Boomer Retirement Watch — 3 Jan 2011

3Jan/1115

Boomer Retirement Watch — 3 Jan 2011

I have a few google news alerts set up to help me hoover up all the retirement- and pension-related articles out there [I also have help from people like Dan and a few correspondents who send along interesting stuff]. And a bunch of Boomer retirement whining has started to creep into my alerts. I figure I might as well turn this into a feature.

DUH RETIREMENT ADVICE FOR BOOMERS:

[edited heavily for content]

1. Have a plan
2. Save more
3. Retire later
4. Scale back your lifestyle
5. Delay Social Security

6. Quit whining

Speaking of whining:

The first of the baby boomers—the post-war Americans born between 1946 and 1965—start to hit retirement age in 2011. And they're not coasting gracefully into the golden years. The entire nation, of course, lost its spunk during the recession that lasted from 2007 to 2009. But the once-upbeat baby boomers seem to be taking the longest to shake off the blues. According to surveys by the Pew Research Center, 80 percent of boomers say they're dissatisfied with the way things are going in the country, a higher proportion than any other age group, younger or older. Part of that may be natural, since people in their 50s tend to deal with the highest amounts of stress and show the lowest satisfaction levels. But the boomer bummer may also reflect the changing fortunes of America itself, and widespread unease about the nation's future.

Yes, I know I'm an unpleasant person to be around b/c I remind people of stuff like their mortality [I'm not here to make friends]. But the way I really annoy is I know a lot of history. And seriously? People have it pretty sweet now compared to prior millennia.

So guess what? Many of the boomers will live well into their 90s, and if they want to avoid the cat food route, they should keep working til they really can't do it any more.

Some note that the boomers' problem is their own fault:

The people who want their benefits preserved are the ones responsible for the problem. After all, it was they who broke the "chain of trust" by which each working generation supports the retired generation's benefits. They reduced the number of their children to about two per family, or even fewer, so that today there are about 60 to 70 million fewer consumers and workers than there would have been, and that many fewer people to support the boomer retirees and soon-to-be retirees.

It would be condign punishment if the boomers' benefits were indeed cut; it would be the utmost in "fairness." In the meantime, the coming generation of workers must be educated to the economic and demographic benefits, and even psychological benefits, of stable marriages and families with many children, say six to eight.

In other words, to save Social Security, have babies.

Now, my parents had 3, but it was nothing on my mom's family of 6. My dad came from a family of 3, though.

Those darned Protestants.

[Love ya, grandma!]

Gag-inducing story from NPR:

It may be hard to believe, but the generation that transformed America as it came of age in the 1960s is now entering its senior years.

"There are 7,000 boomers a day who will be turning 65 in 2011, which is a significant birthday for sure," says Steve Cone, executive vice president of AARP.

Sixty-five used to be the age when Americans stopped working, kicked back and embarked on serious leisure to make up for all those decades of the daily grind. But just like with every other stage of life they've gone through, baby boomers are expected to transform how we think about "retirement."

If I hear about how the boomers are reinventing hip replacement and senile dementia, I will be very, very displeased.

More stupidity in being surprised that time moves at 1 year per year:

Green Bay's first baby boomer graduated from West High School and maintains close ties to the community.
....

"I didn't think of myself as a baby boomer until it started being talked about," he said. "Right away I realized, 'Hey, I'm the first.' I thought it was cool."
....

"I'm kind of surprised that I'm that old. I feel kind of young," he said about reaching retirement.

What, did he expect to be dead by now? How the hell can he be surprised to get old? This is one of the most inevitable things that happens to person [and you can't be surprised to be dead...well, maybe you can, but people generally aren't quoted about that]. You can be surprised to have a broken leg or a kid from a dalliance decades past that you didn't know about. But surprised to get old?

Dear lord, we're going to have at least 20 years of this, aren't we?

[Love ya, ma!]

Meep

Meep is a member of the Irish Catholic mafia, having a suspiciously high number of green-eyed, red-haired friends. While she doesn’t have red hair herself [except when she goes into the sun (rare for any vampire)], she does have green eyes. She’s a raving Papist and is a life actuary on the side [i.e., she counts dead people]. An amateur pain-in-the-ass [willing to go pro!], she likes covering retirement, mortality, math, and education issues.

Tagged as: baby boomers, boomer retirement watch, boomers, retirement, retirement age Leave a comment

Comments (15) Trackbacks (1) ( subscribe to comments on this post )

jefferson101
January 3rd, 2011 - 10:31

Yes, you are going to get to hear about it for the next 20 years. Or 30, or longer. Don’t feel too bad. I’m already getting to hear it all repeated from the third or fourth co-worker.

