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INSIDE BUSINESS

Retirement Postponed

Baby boomers who'd expected to quit work by now discover they can't afford it. Blame the meltdown.

By Daniel McGinn and Temma Ehrenfeld | NEWSWEEK
Mar 31, 2008 Issue

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  • Posted By: grnilady @ 04/09/2008 4:34:09 PM

    Comment: My husband took retirement two years ago after 35 years in government service. We put off selling our home to wait for our son to graduate college. Now it's too late! The housing market has made it impossible to sell and we're losing equity every day. Now my husband (who is nearly blind) is trying to work at home for a call center and I'm scrambling to get new clients for my medical transcription business to replace the many physicians who have decided to "out-source" their transcription to India, Pakistan, and the Phillipines where their workers can live on what I need to make in a day! Now the government is handing out money to the very affluent companies whose owners have millions like Hovnanian (who can certainly bail themselves out of the mess they got themselves into with speculation). I am no longer sure that I can pay my home equity loan (used for my son's education) and I am frantically looking for a good client and praying that my husband can see the "scripts" and do his call center job. There has got to be a better way!

  • Posted By: greg vannice @ 04/09/2008 2:52:04 PM

    Comment: Now think about this. Housing prices and incomes should be pretty much parellel lines on a graph. With more and more people pushing back retirement and with the slow down in the economy, it means more and more people will be competing for the same jobs. Which in turn means incomes will stay the same or even go down when you add in inflation. Causing housing prices to more then likely keep dropping until they get back to where they should actually be compared to incomes. And on top of it all our government keeps printing money making the dollar you have put away worth less and less, they are causing inflation. We are going to be lucky if this doesn't turn into a depression.

  • Posted By: kljohns8 @ 04/01/2008 11:05:19 AM

    Comment: I understand everything that is in this article.I have to take up a part tiem job so when it is time for me to retire I can live the same life I live now and not have to have my children care for me. The white house and the whole government system needs to change now.

  • Posted By: kljohns8 @ 04/01/2008 11:02:58 AM

    Comment: This article is very informative. And I know exactly what they mean by it as well. I have to put money in my own retirement so I can have a living when I do retire.

  • Posted By: letha c. chamberlain @ 03/30/2008 6:15:43 AM

    Comment: Aren't what you're looking at mass starvation and plagues due to no transportation and medical care because there is no money or production that the masses can afford due to this "stagnation. THIS is what the big financiers want--a world with less people in it. This is what they would have us believe we NEED. Indeed this is NOT the case--but we are being led into these conclusions by all the media. I hope my comment is allowed. We'll see.

  • Posted By: Karenn1 @ 03/24/2008 9:27:24 AM

    Comment: Baby Boomers can't afford Repulican policys. Four more years of this policys trickle down. We will need to order more paper,to print more money.Your choice The Big R, Big S or the Big D cause even the republicans don't want the white house for four more years. Let the democrat rise taxs to pay for privous Admin. Than in four years GOPS will clean taxpayer clock again.

    • Posted By: mccormickbom137 @ 04/14/2008 22:56:14

      Comment: Dear Karenni...
      I"m assuming, fraught with peril doing such, that you are a "Boomer", as I am. I'm 54...what are you?
      I am in Health Care.
      I loathe the GOP's handling of the past +/- 8 years. But here's the rub, Babe:
      Do you think, or know enough about, what will become of ou already-broken health care system, should The "D"'s end up @ 1600 Pennsylvania??? Can you say, Socialisitic medicine? Of course you can!!!
      One needs to look no further than Canada, several EU countries, to learn this lesson. Of course, it's merely by observation! To extrapolate similar results here in the U.S., yes, is projecting, isn't exactly a HUGE leap-of-faith!
      Think it was Dennis Miller, possibly Bill Maherer that s0-0-0 "nailed-it": I'm paraphrasing..."If you think health-care is expensive today, wait until it becomes free. Portending, of course, Big Government, a metaphor for Socialism, which is being referred to. Capece?
      I'm unsure, what you meant by referencing "The Big S...?" What is that, pray-tell?
      Looking forward to establishing a rapporte, ongoing discourse c you! Take care...Robert

  • Posted By: thosfiore @ 03/23/2008 1:07:08 PM

    Comment: What this story neglects to mention is that they are talking about the top 10%, not the rest of us. It's only a very small percentage of people who can afford to retire early and that percentage is going to decrease in the next decade as the percentage of people who have defined benefit pensions decreases. The good side of this is that society will have the benefit of their experience for longer than we would have. I see a substantial upside to a greater percentage of the smartest, most productive members of the early baby boom staying in the work force.

  • Posted By: Karenn1 @ 03/23/2008 8:45:30 AM

    Comment: Perhap we should focus on the CEO who outsoucre america, Return to 36% capital gain.Charge tax on inport for our road repairs.We as tax payers payed for them and Corp. who outsoucre use them.Baby Boomers when you wake up you will find Corporation have no heart,just republicans who sell them as compassionet. Conservative politics is a myth. Instead of 401 k saving bonds would have been safer,cause repulicans will order more paper to make more money.This economy is GOP M O. check your history, were close to the BIG D this time,STAGFLATION, you can still breathe can't move. No unions no future for workers.

  • Posted By: burbank @ 03/23/2008 5:57:28 AM

    Comment: The dream of retirement ended with the demise of the manufacturing base that enabled people to work for 30 years at the same company. Unless you work for the state or the government, longevity at any job nowadays is a luxury that few enjoy. With rising energy and health care costs and the meltdown of the housing industry, boomers need to realize that the end of one career could mean the start of another. While the focus of any industry is geared toward youth with their enthusiasm and productivity, it is the experience and work ethic that boomers bring to the table that that will give modern industry the stability it needs to navigate the uncertain waters of today's global market place.

    Retirement today is a myth. The 30 year job with benefits is a thing of the past. Perhaps we should focus not on retirement, but on renewing our desire to make a difference and with wisdom and maturity chart a different course that will enable us to realize our dreams.

  • Posted By: MrsH @ 03/23/2008 3:21:59 AM

    Comment: It's more than the current meltdown. I finished college in 1974, just as home prices started an upward spiral that saw new homes in my area increase from $17,000 in 1978 to more than $100,000 in 1982. In the first 10 years I was out of college, we had the oil embargo which quintupled gas prices, a recession, and huge spikes in mortgage interest. All at a time I was trying to start my career and my family. By the time things were financially stable for me, we hit another recession -- and now this one. I'll never be as financially secure as my parents or grandparents were, becasue I've never had the luxury of a stable job with benefits. Most of my career has been spent at small or mid-size companies.

    Health insurance costs of $1,000 per month. FICA and other taxes that eat up 30% of every paycheck. Our parents never had to contend with these things. I live simply -- I don't have cable TV, a cell phone, an adjustable rate mortgage, I don't wear designer clothing, and I don't spend money I don't have. Just surviving and saving for something resembling a stable future is all I can manage.

    I don't trust that social security will be there for me. Besides, as they keep raising the retirement age from 62 to 67 to 70, I may not live long enough to retire.

 
 
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