time playing games and doing personal research as well. The games were mostly language based (think Wordle but many others) and teh personal research had nothing to do with my job. I found that when I went back to working much more I did not experience the same sense of needing to catch up I had before. I also think my language skills have improved somewhat but that is obviousl introspective and suspect.

I don't think it is fair for researchers to call it cognitive decline. I personally think our brains adapt to the task at hand and archive things that are not immediately relevant. This is a survival skill. If you spent your career as an English lit professor and now spend your days playing pickle ball. Is it really decline if you can't talk about Shakespeare the way you could 10 years ago?

 

[Bigdawg]

OP here. Thought I would mention that the original post was to get a laugh from this crew. Basically the sensational headline. 33 replies were more than I expected. Like someone mentioned earlier, these headlines/stories pop up once per quarter at least.

 

[irishgal]

This will sound odd, but I do miss being around smart, fun hard working people. Like many here I do structure some of my time and do a number of brain exercises so I don’t start offloading brain cells.
The hardest part for me is lack of intellectual conversation and bantering.

 

[Timeisprecious]

Here’s a link to the original study referenced in the news article https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0167268122004358

The conclusion as written by the study authors

In their view the problem is not early retirement, it’s receiving a pension. I guess those of us that have no pension are safe ..

Given a choice between slow cognitive decline w/ a healthy pension and NO pension, hmmmm ... tough choice. *walking away with a full wallet*

 

[Extra Medium]

Having spent time in rural China, I'd say the article is relatively useless/misleading as a comparison to the Western world.



Apples and oranges culturally, socially and infrastructure-wise.



Your other points are right on IMO.

I’m with you on this point. I wouldn’t expect a study of pensioners in rural China to be generalizable to all types of early retirees everywhere. Good to add to the literature overall, but still need more studies to reach conclusions.

 

[Go-NoGo]

Tomorrow maybe I’ll ask this new AI chat thing everyone is talking about to write a proposal requesting $100M from the government to study how aging contributes to our deteriorating health.

Done.. Courtesy of ChatGPT

Introduction:

As the population of the world continues to age, it is imperative that we understand the underlying causes of the deterioration of health that often comes with aging. This proposal requests $100M in funding from the government to conduct a comprehensive study on how aging contributes to our deteriorating health.

Background:

Aging is a complex process that is influenced by a variety of factors, including genetics, lifestyle, and environmental factors. Despite significant advances in medical research, our understanding of the underlying causes of aging-related health problems is still limited. This lack of understanding is a significant barrier to developing effective interventions and treatments to improve the health and quality of life of older adults.

Objectives:

The primary objective of this study is to conduct a comprehensive investigation of the causes of aging-related health problems. This will include research on the genetic, environmental, and lifestyle factors that contribute to the deterioration of health in older adults.

Methods:

This study will use a multi-disciplinary approach to investigate the causes of aging-related health problems. This will include genetics, epidemiology, and lifestyle studies. The study will also involve the use of state-of-the-art technologies such as advanced imaging and biomarker analysis to gain a better understanding of the underlying causes of aging-related health problems.

Expected Outcomes:

The results of this study are expected to provide a comprehensive understanding of the causes of aging-related health problems. This will allow for the development of effective interventions and treatments to improve the health and quality of life of older adults. Additionally, this study will provide valuable insights into the underlying causes of aging-related health problems that can be used to develop public health policies and programs to promote healthy aging.

Conclusion:

Aging is a complex process that is influenced by a variety of factors. A comprehensive study on how aging contributes to our deteriorating health is necessary to understand the underlying causes of aging-related health problems. With $100M in funding from the government, this study will provide valuable insights into the causes of aging-related health problems, which will allow for the development of effective interventions and treatments to improve the health and quality of life of older adults.

 

[JohnRM]

Skewed?

I haven't seen the data, but I wonder if it's skewed because people who retire and then get sick right away are offset by people who happen to become too unhealthy to work and THEN retire. I know a few former coworkers who had that particular misfortune, one guy didn't even last a month.