The typical evolution is that they go sign up for S.S. the day they become eligible for reduced benefits, and immediately conclude that they can’t live on that, but sign up anyway.

Then they whine because they have to pay the money back because they make too much. They whine if they are asked to work, because they are “losing money”. They whine if they are elegible for a layoff, because they have screwed up their unemployment because they are drawing S.S. benefits.

As noted, I’ve seen this play out at least four times already. I’ve told each and every one of them repeatedly. “Don’t sign up until you are going to quit working!!! Do not do it! You’ll be SORRY!!!”

“But it’s my money, and I wants it. I wants it, Precious!”

Sheesh!

How that many people can survive to 62 1/2 years of age and still be that totally lacking in sense, both financial and otherwise, is completely beyond me.

FWIW, I’m 59, so it’s not as if I’m sneering at ‘the older generation’. I’m in “The Who” mode, and I’m talkin’ bout my Generation. I’m really unsure how some of them manage to breathe without mechanical assistance.

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- enoch_root
  January 3rd, 2011 - 10:53
  
  I’ve not been kind to my assessment of the Boomer Generation. So why start now? Shall I list the shit they f’d up for us X-ers? Selfish, self-centered, me generation. That is all.
  
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  - jefferson101
    January 3rd, 2011 - 15:20
    
    While I’m not notably pleased with the way my Generation has dealt with the situation, it could be noted that it wasn’t the Boomers who planted this relatively awful crop.
    
    FDR and LBJ got it all started, and nobody did a flipping thing about it for lo, these many years.
    
    Until Dubya inflicted the perscription drug benefit on us, nobody in my generation had done much of anything to or about any of it. I’ll accept blame for the part that we didn’t do anything about the problem. And we surely should, and could, have.
    
    But don’t try to drop the stinking corpse on our doorstep. We didn’t donate enough blood to keep it alive, but the fatal wounds weren’t our doing.
    
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  - Meep
    January 3rd, 2011 - 15:23
    
    I’m just tired of the whining and “reinvention”.
    
    To be fair, it’s not all of the boomers like this. It’s the media boomers that simply will not stop whining at the rest of us. SHUT UP! [and no, we will not pay for your pensions that you did not save up for]
    
    I can’t wait til that group of people reinvent getting canned.
    
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Mark A
January 3rd, 2011 - 15:27

They just wouldn’t be ‘themselves’ if the Boomers didn’t go kicking and screaming and complaining. Expect them to be even more selfish and demanding as they now start staring down the chute that leads to the ash-heap of history. **snicker**

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- Meep
  January 3rd, 2011 - 17:50
  
  I have a lot of fun pointing out to people who thought youth was so important that yes, they are now old.
  
  And here I am trying to cultivate the few white hairs that have sprouted.
  
  Dammit, I want to be an elder! Respect me!
  
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  - jefferson101
    January 3rd, 2011 - 21:26
    
    There you go, young Lady!
    
    I figured that I’d have lots of time for my 401K to mature before I did, and that my income would continue to be increasing.
    
    Bummer, but between Clinton’s collapse, the NASDAQ bust, and the current bubble, I’m not getting the ROI that I was counting on.
    
    Are you putting half your income away? In Gold?
    
    If not, you may wind up in the same boat that I’m currently floating around the financial world in. It’s never enough, but it may be sufficient.
    
    OTOH, with the current situation, it’s going to all go down the chute because of massive inflation, which means that my retirement fund will probably buy me a couple of cases of Beer, once Obama and his minions get through.
    
    I’m not quite vindictive enough to buy explosives as a hedge against inflation. (Or I’m not a Moslem….Take your pick of the two alternatives.)
    
    Whatever the case is, though. I’m more than seriously annoyed, and expecting to be robbed, either by inflation or by the .Gov confiscating my funds.
    
    And I will be hard to live with, in either case. Government and I are going to be seriously at odds, and perhaps even in conflict, as it were.
    
    Take that where you will, but there are the probabilities. If inflation doesn’t eat your 401k, the .Gov probably will.
    
    Enjoy your situation, GenX people. You are currently looking down the barrel of a worse situation than I am. And what are you doing about it?
    
    Got Gold? Silver? Lead, Copper, and Brass? Food and Batteries?
    
    Heh.
    
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    - Mark A
      January 3rd, 2011 - 23:41
      
      “Enjoy your situation GenX people. You are currently looking down the Barrel of a worse situation than I am. And what are you doing about it?”
      
      It’s not a good idea to ask such an indignant question of the generation that controls your fate. But if you really demand an answer…… for starters my friend, you Baby Boomers have already given us all the rationalizations for euthanasia via your own rationalizations for abortion: “the quality of your life would be so low”…..”there are huge financial considerations for the family”…..”it’s not a good time in my life to deal with this (a dementiad relative)”. Etc, etc.
      
