Rewrite the Script After 50: Creating More Space for What You Want

For a long time, our culture sent an unequivocal message about wanting more for yourself, and it wasn’t a kind one.

 Back in the 1980s, there was a popular movie that championed the idea that “greed was good.” Over time, that idea fell out of favour, and rightly so. But something else happened along the way. Wanting anything more for yourself began to feel suspect. Self-interest became confused with selfishness, self-reflection with self-indulgence.

 

That kind of thinking can quietly hold you back, especially as you approach retirement.

If you’ve spent much of your life being responsible, dependable, and useful to others, it can feel uncomfortable, even wrong, to ask what you want next. Yet midlife reinvention depends on that very question.

 

Recently, I was talking with my adopted daughter, who has just turned 50. We were discussing work, savings, and the long view of retirement. She’s considering reducing her hours at work. Not because she’s lazy or disengaged, but because her supervisor is under pressure and, as a result, has begun micromanaging her. The work itself hasn’t changed, but the environment has, and it’s taking a toll.

 

At the same time, she’s thinking seriously about her pension and whether she’s saving enough. Turning 50 has sharpened her focus. It’s made the future feel real in a way it didn’t at 40.

 

What she’s doing isn’t self-indulgent. It’s thoughtful. It’s responsible. It’s the work of renewal.

 

For many people, 50 is a milestone year. It invites reflection, not panic. You begin to review the decisions you’ve made, the paths you’ve followed, and the ones you didn’t take. From that reflection often comes a desire to make changes, not dramatic gestures, but meaningful adjustments.

 

I’ve seen this before.

 

When Boomers began turning 50, many lives shifted. Divorce rates rose as couples re-evaluated relationships that no longer fit. People changed jobs, redefined friendships, and questioned long-held assumptions about success and happiness. Beneath all of that was a search for voice and values, a desire to live more honestly in the time that remained.

 

Reinvention often begins here, but it doesn’t end quickly.

 

For some, it takes years to find the courage to make the changes they sense they need. That’s normal. The important thing is not speed, but direction. Starting the journey matters more than finishing it neatly.

 

Creating more space for what you want doesn’t mean taking something away from others. It means reconnecting with your own voice and allowing it to be part of the conversation again. It means aligning your days with your values, rather than simply filling them with obligation.

 

Retirement is not a reward for endurance. It’s a chapter of life that needs to be shaped with care.

 

As this series closes, I hope you take one idea with you: wanting something more for yourself is not a moral failing. It’s a natural, healthy response to experience, reflection, and growth. The work of midlife is not to disappear quietly, but to create a life that feels true to who you are now.

 

The script doesn’t end at 50. That’s where many people finally pick up the pen.

Rewrite the Script After 50: Letting Go of Old Identities

Letting go of old identities is easy to talk about and very hard to do.

We live in a world that encourages us to introduce ourselves by what we do. “I’m a teacher.” “I’m a nurse.” “I’m an accountant.” Over time, those labels stop being descriptions and start becoming definitions. They tell us who we are, where we belong, and why we matter. Walking away from them, or even loosening our grip, can feel like stepping into thin air.

I understand this personally.

Until I was 50, I saw myself as a classroom teacher. That was my identity, my anchor, and my shorthand explanation of who I was in the world. After 50, something shifted. I began to see myself not just as a teacher, but as an educator. It sounds like a small change, almost semantic, but it mattered deeply. “Teacher” tied me to a room, a schedule, a role. “Educator” gave me room to grow, to explore, and to imagine myself in new contexts.

That shift didn’t erase my past. It expanded it.

Not everyone finds that expansion easy, or even desirable. I think of my sister-in-law, who has been a nurse for 35 years and is now three years from retirement. Nursing isn’t just her job; it’s her identity. She cares deeply about her patients and feels responsible for them in a way that goes far beyond a paycheque. When her children were younger, she was actively involved in their Air Cadet adventures. She volunteered, supported, and showed up. As they grew up and her work demands increased, those outside roles slowly fell away.

Now, work fills most of her emotional space.

She has very few interests beyond nursing, and I worry about her, not because nursing isn’t valuable, but because it has become almost the only place where she feels useful and known. I once suggested to my brother that she might consider working part-time and returning to her love of knitting. His response was immediate and telling: she doesn’t want to leave her patients.

I understand that loyalty. I also understand the risk.

When she retires, she won’t just be leaving a job. She will be leaving an identity that has shaped her days, her relationships, and her sense of purpose. Finding a new one won’t be simple, and the loss may come as a shock.

I see this pattern often. I have friends who, even years into retirement, still think of themselves first as accountants, lawyers, teachers, or truck drivers. You name the occupation, and you’ll find people who wear it like a permanent name tag. Take away the role, and they’re left wondering who they are without it.

That question can be frightening, not just for the person asking it, but for the people around them.

Many of us, especially in midlife, are “the ones who hold everything together.” We are the reliable ones, the problem-solvers, the steady hands. Our identities are built around being needed. Stepping away from those roles can feel like abandoning responsibility or losing relevance. No wonder we resist.

