How long will baby boomers keep working? For some, the answer is forever.
To grossly paraphrase Kim Kardashian, nobody stops working anymore. Just look at who’s in the running for the top job in the nation: a 77-year-old against an 81-year-old, both vying to keep working for another four years. Yet they’re in lockstep with a national trend — older Americans are working longer, into their 60s and even their 70s and beyond. Among Americans 65 and older, 19 percent were still working last year, which is almost a twofold increase from the late 1980s.
Last year, the average retirement age was 62, according to a Gallup survey, up from 59 in the early 2000s. Older people aren’t just delaying retirement, but working longer hours: On average, this group’s annual work hours are almost 30 percent higher than they were in 1987.
The question of why is hard to answer. People keep working because they want to and because they have to, and sometimes a mix of both. “You can think of it as both a reflection of empowered preferences to go work more and longer — versus curtailed savings that force you into the labor force. They’re both happening,” says economist Kathryn Edwards.
My gandfather, born in 1928, worked every day until lung cancer stopped him at 85.
My boomer father retired at 65 and died of a massive heart attack a few months later.
At 54, I’ve survived 2 heart attacks and am not expecting to reach retirement age.
The really unfortunate thing about the anonymity about a place like Lemmy is that those of us who have grown to enjoy talking to you and seeing what you have to say will never know if you stop posting because the worst has happened or if you just decided to not post on Lemmy anymore.
True of most, if not all of us. If I died tomorrow, none of you would know it.
As morbid as it sounds, maybe there’s a genuine need for an internet “dead man switch” as a service? Something that blasts some stuff to your socials, emails your contacts, etc, when you fail to show up after a month or so.
It wouldn’t be the worst idea.
This is true, but my apps are logged in for me. I’m sure my family would post something. :)
Dang. Now I’m going to worry about you dying if I don’t see you submitting things.
Maybe I’m already dead.
That’s a sad statement… Are there no possible changes that could give you a longer life expectancy? I’m in my early forties and I’m starting to have a different fear: my dad’s got advanced Parkinson’s and it’s a terrifying battle…
Watched the Netflix documentary on “blue zones” recently - not perfect, but a pretty compelling case for (at least for me) at least some dietary changes, and increasing substantially my daily walks… :-/
So I was diagnosed with 3 constrictions in my heart probably a decade or so ago. 1st heart attack resulted in a bypass for one of them. 2nd heart attack has a stent in the 2nd.
The 3rd is in a weird place and not easily fixed.
Yeah but think of all that income the sacrifices of you and your loved ones made for the company!
My retirement plan is to die in the AI-Climate wars, hungry and thirsty.