I spent the past four days in Washington at a fellowship examining retirement issues in the 21st century.

I learned some, debated some and came home with lots of data about the graying of our society.

For those of you living on another planet (or another generation who wrongly believes these issues have nothing to do with you), the gist is that there are a lot of people about to enter their senior years, that they are living longer, that health care is growing more expensive, that they aren’t saving enough, and that they might run out of money unless they work longer (if they are healthy enough to do so and can find employers willing to hire them).

As I sat listening to presentation after presentation about these issues, I started reflecting upon my own savings. I’m not expecting a 30 year retirement consisting of travel and bingo (although I’m game for both). I figure I’ll earn some money doing work I enjoy until I’m at least 70 if i’m healthy. Yet I am always planning for retirement using calculators designed for a “retire at 65 and you’re done” mentality.

Does that mean that I could possibly be saving too much? Yes, especially if my husband and I both see our pensions and and if Social Security survives and if we stay healthy and if we get an inheritance or help paying for college and if the market doesn’t tank right as we retire and if and if and if.

This is my long-winded way of saying that I’m going to keep saving under the old paradigm because I don’t want to be someone who outlives her money.

On the other hand, check out this chart from a presentation given by Barbara Bovbjerg from the Government Accountability Office. It basically shows that if a 35-year-old today delays retirement, the percentage their salary they need to save drops from around 12 percent per year if hanging it up at age 62 to saving roughly 4 percent if they plan to work until age 70.

Do you think you’ll retire after age 65? How do you imagine retirement will be like for Gen X and Y?

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 20th, 2007 at 3:50 pm and is filed under generations, retirement. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.