Summary
Faced with inflation, taxes and concerns over the size of Social Security benefits, most Americans are more afraid of going broke in retirement than they are of death.
In total, 64% of respondents across generations said they are more stressed about running out of funds in their golden years than the prospect of death.
Americans say they need $1.26 million to finance a comfortable retirement, yet the median amount saved is $87,000. “Certainly for boomers…inflation is a big deal.”
I feel for them, truly. We American workers have been promised pensions that were taken because it was too expensive, Social Security that’s now being reduced or threatened with reduction to save money, and told to gamble our retirement in the stock market which is crashing to save money. The folks that were up for retirement this year have been screwed by Trump and his tariffs. The folks already retired are getting screwed by the cost of living. And everyone else years or decades away from retirement are looking at the gates of Oblivion.
I used to work in a factory a few years ago while trying to get a tech job (had to pay the bills) and I remember this old guy that worked there with me. He was in his mid 70s, was slow, and tired. Definitely couldn’t keep up with the fast pace environment that required 20, 30, 40yo people to do the job so he had the simplest most insignificant tasks to do. I asked him, one day, why he was still working when he should be at home retired. He said he needed the health care and if he had a medical emergency then there was always someone here that could save his life. That was pretty sad.
I knew a fellow that was in his 80s that worked at the same shitty company I did. It was also pretty clear to me that he just couldn’t keep up. Very sweet guy too. Conscious of racism, opposed a lot of bad policies (and took direct action in his younger years).
He told me one day that he worked there so he could afford care for his wife. Soon after his wife passed, so did he. Didn’t really get to retire.
Another victim of capitalism. But I don’t know of a better system proven over time.
Suicide is going to become a popular retirement option.
Been my default plan A long before the economy went to hell.
I set up home medical equipment for 10 years, and by the eldery’s own words, even if lucky enough to have amoral levels of resources, it’s no life or victory, and certainly shouldn’t be your main life goal. Taking a dozen pills every day to stave of the inevitable, dealing with unyielding physical pain, even in the best of cases being cognitively dulled as if in a permanent, ever worsening brain fog as your very sense of self erodes until even those dozen pills can no longer cheat your body’s imminent failure any longer.
I’ll never understand regular people that live like monks just in case they don’t get hit by a bus or some debilitating disease and make it to… Their absolute shittiest years (them being the “golden years” was always marketing to keep you working your best years in service to sociopaths). Because sadly even in the supposed “good” times from the 90s onward, most people economically have to choose to live in the present, or do the supposed responsible thing and scrimp to subsist in the future when you’re no longer of use to the oligarchs.
Should have used all that money in your 401k to take a bunch of vacations back when you could actually fully taste the food, fully feel the wind in your face, fully partake in activities your failing body would no longer survive without injury or death, and fully imbibe the experience as more than a faint, fading shadow of who you once were.
And again, that’s from the experience of basically hearing how horrible it is from elderly people from the extremely wealthy to the extremely poor.
I used to make 100k at a job that I knew I wouldn’t be physically able to do in my 40s and 50s. Conventional wisdom says save it, build a big nest egg, plan for the future. Fuck that, I ate and drank and traveled it all away. 41 years old now making 30k. I’ve been everywhere, done everything I ever wanted. No regrets.
That is my retirement option. Figure an early retirement might be for the best.
Mine is life in prison.
Ive been thinking that for a the last few years. When I get to be too tired to work, Im just gonna get a gun and a bullet. I dont want to be doing physical labor at 70. Im almsot 36 and Im already getting tired. So if thats it, then thats it.
Death is retirement. Suicide when I can no longer work. They don’t leave all of these guns and fentanyl around for nothing.
There’s a third option where the people responsible retire with us
Getting awfully Blade Runner in here.
If I got a gun, they can retire me.
Of course they are, who cares about going broke in death?
This happens when you weaponize homelessness & poverty.
We sure don’t vote like it.
For the number folks:
The most respondents cited high inflation (54%), Social Security not providing as much financial support as they need (43%), and high taxes (43%). Boomers (61%) were more likely than millennials (56%) or Gen Xers (55%) to say high inflation contributed to their fear of running out of money.
But this fear is more prominent among Gen Xers (70%) who are in their 40s and 50s and fast approaching retirement and millennials (66%) than boomers (61%) who are over 60 and many have already retired.
Asian/Asian American respondents (34%) were more likely to have discussed this fear than white (22%), Black/African American (28%), and Hispanic (25%) respondents.
Interestingly no mention of Gen Z, who I guess is just starting their careers so might be why?
Though I’d imagine the doom and gloom is just as high for Gen Z if not more.
You guys are retiring?
Lol death can’t be worse than capitalism
I’m 46. My expectation is that retirement will be completely impossible. I expect to die at my desk or in between visits to my desk.
100%. My wife and I live a very modest lifestyle but the numbers still don’t add up come the day I can’t work.
“Certainly for boomers…inflation is a big deal.”
This sorta stuff is why I think blaming Boomers is not helpful. This inflation has been inevitable since the Nixon Shock, and it was the “Greatest” generation - not the Boomers - who elected Nixon. We’ve built a high GDP economy that doesn’t serve the working class at all.
This is going to be every generation if we don’t organize in a big way.
It’s never going to happen unless something happens and it just “clicks” like a chain reaction and people “do it” across the country/globe. People these days don’t have the money to pay for privacy.
America brought other countries into this now. It’s not a civil war.
They can never become a part of the demonic, worthless, piece of shit, drug addicted, criminal, rapist homeless population, because those are the very views THEY put onto those people.
This wouldn’t be a problem if Americans learned how to be responsible citizens and vote responsibly.
At this point, voting responsibly means not voting for felon rapist traitors.
So pretty low bar.
American life isn’t living. Unless you are taking advantage of others lives for money then you are just cattle.
