Continuing with my lazy rehash rummaging through the archives, here is another interesting (if simple) post asking a very tough question. I think the topic of retirement is a while off for me, but it is much closer than it was when I posted this many years ago. I have edit’ed this because it was kind of raw at the time. Will you ever retire is a hard question .
Our buddy friend over at the Canadian Capitalist asked the lyrical question about whether when the baby boomers retire, will it cause the financial markets to crash because they will all be sucking their money out of them to live on.
That’s a good question, but here is a better question, are we actually going to retire?
The Baby Boomer generation and the generation before it may well be the only two generations to retire. My Dad retired, but before that most people died before they reached retirement age (two world wars does put a damper on planning for the future). All these baby boomers have all this money put away (or do they? we’ll only know in a few more years) and think they will retire.
I am a little more pragmatic, will I retire? I have dreams of retiring now while I can really enjoy things, but will I have enough money to retire at 65? Will CPP exist then? Will my pension from my employer still be solvent? (remember I wrote this while I still worked at Nortel) Will my debts be low enough that I can retire? Will I be doing something by then that I want to STOP doing? All very good questions to think about.
Will You Ever Retire ?
Don’t assume you will retire, but plan like you want to is all the advice I can give right now.
Given I have a safer pension, retirement is much more of a reality now, but retirement is still more of a dream than a reality for me right now.
Retirement is a concept that has only really been around for 75 years. Before that you simply got sick and died on the job, or plowing the fields. Will the Millenials ever retire? I doubt it, but they will live a lot longer too, which will make for an interesting financial equation.