FREE NEWSLETTER
SUPPOSE YOU KNEW you’d live until at least age 90. How would that change your thinking about retirement?
It seems most of us focus less on the possibility of a long life and more on the risk of an early death. This grim view is buttressed by endless anecdotal evidence—celebrities who pass away in their 40s and 50s, terrible accidents that take multiple lives, old classmates and colleagues who die at tragically young ages. Still, I’m starting to think that this focus on an early demise is not only a gloomy distraction from life’s daily joys, but also it leads us to make less-than-ideal retirement decisions.
Indeed, as I squint into the future from the not-so-grand age of 61, it occurs to me that there’s a chance I have three decades or more ahead of me, and it would be a shame to spend all that time focusing solely on fun and on short-term investment results. If I do that, I fear there’s a risk I’ll look back and rue the wasted time.
So, humor me, and join me in a thought experiment: If you knew the grim reaper wouldn’t turn up until your 90s, how would that alter your retirement plans? Here are four changes you might make:
Still, on this last one, I think it’s important to strike the right balance. Even if folks knew they’d live to their 90s and hence they might want to spend a tad more cautiously in their 60s, I wouldn’t want to discourage them from ticking off bucket-list items in their 60s and early 70s. While we might live until our 90s, our desire to spend time in the wider world—whether it’s traveling, hiking, attending concerts, visiting friends—might wane in our late 70s or early 80s.
All this raises an obvious question: What are the chances that a 65-year-old will live to his or her 90s? Among the general population, the odds aren’t great: 20% of 65-year-old men and 31% of 65-year-old women will live to age 90. What if you’re married? The chance that one of you will live to 90 rises to 45%.
But what if you’re a 65-year-old who is in good current health, has lived a healthy lifestyle and didn’t have a job that was physically demanding? The odds of making it to 90 rise to 30% for men and 42% for women, with the chances that one member of a couple lives that long at 60%. Suddenly, living to 90 looks like a distinct possibility.
Still, such odds may not be enough to persuade folks to change their behavior. But I’d encourage readers to ponder one more notion: As you plan your retirement, what’s the bigger financial risk, dying early or living to a ripe old age?
Let’s be honest: If you keeled over at 68, it would be a family tragedy—but it wouldn’t be a financial one. At that juncture, all your financial problems would be over, and your family would likely be better off financially because they’d inherit your retirement nest egg, which would probably still be largely intact.
Instead, the real financial risk is living to a ripe old age. That raises the question: As you make your retirement plans, shouldn’t you care more about the live version of your future self, rather than the dead one?
Jonathan Clements is the founder and editor of HumbleDollar. Follow him on X @ClementsMoney, on Facebook and on Threads, and check out his earlier articles.
Want to receive our weekly newsletter? Sign up now. How about our daily alert about the site's latest posts? Join the list.
As life reaches its end the need for care increases. Exponentially. There are only two ways to meet that need: Time and labor gifted by those who love you, or time and labor purchased privately. Those who love you will do their best, and may even set aside their own lives or careers to do the work – if you are lucky and it doesn’t bother you to impose on them. Those who offer services for hire, whether in your home or in a facility, will only provide for you as long as you can pay. Concocting some combination of the two strategies may be an option, but I know now that it takes an unnatural amount of effort to secure a natural death for someone you love.
My personal conclusion is that no “bucket list” of exotic travel or other indulgence is worth putting myself in the position of being without the resources I need to live out my last hours in compassionate, skilled, care and perhaps even with a loved one standing beside me. Not alone, abandoned in an institutional wasteland, between shifts.
At the fine, young age of middle-70s, already I find so many things that I can no longer do. (I won’t list the particulars, but they are significant that I don’t move much heavy stuff around any more, and can hardly manage to hit a nail on the head with a hammer.) (On the Nail’s head, that is.)
The idea of being without assets at the farthest end of my life seems as irresponsible as doing so at any earlier age. These questions—such as (A) will I die before I get a profitable return on my Social Security and (B) why shouldn’t I blow through a lifetime of savings and leave <0 behind—are no more avoidable now than they’ve ever been.
If “freedom” means the right to pursue your own course, and find your own “doom,” to shift the burden of self-responsibility on to my kids is—to repeat myself—no more avoidable now then ever.
“I know not what self-indulgent wasteful, final years others may choose. But as for me, give me a secure pension & assets in reserve to cover my ass in my declining years, or give me death.”*
Regards,
(($; -)}™
Gozo
—
*Nathan Hale (oft-misquoted)