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Policy

Fogies Are Working for the Weekend, Not Retirement

Katherine Mangu-Ward | 8.17.2009 11:33 AM

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Folks are waking up to the fact that the market crash and looming state insolvency mean the dream of a pension-and-government-funded adventure vacation retirement starting on their 62nd birthday is dead:

Just over half of all working adults ages 50 to 64 say they may delay their retirement—and another 16% say they never expect to stop working.

Members of this so-called "Threshold Generation" are twice as likely as younger workers to say they never plan to retire (16% vs. 8%). Moreover, the Thresholders who do plan to retire someday say they plan to keep working, on average, until they are age 66—when they would be four years older than the age at which current retirees age 65 or older report that they stopped working.

More Social Security reading here. More on why your pension is screwed here. 

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Katherine Mangu-Ward is editor in chief of Reason.

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  1. CoyoteBlue   16 years ago

    The concept of "Retirement" is sooooo 20th century.

  2. Xeones   16 years ago

    Nice alt text on the pic.

  3. Warty   16 years ago

    His hair is perfect.

  4. Stretch   16 years ago

    Can't say I feel sorry for them. They spent their lives spending their money and others' money like there is no tomorrow. But, tomorrow finally came.

  5. creech   16 years ago

    Stretch, not all of us. Delayed retirement means not being able to spend full time on libertarian activities. I guess that's a "feature" to our leftist friends. But then, they'll not have time or resources to pursue their political activities either.

  6. squarooticus   16 years ago

    I hope their progeny learn the lesson that believing the promises of politicians leads to financial ruin.

  7. Gunboat Diplomacy   16 years ago

    My grandfather was born in 1880. He started working as a ranch hand breaking horses at the age of 15. In 1955, at the age of 75, he retired his position as Secretary/Treasurer of a railroad union. He died 11 years later in 1966. I inherited his estate.

    I plan to work until I'm 75 too. i figure if a guy born during the 19th century could pull it off, I certainly can.

  8. Xeones   16 years ago

    I'm not 30 yet, and i've made my peace with the fact that conventional retirement is just never going to happen for me. But i've balanced this with the conviction that a conventional "career path" is also not something i'll be bound by.

    I mean, i'm typing this from a cubicle (for now), but i am optimistic regardless.

  9. steve   16 years ago

    Retire from work and do what, exactly? No thanks, I will have a job, of some sort, until I die or become incapacitated.

  10. Gunboat Diplomacy   16 years ago

    "Nice alt text on the pic."

    What does that mean?

  11. Xeones   16 years ago

    Retire from work and do what, exactly?

    Well, i hope to make it until transhuman immortality becomes an option, at which point i will upload my consciousness into a bunch of space probes and go explore the galaxy.

  12. Xeones   16 years ago

    What does that mean?

    Move your mouse over the picture of Senator Kerry and his hair, and a lil' joke will pop up.

  13. Gunboat Diplomacy   16 years ago

    Who would even think to do that?

  14. brotherben   16 years ago

    Is that one a them there Swift Boats?

  15. Tulpa   16 years ago

    another 16% say they never expect to stop working.

    I'm pretty sure they're going to stop working. Well, unless hell has a carpet factory that needs help.

  16. Mike in PA   16 years ago

    Oh great! This means more fogies staying in the workforce preventing the youngsters from getting those new jobs...

    Where are those death panels when you need them?!

  17. torpid   16 years ago

    the people who got an honest job working for the government won't be worrying about their retirement. Those capitalist people whose paychecks were expropriated from the pennies of the working man are just getting their just desserts.

  18. steve   16 years ago

    When I get older I'll do a job no self-respecting youngster will want.

  19. Rich   16 years ago

    The concept of "Retirement" is sooooo 20th century.

    In the 21st, folks enjoy their leisure fully *now* and promise to work in the future.

  20. Rich   16 years ago

    Oops, reverse fonts.

  21. Nick   16 years ago

    Retire from work and do what, exactly?

    I plan to travel all over the world (and if Xeones can help me with this transhuman consciousness thingamabobber, the galaxy) at a leisurely pace getting in the way of anyone who may be in a hurry, telling kids to pull up their britches, and just being a cantankerous old fart who fakes hearing loss when his wife speaks.

    And, instead of going into a nursing home when I can no longer take care of myself, I'm going to spend about the same amount of your money on cruises where they'll change my sheets every day and feed me my dinner in a funny shaped glass with an umbrella in it.

    Oh, how I will enjoy that surf and turf margarita at 4 in the afternoon! And when they find me dead in a deck chair, they can just shove me off the side of the boat.

  22. Old Geezer   16 years ago

    Where are those death panels when you need them?!