But here’s the quiet truth: letting go of an old identity doesn’t mean erasing who you’ve been. It means making room for who you might still become.

This kind of letting go is emotional work. It involves grief, even when the change is chosen. There’s grief for routines that once gave structure, for recognition that once came easily, for certainty about where you fit. Ignoring that grief doesn’t make it disappear. It just makes the transition harder.

What helps is curiosity.

Instead of asking, “Who am I if I’m not this?” try asking, “What parts of me have been waiting for attention?” Often, the seeds of a new identity are already there, interests set aside, skills underused, voices muted by busyness. Knitting needles put down years ago. Ideas postponed. Questions unanswered.

You don’t need to rush this process, and you don’t need to have a replacement identity lined up before you loosen the old one. Midlife is not about instant reinvention. It’s about creating space, space to notice, to experiment, to breathe without a label attached.

In the next post, I’ll explore the difference between change and transition. Change happens on the outside: retirement dates, job shifts, new routines. Transition happens on the inside, and it has its own timeline. Understanding that difference can bring a great deal of relief, especially when letting go feels messier than you expected.

For now, it’s enough to notice the identities you carry, and to ask gently whether they still fit the life you want to live next.

Celebrating Your Retirement

 As I come to the close of this series on retirement events, it’s worth pausing to reflect on what I have explored with you. Retirement is no longer a single day or a dramatic exit; it is a journey, a series of quiet and meaningful moments that shape your next chapter in life. Each event is a reminder that this transition is yours to design, yours to savor, and yours to celebrate.

We’ve talked about paying off debt and realizing that you have enough to retire. We’ve explored the subtle shifts, when work begins to feel optional, when handing over a long-held project brings relief, and when you first imagine the rhythm of your weeks without deadlines. We’ve celebrated small but powerful turning points: trialing your first taste of retirement, choosing to live with intention, and sharing your plans with someone you trust.

We’ve also honored the moments of transition that carry both gravity and liberation: walking out for what you think is the last time, enjoying your first weekday entirely your own, and shaping what you actually want from this stage of life. And finally, we’ve marveled at the joy and expansiveness of leaving on your first big trip after retirement, a landmark that often transforms possibility into lived experience.

What these have in common is their quiet power. They may not come with fanfare, speeches, or balloons, but they mark the profound shift from one stage of life to the next. They remind you that retirement is not just a destination; it is a journey to be lived with awareness, intention, and celebration, even if that celebration is small, private, or personal.

Some may resonate with you immediately; others may feel far off. That’s the beauty of this approach: there is no fixed order, no checklist you must complete, and no external expectations. You notice the events that matter to you, and you honor the ones yet to come. Your journey is uniquely yours, shaped by your experiences, your choices, and your desires.

This series is an invitation: to pause, reflect, and celebrate each step along the way. It is a reminder that retirement can be expansive, joyful, and full of purpose when approached intentionally. Every small victory, every quiet moment of clarity, and every choice to embrace your time and energy is worth noticing.

So, as you move forward, take a moment to honour where you are now. Consider the landmarks you’ve already passed and the ones you are looking forward to. Celebrate them privately, share them with loved ones, or simply allow yourself a quiet smile. Each one is a testament to the life you’ve lived and the life you are now free to shape.

Retirement is not the end of a story, it is the beginning of a new chapter, written with your values, your curiosity, and your intention. Each milestone along the way is a signpost, guiding you, affirming you, and reminding you that the next stage of life is yours to define.

So, whether you are just beginning to imagine retirement or already walking fully into it, remember this: it is not the finish line that matters most, but the journey itself, a series of moments, events, and celebrations that make your next chapter rich, meaningful, and uniquely yours.

Here’s to noticing the landmarks, honoring the journey, and celebrating the life you are creating, one intentional step at a time.

Getting sernious about retirement

It begins with a thought that seems almost ordinary at first: a quiet recognition that life could be different. Maybe you’re sipping tea on a Sunday morning, or walking through your neighborhood, or glancing at a calendar that no longer feels like it owns you. And then it hits, a gentle but undeniable clarity:

I want to shape this next stage. On purpose.

For years, retirement may have felt like something that would “just happen” someday, a far-off chapter you could only imagine in vague terms. You saved, you planned, and you hoped, but the life beyond work was largely unformed. Maybe you imagined slowing down, maybe traveling, maybe finally picking up a hobby you once loved, but it was mostly an abstract concept, a destination defined more by absence than by action.

This milestone changes that.

It’s the day you move from passive imagining to active design. You start thinking in terms of intention rather than chance. Instead of wondering what retirement will feel like, you begin asking yourself what it should feel like.

What matters to me?
How do I want to spend my energy?
What rhythms will bring me joy?
Who and what will I surround myself with?

These questions open the door to the real work of retirement: building a life that fits, not just leaving a life behind.

Some people experience this milestone with a jolt, like the sudden clarity of a light switched on in a dim room. Others feel it as a soft, expanding warmth, a sense that the next chapter has always been waiting, and now they’re noticing it. Either way, the shift is undeniable.