      Everything you Baby Boomers have inflicted upon society is about to be revisited back on you. You just don’t know it yet.
      
      “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap.” Galatians 6:7
      
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    - meep
      January 4th, 2011 - 06:25
      
      By the way, boomers are on the whole going to live into their mid80s and a considerable percentage will end up in their 90s.
      
      As Mark A. says, we Xers are in a less worse situation than you are for the next 30-40years, inasmuch we can still work, provide for ourselves during this period. And we will have seen what happens when people retire too early. I know I plan to be working well into my 70s.
      
      The Boomers will have to deal with increasing dependency, and there’s not enough younguns to help or pay for their goodies. The goodies won’t get paid for. And there won’t be enough nursing home space, and people will not have kids/grandkids to help them.
      
      So long life — huzzah! Deal with it.
      
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Mark A
January 3rd, 2011 - 23:43

Heh.

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enoch_root
January 4th, 2011 - 19:28

yeah – the whole aborting the generation that would otherwise care for you is sort of… well, you could live without that fetus when it was convenient… but is it convenient to live without that person now?

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- jefferson101
  January 4th, 2011 - 21:03
  
  If you really want to put a horse-collar on the majority of the Boomers, it was that we wanted our kids to live better than we did. And we tried to do that thing.
  
  Which is why there aren’t so many of y’all, actually. You did live as well or better than we did, though.
  
  You don’t object to your upbringing, but you are now prepared to gripe?
  
  Don’t talk to me about Abortion. I really worked to get my children, and wanted them all. (I’m talking fertility drugs here, for the first one!)
  
  But when my dear wife decided that we couldn’t support any more, I was not going to argue that part, either. As I’ve noted elsewhere, this was in the late 1970′s and early 1980′s. I was almost as concerned about triple digit inflation then as I am now. The price of a gallon of milk was going up far faster than my income was.
  
  We won’t even talk about gasoline and hamburger prices.
  
  You kids think you have been through it all, but it’s been that way before. And my old Daddy still tells about the real “hard times” in the 1930′s.
  
  If you are tough and resourceful, you can live through most anything. If you want to whine? Those of my generation, and of yours, who are?
  
  “Think of it as evolution in action.”
  
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  - Meep
    January 5th, 2011 - 08:07
    
    Oh horsepuckey.
    
    My grandparents had 6 kids and those kids on the whole did better than the previous generation. Same for my husbands’ grandparents – family of 10 kids, most of whom did very well for themselves [most of those 10 were born during the Depression]. Pretty common for a prospering family to try to have a lot of kids (for one, it indicated you were prospering).
    
    Now, my ma had only 3, and I’ve had only 3. One of the things cutting into the fertility is the older age at marriage. The age I got married at was the age at which my grandma already had her 6. The age I had my 1st child, was the age my ma had 3 kids (and the youngest would’ve been 1 year old). I’ve got a bunch of friends in their mid-to-late-30s attempting to have their first children. Yikes! Biology wasn’t set up for that. And a lot of us have autistic children for some reason (of the group of people I went to school with – on facebook, let’s see, there’s at least 5 of us. We’re all about the same age. 34 – 38ish is the range. Autistic child born when mother about 32.)
    
    But anyway, it’s not going to be about what people =deserve=. It’s going to be about the reality of demographics and productivity of the population. And who is going to be willing to check after you (not necessarily one’s own children, but it’s worked okay so far in my extended family.)
    
    None of us think that it’s particularly hard, as most of us have talked with relatives who lived through the Depression (many of whom are still alive). I’m still counting on the Japanese to perfect robotics….because they =have= to.
    
    As per the Niven/Pournelle quote, indeed, it will be evolution in action.
    
    Then there’s always TEOTWAWKI…..
    
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enoch_root
January 5th, 2011 - 08:19

jefferson – you cant be serious. we Xers havent had our opportunity yet – the oxygen is being continuously sucked out of the air… in any event, it is interesting to speak of what we Xers had. Thanking you all very much for Disco, AIDS, Drug Abuse, and Divorce. Abortion, mountains of debt, etc. This is not personal, but really… you all know/knew best. Hope I die before I grow old.

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jefferson101
January 5th, 2011 - 12:09

We can discuss any of the rest of it, but if you insist on trying to blame Disco on me, we’re going to go around. That is a bridge too far.

Just because some cokeheads in LA decided that their record company needed a new sound and all the trendy kids fell for it?

In an ideal world, I could have prevented it, but in this one they won’t let me own nuclear weapons. Not even little-bitty ones.

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