Americans Are Retiring Later In Life. What Does This Mean For You?
Research shows that Americans are now retiring as many as four years later in their life than they did when compared to 30 years ago. Gallup, the Center for Retirement Research and the American Enterprise Institute have all conducted research studies to find the average retirement age.
Deciding the right age to retire is a personal decision and might be based on a variety of factors. For married couples where both parties work, they might be trying to time their retirement dates together. For a single person, they might want to work as long as possible to maximize withdrawals from retirement accounts. This new trend in retiring later is quite different from retirement age traditions in the past.
For much of history, beginning after the Civil War, the trend had actually been going in the other direction with people retiring younger. However, that number started climbing back up in the 1990s.
Some of the most common reasons for the retirement age to get later include:
- Changes in the Social Security program, when the program’s full retirement age went from 65 to 67, in the 1980s.
- Generational shifts in the 401(k) program.
- Health insurance consideration benefits.
- Living longer and healthier lives.
As you think about protecting your own retirement in these later years, it’s very important to work with a qualified and knowledgeable estate planning attorney. An estate planning lawyer can help you with a variety of different tasks associated with planning your retirement as well as aligning your estate planning objectives with these goals.