It often comes with a reordering of priorities. Suddenly, small irritations at work or in daily life feel less important. You start noticing what truly energizes you and what drains you. You make subtle adjustments: a late start here, a quiet afternoon there. And each choice becomes a brushstroke in a larger painting you are only beginning to see.

This milestone is deeply empowering because it moves you from reacting to circumstances to deliberately creating the life you want. You stop drifting toward retirement and start stepping into it.

And with that intentionality comes a surprising sense of calm. There’s no rush. No deadline to “do it all.” Instead, there is purpose, clarity, and the growing excitement of possibility. You realize that retirement isn’t a single day; it’s a series of choices, and you now hold the pen.

You might start talking about it with someone you trust, a partner, a friend, a mentor. Perhaps you sketch ideas for your days, your weeks, or even a travel plan that has long been on hold. You begin to name what matters most: family, learning, health, adventure, creativity, connection. You acknowledge the life you’ve built and recognize the life you want to continue shaping.

This is also the milestone where you start giving yourself permission. Permission to slow down, to explore, to focus on joy rather than obligation. Permission to release old patterns that no longer serve you. Permission to be intentional without guilt.

And once you cross it, everything subtly shifts. Work is no longer a fortress you must defend; it is a choice among many. Your time begins to feel lighter, more precious. Your energy starts to flow toward things that resonate with your values, not just your responsibilities.

The day you decide to get intentional is more than a milestone, it’s a turning point. It is when retirement stops being a passive “someday” and becomes a carefully, thoughtfully constructed chapter. A chapter where you are the architect, the curator, and the participant all at once.

It is, in essence, the day you step fully into your own life, a life shaped by purpose, presence, and freedom. And once you take that step, you realize that every choice you make from this point forward matters, not because it’s urgent, but because it’s yours.

This is the milestone where the journey truly begins. Not with an exit, but with an entrance: an entrance into a life you consciously design, a life that reflects who you are, and a life you are finally ready to celebrate.

Seeing the Everyday with Fresh Eyes

Retirement can feel like stepping into a quieter rhythm, a slower pace of life. And yet, sometimes the most extraordinary experiences come from this very slowing down. By taking a fresh perspective on everyday tasks, you can uncover rewards that might have gone unnoticed for years.

A simple week in my life illustrates this beautifully. I spent time learning a new software package to make posters for an event. The challenge initially felt cumbersome, but as I explored the program, I began to see creative possibilities I hadn’t imagined. What was once a mundane task became a playful exercise in problem-solving and experimentation. Retirement allows these kinds of discoveries, where curiosity transforms the ordinary into something rewarding.

Later in the week, I faced another ordinary task with a fresh eye: cooking dinner. My wife wasn’t feeling well, so I stepped in. Normally, dinner is routine, but this time I experimented with new flavors and methods. The result was delightful, but the greater joy came from approaching the familiar task differently. Each new perspective brought small lessons in creativity, adaptability, and patience.

Sometimes, the rewards are quiet and unexpected. One afternoon, I was standing at the kitchen window with a snack when a pair of blue jays appeared on the cedar tree. I paused, observing their movements and the way they interacted. These birds are not frequent visitors, so it felt like a small miracle. The experience reminded me that even routine moments, a glance out the window, a walk through the garden, can offer fresh insights when we slow down and pay attention.

What makes this perspective so valuable is its accessibility. You don’t need to travel far or spend money to experience novelty. Instead, you learn to see your surroundings, your tasks, and your relationships in a new light. Each day presents an opportunity to notice something you’ve never noticed before, and in doing so, you gain a quiet sense of fulfillment.

Retirement invites us to embrace the small adventures hidden in daily life. Whether it’s mastering a new skill, experimenting in the kitchen, or simply observing nature, approaching the world with fresh eyes enriches your experience. Life doesn’t have to be dramatic to be rewarding; sometimes it’s the subtle shifts in perspective that bring the most joy.

So, pause in your routine, look closely, and explore the ordinary. With a fresh perspective, every chore, task, and glance around your home or neighborhood becomes a chance to learn, grow, and feel delight. Retirement isn’t about stepping back from life, it’s about stepping fully into it, with curiosity, openness, and appreciation.

Life after 80?

I recently realized that I have been retired for almost 20 years. I retired at 60 and am now approaching my 80^th year. I plan to be around for at least another few years. 

I am not in the minority. In modern society, people are still acting like life wraps up at 60 or 70 yet we're now living well into our 90s and beyond. This disconnect between how we live and how we think about aging is one of the most significant societal misalignments of our time. Retirement, healthcare, employment, and even personal identity are still being structured around outdated assumptions rooted in the 20th century. This mental model assumes a brief window between retirement and death, but today, that “retirement phase” can span 25 to 35 years ,  nearly a third of a person’s life.

If society fails to adjust to this new reality, retirees may face isolation, inadequate income, and identity crises. Businesses might lose valuable workers prematurely. Health care systems may be strained by avoidable chronic illnesses. Pension systems may become unsustainable. And workers in their 40s and 50s ,  who are likely to live to 90+ ,  may be preparing for a retirement based on faulty timelines and expectations.

