Americans Working Longer

[street]

Not every well-paid worker knows to save. I left behind many coworkers at megacorp who still toiled away.

So true and very good point. I know one of those guys! LOL

 

[Closet_Gamer]

Living longer/staying healthier +
generally low retirement savings +
few pensions +
healthy economy where its easier to get/keep a job =
working longer.

 

[ER Eddie]

I was self employed and did not "retire" until I was 69. I didn't work that long because I had to but because I enjoyed working. Numerous friends of ours still work and are in their 70's. For the most part, they are self-employed. My point is, not everyone wants to retire early and not every older worker is employed because of financial reasons.

True. Just because someone is working, it doesn't mean they have to work. Plenty of people enjoy their work and continue to work for reasons other than just the money.

 

[brett]

I suspect that some people in their early 50's took a hit in the 2008/9 downturn and in the real estate crash. Those are prime earning years. If one is in a DB plan, those are the years where your DB pension can grow substantially. Longer periods of unemployment or lower paying replacement jobs can put a real dent in retirement planning.

 

[pjigar]

Not every well-paid worker knows to save. I left behind many coworkers at megacorp who still toiled away.

I haven't left MegaCorp yet but I know several highly-paid, near-retirement age people in my company that can't afford to retire, early or otherwise. Spending too high, big houses, expensive cars, boats, vacation homes, fancy dinners, international vacations, etc. It seems "impossible" for them to scale back on spending side and hence they have no "choice".

 

[steelyman]

I think one positive reason some people choose to work longer is to keep up social interactions that involve the workplace. Those can be within the same organization or with people in a broader, related network.

I still keep in “e-touch” with a handful of people with whom I worked although I’ve moved 700+ miles away. These are mainly people I chatted with daily and we still talk as if we were sitting in a booth at that diner in “Seinfeld”.

 

[Bir48die]

I think the phrase “working as a Walmart greeter” is just a euphemism for a job that a senior citizen is forced to take in their later years in order to survive. I don’t think it’s meant to disrespect the work as much as try to convey the sad situation that a senior citizen has found themselves in. Of course, if the senior citizen just does it because they want to be busy, that’s a different matter. I don’t go to Walmart often, but I don’t recall them actually having greeters. It’s not a reflection on honest work which I hope we all honor, it’s a way to convey a situation the person has found themselves in.

If I say I don’t want to end up “living in a van down by the river”, is that disrespectful to RV’ers or homeless people? It communicates a situation.

Ok. I'm better now. I get it. Many here on the forum have been successful given the whole gist of the forum is RE. My attitude has really changed in the last 20 years. Everyone is working hard and some of us had more opportunity while some made more of opportunities. However, many were born into poverty as many have also mis-managed their finances.

All that being said is many are struggling and as we become more technical and service oriented there are a lot of people just scraping by. I'm not a redistribution of wealth person of any degree. I'd like to see more of a national training program for people that need to develop skills.

On another note I have just been working every day to make sure I treat others as I would want to be treated (unless they're a bad driver).

With that said I hope all have a memorable Holidays and Merry Christmas

 

[mountainsoft]

Seems majority of people on this forum are/were 6-figure earners. Shouldn't be difficult to retire early on a large income like that. Majority of the general public makes less than $50K/yr gross. Much harder to FIRE on that income with no pension.

My wife and I together have never earned more than $65K/yr. We are planning to retire in 5 years when I'm 60 and she's 55. By eliminating work related costs and saving for retirement we should be quite comfortable on 40K/yr.

The only reason this is even a possibility is because my wife will receive a pension that will pay about 2/3 of our expenses. The rest will come from savings and eventually social security. If she did not have her pension we would not be retiring for a very long time.

I earn a small income with self employment and will probably continue with it at least till I start social security. I probably won't invest as much time and effort into it, but it's something I enjoy and will keep my mind active.

 

[Badger]

Seems majority of people on this forum are/were 6-figure earners. Shouldn't be difficult to retire early on a large income like that. Majority of the general public makes less than $50K/yr gross. Much harder to FIRE on that income with no pension.

I and my wife are not one of those 6-figure earners. We fell into the majority of "less than $50k gross". My pension is enough to buy each of us a Happy Meal once or twice a week (although we don't frequent those places) and my wife has one that is about the same and a second that is not quite twice that. Our SS and small pensions work well for us and so far we have not tapped into our retirement savings for our annual expenses although we have use it to gift our children while we are still around to see them enjoy it. Boy are they going to be surprised when we are gone and there is a nice inheritance for them.


As far as a trend for working longer I have noticed the last few years of all the encouragements from government and financial advisors to continue working and delay taking SS. I think that is great for all of us on SS to know that it is being paid into as we take ours today.



I glad for those who have more. It doesn't take away from our happiness.


Cheers!

 

[broadway]

I was at a McDonald's on Friday.
There was a woman working there who I am guessing must at least be in her late 70s.
The shift manager did not cut her any slack.
She had to take food out to the drive-thru customer waiting in their cars for their food.
Clean the glass door with the dirty palm print.
Wipe tables.
She was constantly on the move.
She was not that quick on feet though. I felt badly for her situation.
I could be wrong, but I doubt she's working for the social interaction.
:-(

 

[brett]

The economy where we live is changing. It is the new economy. High paying manufacturing jobs are disappearing. So are jobs in the extraction industries-professional and otherwise. They will not return. The primary reason is technology and automation though some, for other reasons, would like to place the blame on alternate factors.

The days of leaving high school and getting a well paid manufacturing job are long gone. Just as the days of remaining with one employer or in one vocation for one's entire working career are slowly disappearing. Seems to me that we need to pay a lot more attention to post secondary education and most especially applied technologies. This is where the job growth will be. It is either there, or in the lower paid service sector.

Where we live politicians and union leaders are doing people a disservice by not bringing the discussion into the public forum and committing resources to prepare and or adapt to this shift before it is too late for some.