<p>Well, for a lot of people, what they get in retirement is:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>What they and their employers decide to put into the 401(k). This is earned by the employee for the work the employee performs.</p></li>
<li><p>Social security benefits, which will very likely be less (in current dollars) than they’re putting into the system during their working years.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>So, to answer your question, why do people retire? Well, because they are productive enough during their working years that they’re able to do so, and subsequently choose to do so.</p>
<p>[This does not address what I think are the really unpleasant questions: what about able-bodied people who choose not to work? what about funding retirement plans - or pensions - for people who are paid with tax dollars? etc. These and other questions are valid questions; how people who earned money choose to spend it is, IMHO, less so.]</p>
<p>I’m with scout and busdriver. Life is too short to spend chained to corporations when we have no guarantee of tomorrow. We plan to “work” at what WE want to do in about five years at 62.</p>
<p>We will be living off our investments. If SS is there for us at 70 or so, that will be icing on the cake, but we did not plan for the government to support us. Also, we have saved aggressively and lived frugally (penuriously?) to ensure that DS graduates from college with no debt so he can decide how he wants to live and have better control over the quality of his life and when he will retire. His education is our last financial gift to him; the rest belongs to us. We do not plan to leave anything behind beyond “closing costs.”</p>
<p>Id like to see a study that shows when the parents of college bound children retire. ill bet many shoulder the financial burden for their kid’s college, at least in part, with retirement savings.</p>
<p>Probably because, back when pensions were first offered, few people reached retirement age, and more jobs were physically demanding enough that many of those who did reach retirement age were less effective workers. Now, more people are living longer past the same retirement age, and a greater percentage of jobs are not physically demanding.</p>
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</p>
<p>The discounts exist because the businesses realize that getting discounted revenue from the senior citizens is preferable than not getting revenue at all, at least for businesses that are not otherwise at full capacity.</p>
<p>Word of advice: If you have a good head on your shoulders and manage money well, you WON’T have to retire at 73. I feel like people are having much lower expectations these days than they should, even with the weak economy we have today. With such a defeatist attitude, sure you’ll retire when you’re well into your senior years. But if you invest wisely, you can plausibly retire at 60, 50, or maybe even 40.</p>
<p>Maybe it is the opposite – people have much higher expectations about the level of current spending they can maintain. Some people with incomes high enough to be ineligible for college financial aid anywhere still feel like they do not have enough money to be fully comfortable financially, including helping their kid with college expenses.</p>
<p>Having a child in one’s early 40’s definitely impacts expected retirement age. DH and I will be working until I don’t know when. We’re already in our 50’s and have no plans to retire in the next ten years. </p>
<p>My dad retired at 68 from his job but took up part-year work. I think working helped him stay young and active; once he fully retired, he rapidly aged.</p>
<p>I think that you are on to something here. A person needs interests, hobbies, volunteer work, or some other meaningful activity in order to retire well. I have seen people who do not pursue these things age rapidly when they retire .My own Dad stays young by going to the gym several mornings a week, golfs a lot, walks, travels, reads and has a very large circle of friends he sees often.</p>
<p>I will hit 71 at the end of the year. I’m going into my 10th year of my retirement job. It’s beginning to drain me and I find some intellectual slippage. One more year and then my wife and I, who also plans to retire from her retirement job, may move to California to be close to our only child. With pensions and investments and our Federal health care plans money and health care will not be issues so it’s time to get paid for doing nothing.</p>
<p>^Good for you. I am thinking not about my retirement job, but a second career. My current one is also draining me, and I know exactly what you mean about “intellectual slippage.” Unfortunately, I am not in a solid enough financial position to take the leap and still have a kid in high school as well as the one in college.</p>
<p>Considering that waiting until 65 or 67 to retire is only “a problem” for certain people, those without significant resources of their own, I doubt that the 73 number should scare anyone off. There are folks in town with kids the age of mine, elementary through high school, who retired before 50. And my dad is 85 and still works for the business he founded, though not full-time and minimal travel.</p>
<p>I find it highly unlikely that someone with a decent 401K or IRA would have to keep working to wait for the best SS benefits to kick in. If the withdrawal dates for retirement accounts don’t change, and SS is defunded, doubtful this will be an issue for most college graduates.</p>
<p>Assuming they pay their student loans off by age 50…</p>
<p>Thank you Sally. I have been doing the same kind of work at the State, Federal, and University level for 40 years. My wife and I are both triple-dippers with substantial IRAs. It’s time to enjoy the results of our hard work. My wife has told me that she wants us to spend all our money in retirement. </p>
<p>The best thing about this is that my wife, who grew up poor, thinks I’m really smart at this money stuff and admires me for it. I don’t want to disabuse her, but it was more about both of us desiring to live well but not extravagantly, having only one child, a rising stock market, making lots of profit off of our house sales, and retreating at appropriate times. And, yes, lots of luck.</p>
<p>My mother is a couple months shy of 79 years old. She graduated from college over 57 years ago, with no student loans at all, but she is still working full time out of financial necessity. Her employer is thrilled to have her because she does a great job and has a much different work ethic than most of their newer employees. While I think she’d prefer to be financially able to decide to work part time or not at all, she enjoys her job and is grateful that she’s still able to do it well. I think there are things far worse than working into one’s 70’s - like not being able to do so.</p>
<p>My mom retired from her local school district at 60 and then put herself through school to do what she always wanted to do: massage therapy. Since then, she has run her own single-person business and, today, at 75, she is still going strong, loves what she does, can do massage six hours a day, and floors anyone who finds out how old she is. Im 55 and most people think we are sisters. (for me)</p>
<p>Funny, tsdad. I am pretty sure we live in the same community but my experience has been vastly different from yours. I will likely have to move for my second career because I, unlike you, have not done well in the housing market and am still paying a premium to have my child in a desirable school district. The cost of living, including the high taxes, is just crushing relative to the salaries for jobs in my field.</p>
<p>Anyway, I am happy for you and if I were in your shoes I would be gleefully planning the next phase in a beautiful, warm place like CA!</p>
<p>Unfortunately for tsdad, if he retires to sunny CA with a great pension and mandatory IRA withdrawals, he’ll be subject to the soul sucking state taxes, for the privilege of breathing the fresh air and taking in the sun.</p>
<p>I know. California is not an optimum place to retire for financial purposes, but I have always lived and worked in high taxes places so I’m used to it, and as a public employee for my entire career I can’t in good conscious object as it impacts on me. Others, on the other hand, can object all they want.</p>
(for me)</p>