We need a new narrative: one that views aging not as a decline but as an evolving stage of life with value, productivity, creativity, and continued contribution. Thus, my writing to help people think about a new narrative. Over the next two weeks I will be exploring the idea that many of us are planning for a life that no longer exits. Have fun with me as I explore rethinking life after 60 in fourteen posts.

Retiree to something not from something

I came across a quote from a retirement specialist that got me thinking about my own retirement. The quote was: If you retire from something and not to something, there is a good chance you’ll return to work. 40% of retirees end up returning to work. Interesting thought, but not necessarily true for those who return to work. This statistic is also misleading as currently, (2023) only 16% of those retired are thinking of returning to work.

There are many reasons to return to work. Some retirees go back because they need the money or in the United States, they need health benefits. A friend of mine worked until he had the money for his next holiday and then stopped, another worked to support his antique car hobby. I am sure my friends are not alone in working for holidays or hobbies.

These examples show that many retirees work for the sake of pursuing their passions or feeling a sense of value and purpose in their lives. It's not uncommon for individuals to have built their entire lives around their work, making it difficult to transition into retirement.

A 2020 Edward Jones/Age Wave study found that one in three new retirees struggle with finding purpose after they leave their jobs. I struggled with finding a purpose. It was an interesting journey, and I started this blog to help me find that purpose.

Purpose isn't something that simply reveals itself; it requires a proactive choice to seek it out. The journey took seven years, and once I found my purpose, I quit work. Having a purpose is crucial, as it gives us a reason to wake up each morning with enthusiasm and drive.

 Purpose is important, we all need a reason to get out of bed in the morning. There have been some interesting studies on the benefits of having a purpose in retirement. The studies

·    At Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, found that rating a person’s sense of purpose even one point higher on a seven-point scale decreased the risk of death by 12 percent over 14 years.

•    Plus, the benefits were seen across people in their 20s to 70s, suggesting it’s never too late to find your passion.

·    By Rush University Medical Center found that people who have a lower sense of purpose in their lives could be more likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease compared to people who have a greater understanding of purpose.

·    By Researchers for the American Heart Association, after analysis, found that over an average follow-up of 8.5 years, having a high sense of purpose in life was associated with a 23 percent reduction in death from all causes and a 19 percent reduced risk of cardiovascular events, including heart attacks and strokes.

·   The University of Michigan found that those who reported having greater life purpose were more likely to make better use of preventative healthcare and spend less time in the hospital than those with a lower sense of purpose.

 We don’t have to have a single purpose, what we need is a sense of purpose and things to hope for that give meaning to our lives, Meaning comes from caring about something beyond ourselves. This could be a social cause, family, faith, a hobby; or whatever energizes you. So, I hope it does not take you seven years, like me, to find your purpose.

The Perfect Storm

The following is a summary of the research on  Factors Contributing to Lower  Retirement Confidence Among Women Who Are Not Married written by Craig Copeland, Ph.D. of the Employee Benefit Research Institute (pdf file)

The Retirement Confidence Survey (RCS) was conducted for its 32nd year in 2022 to measure attitudes toward, preparations for, and understanding of the various issues surrounding retirement by American workers and retirees. In 2022, the RCS found that Americans have near-record-high confidence in having enough money to live comfortably throughout retirement. However, unmarried women workers and retirees have lower retirement confidence than their married counterparts and are more likely to have lower incomes and assets. Unmarried retirees are also more likely to say that their expenses were higher than they expected and are more likely to have retired earlier than planned.

In this Issue Brief, the attitudes, considerations, and behaviours surrounding the retirement of women workers and retirees of different marital statuses are examined to provide greater insight into what can help improve women's retirement outcomes. Key findings are:

• Divorced and single, never-married women workers are more likely to have lower levels of financial assets than married women workers. Just 27 percent of married women workers have assets of less than $25,000 compared with just over half for divorced women workers (58 percent) and single, never-married women workers (56 percent). Married women retirees are also less likely to have lower levels of assets than divorced and widowed retirees.

• Married women workers are more likely to say that they are confident they will have enough money to live comfortably throughout their retirement years than both divorced and single, never-married women workers. Among retirees, married women are also more likely to be confident that they will have enough money in retirement than divorced or widowed women.

• Married women workers are more likely to agree that they feel knowledgeable about managing their day-to-day finances than single, never-married women workers. The share of divorced women workers who feel knowledgeable about managing finances is not significantly different from the share of married or single, never-married women workers.

• Both divorced and single, never-married women workers are more likely to agree that retirement savings are not a priority relative to the current needs of their family than married women workers. When asked about priorities aside from managing day-to-day finances, single, never-married women workers are more likely to choose purchasing a home or starting a business as the top-three longer-term financial planning priorities. Married and divorced women workers are most likely to say that saving and investing for retirement is among their top three longer-term financial planning priorities.

• When asked if individuals even know where to go to find good financial or retirement planning advice, one-third of women either strongly or somewhat agree with the statement that they do not know where to go for good financial or retirement planning advice. This is substantially higher for single, never married women, as 45 percent report that they do not know where to go for financial advice.

