Comments on: Retiring Retirement http://garrickvanburen.com/archive/retiring-retirement User Experience Strategy, Ruby and Rails Web App Development Sat, 20 Mar 2010 20:37:58 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: J Wynia http://garrickvanburen.com/archive/retiring-retirement/comment-page-1#comment-1371 J Wynia Tue, 28 Mar 2006 22:14:09 +0000 http://garrickvanburen.com/archive/retiring-retirement#comment-1371 I think both "stop working entirely at 65" and "live to 80 or so" are both assumptions that are going to be blown away in the next 35 years (when I hit that magical '65' age. Increasingly, people aren't actually stopping work, but are switching to doing something they *want* at 65. For instance, someone who's been working a job they hate for 20 years to put the kids through college and pay the house off, making $75,000/yr might quit doing their high stress job and go to work at the local bait shop for $9/hr selling fishing lures. When you remove the "have to" from work, it gets increasingly difficult to differentiate it from a hobby. However, if life expectancies drift upward much further and you view retirement as "sitting around", you had better be prepared to sit around for 25-30 years. I can't even imagine sitting around for a full 1/3 of my life. I intend to be "doing something" until the day I can no longer. It's just that if I manage to save enough money to reach the escape velocity I describe, I won't ever do stuff I don't enjoy anymore. I think both “stop working entirely at 65″ and “live to 80 or so” are both assumptions that are going to be blown away in the next 35 years (when I hit that magical ‘65′ age.

Increasingly, people aren’t actually stopping work, but are switching to doing something they *want* at 65. For instance, someone who’s been working a job they hate for 20 years to put the kids through college and pay the house off, making $75,000/yr might quit doing their high stress job and go to work at the local bait shop for $9/hr selling fishing lures.

When you remove the “have to” from work, it gets increasingly difficult to differentiate it from a hobby.

However, if life expectancies drift upward much further and you view retirement as “sitting around”, you had better be prepared to sit around for 25-30 years.

I can’t even imagine sitting around for a full 1/3 of my life. I intend to be “doing something” until the day I can no longer. It’s just that if I manage to save enough money to reach the escape velocity I describe, I won’t ever do stuff I don’t enjoy anymore.

]]> By: Garrick Van Buren http://garrickvanburen.com/archive/retiring-retirement/comment-page-1#comment-1370 Garrick Van Buren Tue, 28 Mar 2006 19:29:48 +0000 http://garrickvanburen.com/archive/retiring-retirement#comment-1370 I dunno. Seems to me, the more our economy focuses on "knowledge work" rather than manual labor, the longer we can be useful members of society. I dunno. Seems to me, the more our economy focuses on “knowledge work” rather than manual labor, the longer we can be useful members of society.

]]> By: Mick Black http://garrickvanburen.com/archive/retiring-retirement/comment-page-1#comment-1369 Mick Black Tue, 28 Mar 2006 19:13:37 +0000 http://garrickvanburen.com/archive/retiring-retirement#comment-1369 That's truly bad to hear. That’s truly bad to hear.

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