I have some health problems that will probably shorten my life, but it has nothing to do with being retired. I think not having to go to work is actually good for me, at least I am enjoying every day. I do miss my coworkers though.

 

[38Chevy454]

The hardest part for me is lack of intellectual conversation and bantering.

I just hang out with people slower than me, so I feel smarter......

 

[Old Microbiologist]

I tend to look at this kind of report as an indicator that there is a subtle message in it driving the consensus towards a change in thought process. AKA PSYOP or known in the US as "influencing". I spent a part of my military career as a psychological operations officer (alternate ASI) in which you define a target audience and develop a plan to influence them. In business, this is known as marketing. I see it being applied constantly in the US against the US population by the government and businesses that provide services.

There must be some goal in mind here to suggest to people that retiring early ruins their health thus "they" must want us to stay working. Why? In countries that keep the retirement age low there are more jobs for younger people, so early retirement is a good thing in that regard. However, perhaps there is a problem with maintaining expertise (indicating a serious problem in education and training) or maybe the issue is on the other end with long-term funding. I believe the results are really the opposite and retiring early leads to longer lives. This is bad for the government medical programs as the longer you live the more expensive you are to health care and/or government pensions.

Way back in 1971 I was waiting for re-assignment and was attached as a technician to a research study looking at military retirement and life expectancy. I recall we found that in 1971 the mean age of death for a military retiree was 47. This was due to the horrors of WWII, Korea, and early Vietnam. Now the mean age of death for a military retiree is over age 70 (I don't know the precise number) which impacts long-term funding. I am certain the actuarial over at the SSA and Black Rock (IRA's) are doing the same thing. Now we get a subtle message that retiring early is BAD! Because the message is counter-intuitive I am suspicious. I am healthier now than ever in my life. I would expect a poll of the members here would show the same thing.

 

[Pellice]

Since retirement, I've almost entirely lost migraine headaches.

And I don't miss interactions with co-workers asking me to fix this or that (low-level) tech problem, or begging them to fill out their forms that they deemed stupid (and they were, but what is that to people higher up who want forms), and demands for me to generate more publicity and interest from others for essentially uninteresting topics. And coming up with good photographs of Happy Young People jumping up and down, waving their hands as they "engaged" with us. (or the word "engaged," for that matter).

Done, done done!

 

[ls99]

Agree with Old Microbiologist.
Just the reduction in stress created by w*rk, commute, etc. is in itself life enhancing.
I, as an example: Figure skate, take dancing lessons and have time to contermplate my belly button at age 75. I'd say the first two activities indicate pretty good health and physical condition. Will that lead me to dancing at 100?
Am sure as a matter of percentegases ether Figure skating or dance lessons are a miniscule portion of the population. Let alone both. There are many other inidicators of good pysical condition. Someone else can list them and try figure out what portion of population participates is doing stuff indicating good life condition.
Oh yeah, dumping television service and not spending hours of time sitting to watch moving pictures of any sort coming out of a box is good for health. Eliminates the sitting bit.
Thus the retire early get sick mantra is BS, IMHO.

 

[big-papa]

Seems like the magic might be to find something that is as mentally engaging/challenging as work was, but without the stress of deadlines, annual reviews, office politics, and the need to please a boss whether such pleasing added real value or not, etc.

I made the decision to retire in April this year back in March of last year. Have a great boss that let me stay long enough to find my replacement and train him. The individual has been on board for a couple of months and the training is about 90% done and my entire team has been transferred to him now.

I'm actually concentrating on a couple of projects that need the attention I couldn't give them when I was the boss and, I have to say, I'm truly enjoying it. It's more of a consulting type of role but I'm able to get things done without the politics or the kind of visibility that I no longer need, nor want (especially at this company). Kind of refreshing, but not so much that my retirement plans are going to change.