• Married women workers are the most likely to feel they have enough money to cover an emergency expense, while divorced women workers are the least likely to feel they can cover an emergency expense. Furthermore, married women workers are more likely to say they have done a retirement needs calculation than divorced or single, never-married women workers—49 percent compared with 35 percent each says they have done so.

• Women of each marital status who are offered a workplace retirement plan cite better explanations for how much income their savings will produce in retirement in their top four most valuable improvements to their workplace plan. However, divorced women are most likely to say that none of the possible improvements are the most valuable, whereas married and single, never-married women have three of the same four in their top improvements.

• Both divorced and widowed women retirees were more likely to have retired earlier than planned than married women retirees — 51 percent vs.42 percent. Women retirees of each marital status have equal likelihoods of retiring later than planned at just less than 1 in 10.

• When asked how their overall lifestyle in retirement now compares to how they expected it to be before they retired, a majority of women retirees say their lifestyle is about the same as they expected. However, married women retirees are more likely to say their lifestyle is better than expected, while divorced and widowed women retirees are more likely to say their lifestyle is worse than expected.

Keeping on Track

Women getting back on track with retirement planning A new survey of employer sponsored retirement plan participants by the Nationwide Retirement Institute® found that COVID-19 has negatively impacted the retirement confidence of women more than men.

But women are taking steps to get back on track, including trusting the guidance of financial professionals and shifting their retirement savings approach.

Women are missing key retirement planning milestones. Women are less likely than men to have started retirement plan contributions, saved enough in an emergency fund or increased contributions to their workplace retirement plans.

Many women say they’re on the wrong track for retirement, and COVID-19 has made it worse. About 1 in 5 women (18%) expect to retire later than planned due to the pandemic.

On the positive side, many women are acting now to improve their retirement outcomes. Since the start of the pandemic, two-thirds of plan sponsors say women are more likely than men to have made changes to their retirement plans.

Among women participating in workplace retirement plans, around half (48%) showed interest in guaranteed lifetime income investment options.

Women are more likely than men to trust financial professionals when it comes to many aspects of retirement planning.

Women are experiencing more negative emotions about retirement. Stress from the pandemic has affected people’s financial lives. Women feel less confident and more worried than men about their current retirement plan status – in fact, one in 10 women feel panicked. There is hope, the average American hopes to retire by age 62 but in reality, they retire closer to 65 and work part time or on a contract until 70. Retirement is not an age, it is a financial number, and in todays economy people reach that number by about age 70. 

Retirement planning, however, is not one-size-fits-all for men or for women. To plan for retirement, it is recommended to sit down with a financial planner. One of the first things you should do is determine exactly how much money you need per year to fund your dream retirement. Once you have that yearly total, you and your advisor can work your way backward to figure out what size nest egg you need and you  will get some help on how to build the nest egg you need.

 

I am 75 and can't afford to quit work

Saving for retirement is not an option, but it is an opportunity that fewer and fewer are taking advantage of in the US and in Canada. Government pensions in Canada are designed to replace between 35 and 40 percent of pre-retirement income. That is if you have worked and get Canada Pension plus Old Age Security. In the US their system is designed to replace between 38 and 45% of pre-retirement income. In the last decades, companies have moved away from offering any type of pension plan and are turning the responsibility of saving for retirement over to the individual. That is not working well for the individual but is working well for companies.

An average of 65 million Americans receive a monthly social security benefit, with the majority of payments going to retired workers and their dependents. When Covid-19 hit the US, millions of workers in the US and Canada had to rely on food banks to have enough food to eat, and in the US where health insurance is tied to a job, many lost health care and had to pay out hundreds of dollars out of pocket for treatments.

The Media reports of older workers have often been framed as feel-good stories, such as a viral news report of an 89-year-old pizza delivery man who received a $12,000 tip raised by a customer out of remorse, as he works 30 hours a week because he can’t afford to retire on social security benefits alone. Or an 84-year-old woman who started a new job as a motel housekeeper in Maine in July 2020. Or an 81-year-old woman in Ohio who volunteered to start working at her favourite restaurant in November 2021 because it shut down temporarily due to an inability to hire and retain enough staff.

The good news stories hide the grim reality that millions of Americans are working into their senior years because they can’t afford to have a job.

Over the next decade, the number of workers ages 75 and older is expected to increase in the US by 96.5%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, with their labour force participation rate projected to rise from 8.9% in 2020 to 11.7% by 2030, a rate that has steadily increased from 4.7% in 1996.

The number of workers who retired during the pandemic was about 2 million more than expected. 50.3% of US adults ages 55 and older said they were out of the labour force due to retirement in the third quarter of 2021, compared to 48.1% in the third quarter of 2019, according to an analysis by Pew Research Center. Though in recent months, the unretirement rate of US workers has gradually increased toward pre-pandemic levels.

As the ageing US population grows, participation in retirement plans has declined since 2000. Nearly half of all families in the US have no retirement savings at all and inequality among Americans based on retirement savings is greater than income inequality. Over 15 million adults ages 65 and older are economically insecure, with incomes below 200% of the federal poverty line, with Black, Hispanic and women ages 65 and older more likely to live in poverty.

