Are you ready for retirement? What's your plan? When will you retire? What will you do when you retire? Do you feel you're on track relative to your plan?
These are all questions that I've challenged others to answer over the past 25 years as an HR professional. Most of the time the context is a rare discussion with a colleague or friend who I'm close to, and sometimes the context has been in a presentation to employees as they consider the amount they want to put into their 401k account, or other income accumulation vehicle offered by the company. Either way, I'm probably like most in not thinking about this a lot ... until now.
A notable few people have a plan and execute against it. Those few are in most cases quite privileged. Working closely with financial planners who were carefully monitoring key investment vehicles, the privileged developed a retirement plan largely independent of 'I need the money'. But again, this was for the privileged few.
Working class baby boomers tended to have pensions. These plans set a date for retirement with full benefits and encouraged employees to think about retiring on a specified date. Social security also played a role. "I'll have my full pension earned when I'm 62, and will live on that until I start getting social security at 65." And that was the extent of their planning.
What about Generation X? Just read a report that said 67% of Xers are concerned that they are prepared for retirement compared to 49% of Boomers. Hmmm, could this be because Xers were more individually accountable for their retirement? They don't have pensions (in most cases) and so they have to rely on their own financial discipline (voluntarily investing in 401k and other investment vehicles) to ensure they are prepared for retirement. Yep, that's me!
And am I worried about retirement? You bet! I don't consider myself to be part of the privileged few (although I had a financial advisor that mostly manages my accumulated 401k account) so when I retire will be largely a financial decision for me. No financial independence here, unless of course I win the lottery. And social security won't provide much in terms of an annuity either.
I've done a decent job of saving for retirement but consider myself to be among the masses when it comes to preparation for retirement as an Xer. Not prepared and anxious about what my future holds in this regard.
What about you?
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