    I see your bid and raise you the draft!

  23. Nick   16 years ago

    And I'm starting with tag alzheimers.

  24. torpid   16 years ago

    If this were a government run website, you couldn't break the entire thread with an italics tag.

  25. Nick   16 years ago

    Apparently, reason fucked up the tags instead of me. Phew. Thought dementia was setting in early.

  26. fix   16 years ago
  27. test   16 years ago

    Franks and beans!

  28. second test   16 years ago

    He was playing with his weiner!

    I'm freeeeeeee!!!!

  29. Gimme Back My Font!   16 years ago

    EOM

  30. Xeones   16 years ago

    getting in the way of anyone who may be in a hurry, telling kids to pull up their britches, and just being a cantankerous old fart who fakes hearing loss when his wife speaks.

    Aside from the 'old' part, i already do that stuff. And thanks to rock'n'roll, i don't need to fake the hearing loss.

  31. fresno dan   16 years ago

    Retire from work and do what, exactly?

    I plan on uploading my conciousness into that "second life" thing, where my moniker will be Hunk Huge, a billionaire - no, make that trillionaire - porn movie producer and strip club magnate, in charge of personally auditioning the talent.

  32. Bitter b*stard   16 years ago

    More on why your pension is screwed

    How did you know about my divorce?

  33. SugarFree   16 years ago

    I would have retired right after high school if given half a chance. I don't define myself by working. I would be perfectly comfortable as a member of the idle rich.

  34. Young Libber   16 years ago

    I blame all my problems on the old.

  35. Isaac Bartram   16 years ago

    Oh great! This means more fogies staying in the workforce preventing the youngsters from getting those new jobs...

    It's amazing how prevalent that kind of thinking was among the original advocates for Social Security.

  36. kinnath   16 years ago

    Oh great! This means more fogies staying in the workforce preventing the youngsters from getting those new jobs...

    I believe the current estimate is the 50% of senior engineering staff will retire over the next 5 years or less. The old geezers that hang on longer will be treated like kings -- at least that's my plan 😉

  37. jtuf   16 years ago

    The Baby Boomers are starting to learn why toppling "the system" wasn't such a great idea.

  38. swillfredo pareto   16 years ago

    Oh great! This means more fogies staying in the workforce preventing the youngsters from getting those new jobs...

    Which is the theory behind the Social Security Earnings Test. It should be fun listening to the economic illiterates in Congress try and find the balance between policies to encourage the dead wood to get out of the employment pool and policies to keep old people working as long as possible to keep feeding the beast and minimize unfunded government obligations.

  39. Paul   16 years ago

    Retire from work and do what, exactly?

    Noooooo imagination. Geez, what would I possibly do with my day if I weren't sitting under these beautiful fluorescent lights and a cubicle, all day? Why, nothing comes to mind. Without my beloved cubicle, flashing 'message waiting' light, constant stream of annoying emails, dumb-ass 2-hour corporate meetings that could be solved with a memo, co-worker dramas, why, I simply wouldn't know what to do with myself.

    Lemme guess, Steve, you work in HR and you're a "people person".

  40. Paul   16 years ago

    More on why your pension is screwed

    How did you know about my divorce?

    As my ex-wife's punishment, she had to take my pension in the divorce settlement.

  41. Rich   16 years ago

    It should be fun listening to the economic illiterates in Congress try and find the balance between policies to encourage the dead wood to get out of the employment pool and policies to keep old people working as long as possible to keep feeding the beast and minimize unfunded government obligations.

    How about "mandatory age-based demotion" as the balance? Might even make some of the youngsters a bit happier.

  42. Rich   16 years ago

    As my ex-wife's punishment, she had to take my pension in the divorce settlement.

    I know a(nother) guy who performed a detailed analysis and engineered just that.

  43. steve   16 years ago

    Worse, I'm in Sales and I hate people, especially those that spend the entire day in a cubicle staring at blinking lights (of any color).

  44. alice bowie   16 years ago

    Let me tell all of u something.

    Now-a-days, one doesn't retire...one gets RETIRED.

    People in their 50s are laid off and told...good luck.

    One spends all of their life working for other people, making them rich, with the belief that the 'American Social Contract' will come true.

    It's a bunch of bull.

  45. alice bowie   16 years ago

    Nobody should loose their pensions.

    Even cops that do wrong-doing...deserve their pensions.

  46. Griff   16 years ago

    Counting on what I can save and nothing else...just need to walk 18 holes of golf 2x a week at a cheap muni. And if that muni was Torrey Pines, even better

    And do tell, just whom should be thanked for these wonderful benefits ? The honest taxpayer, for starters...

    "the people who got an honest job working for the government won't be worrying about their retirement."

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