With the average estimated social security retirement benefit in 2021 at $1,543 a month, even with a 5.9% cost of living adjusted increase for 2022, millions of Americans who rely on social security benefits are forced to continue working past retirement age in order to make ends meet.

As the US population ages, with millions of Americans having no retirement savings, the number of older Americans with student debt, either for themselves or for children, is on the rise.

Nearly 9 million Americans ages 50 and older still have student debt, and the amount owed by this demographic is growing faster than any other age group. In 2015, 40,000 Americans had their social security retirement benefits garnished for student loans.

If you are still working pay attention and start saving for retirement, do not follow the lesson of your elders.

 

Lend a helping hand or not?

 CIBC’s Deputy Chief Economist Benjamin Tal raised eyebrows this week when he said that one in five first-time homebuyers is getting help from their parents with a gift, on average, of $150,000. Not only are more first-time buyers getting financial aid from the bank of mom and dad (up from 15.5% in 2015) but the dollar amount has more than doubled (up from $71,000 in 2015).

This is one of the reasons that older Canadians are working much longer than most experts had predicted. Due to a combination of factors, including the growing number of women in the workforce and a decline in the percentage of dependent children, even by 2030 when boomers are all over 65, the ratio of people being supported by the working population will be similar to that in the 1950s and 1960s. Not only that but in the years since COVID our labour force is being transformed and we are not yet sure of what it will look like in the future.

Twenty years ago, or so, many of the experts were talking about the transfer of wealth from the silent generation to the Boomers, that really did not happen as expected, Now according to a J.D. Power study, as much as $700-billion in financial assets is set to be transferred to the next generation in Canada by 2026.

Like it or not, many retirees have more than enough assets to live their desired lifestyle and leave a significant estate to their beneficiaries. The problem is many of my generation believe that it is not a good idea to save money for the younger generation, but it is a better idea to spend it now or save it for when you need it.

Assume you live a long and healthy life. That’s not as far-fetched as it sounds. FP Canada’s assumption guidelines suggest a 65-year-old male today has a 50% chance of living to age 89 and a 25% chance of living to age 94. A 65-year-old female has a 50% chance of living to 94 and a 25% chance of living to 96.

Many of my friends and my family are not willing to leave a large inheritance and neither am I. I would rather give them smaller and potentially more meaningful amounts at key milestones such as buying a first home, or filling up the grandkids’ RESPs?

My parents believed that if you worked to earn something it was valued more. They say the financial struggle is a rite of passage, and a way to build strong character.

The world is different today, a living wage in my area is about $25 an hour. Home prices are off the scale and prices just keep going up. The different world is where affordable housing and education, defined benefit pensions, and company benefits have all but disappeared. We’re living in a gig economy with temporary contracts, no benefits, and housing and other costs that are spiralling out of control.

If you want to help your children and grandchildren, make sure that your own retirement needs are met before making financial commitments to your kids to protect yourself.

What can a person who has Power of Attorney do?

 As we get older many of us may consider getting someone, we trust to help us look after our financial affairs. In BC this is done through an Enduring Power of Attorney, in other jurisdictions, there are other names and requirements.

When you give someone your Power of Attorney make sure it is someone you would trust to step in for you if you cannot manage your money down the road. They might be your spouse, adult child, grandchild, nephew or niece, a long-time friend, or someone else you really trust.

An Enduring power of attorney is a document in which an adult authorizes another person (called their attorney) to make decisions in relation to your financial affairs, business, and property. The person (attorney) is authorized to act when you become incapable, or to continue to act while you remain incapable. Attorneys may not make health care treatment decisions. A Power of Attorney is drawn up by a lawyer, both to protect your rights and to protect the attorney’s rights.

A person who has your Power of attorney can act on your behalf in the following four areas. These areas are the most common, but the attorney can act in any other financial areas that you define in the legal agreement. If you are considering giving someone the Power of Attorney over you, check with a lawyer before you do this.

1. Manage daily finances

2. Manage investments and sources of retirement income

3. Manage your home and other property

Let’s go over these categories in more detail.

1 MANAGE DAILY FINANCES

•        Make sure your bills are paid on time. This includes mortgage, rent, credit cards, insurance premiums, and basic services such as utilities and subscriptions (cell phone, TV, newspapers, etc.). They can also set up automated bill payments.

•        Monitor your checking and credit card accounts, including making sure automatic payments are appropriate.

•        Look for unusual purchases, donations to charity, and payments that may signal that someone is stealing money from your account or that you are being targeted by a scam.

•        Make sure your tax forms are filed correctly and on time, such as income taxes and property taxes.

•        Hire and monitor professionals like tax preparers, financial advisers, and attorneys.

•        Securely store your passwords, financial records, bills, checkbooks, credit cards, tax returns, and other important documents.

•        If needed, pay home health aides and other care providers.

The goal here is to make sure all your expenses are accounted for and that your bills are paid on time, thereby avoiding late fees, penalties, and loss of service or coverage due to missed payments. This helpful monitoring will also protect you from inappropriate purchases and repairs, overzealous solicitors for charitable causes, and many forms of scams, fraud, and identity theft.

2. MANAGE INVESTMENTS AND SOURCES OF RETIREMENT INCOME

To keep you financially secure, your attorney might help with the following tasks:

•        Determine if you’re eligible for financial support or other government programs.

•        Initiate pension payments and appropriate withdrawals from retirement accounts

•        Periodically monitor and evaluate your investments and insurance to make sure they are still appropriate for your situation and meet your goals.

•        Review that your income from retirement accounts is properly transferred into checking and savings accounts.

•        Work with you to develop and manage sources of retirement income and an investment strategy. If needed, your attorney can help find the appropriate financial professional.

Ultimately, your attorney will keep your retirement savings safe by making sure you aren’t sold investments and insurance products that are inappropriate for your circumstances and goals. They can also prevent high charges for professional services from brokers and advisers, and potentially catastrophic losses due to fraud or mistakes. Last, they can make sure you receive public assistance if you meet eligibility requirements.

3. MANAGE YOUR HOME AND OTHER PROPERTY

If you own your home, your attorney can:

•        Work with you to identify what repairs and maintenance are needed.

•        Screen, hire, and monitor work done by service providers like contractors, housekeepers, exterminators, plumbers, electricians, and other repair people.

If you own rental properties, your attorney can:

•        Hire people for maintenance and repairs.

•        Collect and deposit rental payments.

•        Communicate with current tenants.

•        Interview and evaluate prospective tenants.

If your attorney is not comfortable with this role or lives far away, you or your attorney can investigate hiring a professional property manager for rental properties. The goal here is to prevent substantial costs due to neglected repairs and untrustworthy helpers.

In the case of rental properties, you want to avoid losing income due to turnover with tenants and other issues that can come up.

IT’S A PRETTY BIG ROLE

It’s quite remarkable how many tasks you do to manage your money and keep it safe. Your attorney might also spend a lot of time with these tasks. Be sure to thank them for their time!

 

Money fears

I was going to write about “Where have all the Volunteer leaders gone”, but since my interests are many, when I saw this question, I changed my topic. The question is What’s your biggest money fear?

This is an interesting question and the answer is dependent, I suspect based on age, lifestyle and stage of life.  So, I went to the net to see if my assumptions were correct. I assumed that twenty-somethings might say they fear having to live in debt forever, or that they’ll never be able to afford a home, which is true, but this group is also concerned about learning how to manage money, debt and savings

Those in their thirties fear they’ll never stop living paycheque to paycheque. By the 30’s many have children, have bought a home or an apartment, and get caught up living with a mortgage. However, they are still learning to manage their money, controlling spending and debt. The savings are now starting to be geared for college for the kids and maybe retirement.

Forty-somethings might fear losing their job and having to start all over again. However, the concerns are more focused, many in their 40’s are established, but they recognize that a downturn in the economy or automation can put a halt to their plans. So, they are focused on gaining new skills, looking for ways to reduce debt by refinancing their mortgage or taking on a second job. Children are getting married so ways to help pay for the wedding become a bigger issue. In the late 40’s the realization that maybe some more money should be allocated to saving for retirement dawns.

The biggest money fear in your fifties might be whether you’ll ever be able to retire. The reality for many is that they have not because of other issues saved enough for a comfortable retirement. All of us will retire and in Canada and the US, we retire at age 61 or 63. This means that we have to find extra money for retirement. In this process we re-examine or debt and perhaps use debt consolidation to pay down our debt faster, we re-evaluate our retirement goals and we start to consider the value of different types of insurance.

The number one concern for all retirees is whether they will outlive their savings. It’s a legitimate fear, especially for women over the age of 60 who worry about the prospect of outliving their money and becoming homeless. Indeed, careful planning is required for those who retire without access to a defined benefit pension and without sufficient savings in RRSPs.

This fear can be overblown because Canadians enjoy government programs such as CPP, OAS, and GIS that provide a financial floor that has kept seniors out of poverty, although there is no assurance that these programs will continue to work as they were intended.

How much will I need when I retire?

How much you will need for retirement will depend on the lifestyle you plan to lead once retired. Will you travel? take up expensive hobbies? downsize? live frugally? relocate? The key is to start saving/investing early in life and do it with every paycheck. Take advantage of 401k or your RRSP plans if offered and max out contributions whenever possible.

It is also important to stay healthy. First, because you will be better able to enjoy life and second, medical costs will most likely be greater if you are not healthy. There are many web pages on ageing, health, travelling and many may have retirement and health calculators.

The average age of retirement is officially 67 in the United States, but retirement actually starts at age 61, for many Americans. They do say that they planned to work longer. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — you should plan to be retired for at least a few decades at least 2 if not three decades.

Your longevity may vary based on things such as your work (for example, executive versus assembly line worker), diet, family health history and participation in extreme sports leagues and your sex.

The average budget for a retiree, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data, or an older household, defined as ones headed by someone 65 or older, spend $46,000 annually. The top three-monthly expenses for those 65 or older are housing ($1,322), health care ($500) and food ($484).

Half of a retired household’s income comes from Social Security as well as private and government pensions, according to the BLS, with personal savings and investment and rental income providing 6.9 percent.

An online retirement calculator can project a more accurate picture of your retirement readiness. It will use your current saving, spending and investment profile, and some rules of thumb about historical investment returns, reasonable withdrawal rates and, yes, life expectancy.

What if the math shows that at the rate you’re going, you’ll outlive your retirement savings? If you’re not yet retired, one of the best moves is postponing your retirement. This strategy is especially valuable for those in their peak earning years.

Besides reducing the number of years you’ll need to live off your savings, working longer allows more time for your investments to grow.

If you’re already retired and un-retiring or waiting to file for Social Security aren’t feasible, there are other ways to make up for the shortfall between retirement income and expenses.

•        Leverage your home as a last resort.

•        Take your investments and shop for an immediate annuity.

•        Budget and reduce the amount you spend, taking out less money from your savings.

•        Seek assistance from family or from the government. There are government, non-profit and for-profit programs that provide benefits to struggling seniors.

Retirement age should it be increased?

On February 1st an article appeared in McLean's Magazine, called  The retirement age in Canada is too low—and that’s a growing problem, it was written by Peter Shawn Taylor and its lead is the following:  The Liberals reversed a plan to push the eligibility age for retirement benefits to 67. It goes against global trends and economic reality.

What is the global reality today? Canada and the United States are two of the countries in the world where workers have to work longer before they retire. According to a study done byAperion Care, the average age of retirement in most countries hovers around the 62-65 age range, there are a handful of countries that plan for workers to leave the workforce even earlier. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) boasts the lowest official retirement age at 49 years old, though the age is 60 for expats (non-UAE nationals). 

The African continent hosts several countries that have low retirement ages. Senegal, Mozambique, and Madagascar are the lowest at 57.5, while most hover around 58-60 years of age, such as Egypt, Tunisia, and Morocco.  There isn’t much information about social services, government programs, or workforce stats but considering so much of workforce is involved in agriculture and labour, over time, a person’s ability to work is affected by the physical toll it takes on their body, and earlier retirement might be necessary.

Other countries, like Russia, Japan, and India, have retirement ages closer to 60, and with large populations of older or retired people. Family obligations, limited opportunity, and rampant poverty keep these large older populations from travelling away and keep them in the workforce longer to be able to make a living.


In Norway, 67 has been the official retirement age since the 1970s and there currently are no serious proposals to raise the retirement age. In 2011, Norway established “flexible retirement” for earnings-related pensions, meaning that Norwegians can draw pensions as early as age 62. Some social science data suggests that Norwegians preferred to retire at 61, then the age rose to 64 in 2013.

In the article, Mr. Taylor states that "According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Canada’s decision to revert to age 65 bucks a global trend. “Many countries are increasing their retirement age,” the OECD observes."

This argument is that contributing more and for longer, especially by postponing retirement as life expectancy increases, is the best approach to face the challenges faced by increasing longevity. The argument is that the best way to address the problems posed by improvements in life expectancy is to maintain the ratio of years saving for retirement to years in retirement constant, increasing contribution periods as life expectancy increases; or to increase overall contributions. This position is being bought by governments as many countries have responded to population ageing by increasing the statutory age of retirement. Some have linked retirement age to life expectancy.

The fairness of this solution, however, can be questioned when we look beyond the average. Gains in life expectancy have not necessarily been distributed equally across society. A skilled executive, for example, can expect to enjoy nearly four additional years in retirement compared to a manual labourer; this assuming that “retirement” begins at age 65. 

Inequality becomes more apparent when considering the period before retirement. Not only can the manual labourer expect to receive his pension for fewer years, but he can also expect to have made contributions to the system from an earlier age, as the highly skilled worker likely spent a number of years in higher education and began working later. Given the same retirement age, the unskilled labourer pays relatively more into the system to receive his pension for a shorter amount of time.


Automatically linking retirement age to increases in life expectancy across the board may, therefore, be regressive. Life expectancy, time of entry in the labour market and improvements in life expectancy are not homogenous across the population, they vary across different socio-economic groups (e.g., low skill, low-income groups). Hence, the best approach may be to link the number of years contributing to life expectancy. Unfortunately, the data needed for this is not available across all countries and the application across different socio-economic groups may be far from straightforward but it is a better method than adding years of work before people can get their pensions.

Mr. Taylor concludes his article by saying, "In other words, Canadians may now be stuck with a retirement age that gets more out-dated with each passing year. Age is just a number, of course. But 65 stopped being the right number for retirement a long time ago." Around the world, there is some pressure to increase the age of retirement with the average age of retirement being between  62-65, but I believe Canada should not be in a hurry to move it that direction as our retirement age is already higher than most countries in the world.

Watch for more articles and studies that will take the position that we need to raise our retirement age. These positions are a response to the risk of living longer. Demand for protection against longevity risk will only increase as individuals are expected to live longer, and the sustainability of pension funds and annuities providing this protection for individuals has to be ensured. 

Sufficient provisioning for longevity is essential to guarantee that future payments will be met, and the ability for providers to manage and mitigate this risk will allow them to continue offering protection in the future.