THE FADING DREAM OF RETIREMENT: SOCIAL AND FINANCIAL CONSIDERATIONS AFFECTING THE RETIREMENT DECISION

Abstract

Considerable attention has been directed at analyzing the lifestyle of retirees and how they adapt to their new stage of the life course. The literature largely treats this stage as a given and suggests Boomers (1946–1965) will retire as the preceding two generations have retired. But retirement in one's early- to mid-sixties is a relatively new stage of the life course and may soon become little more than a fond memory. The social conditions driving the changes that will keep people in the workplace longer than anticipated are examined in this article. These changes may not all be negative; indeed, there are considerable positive consequences for individuals remaining in the workforce longer. One of these is obviously the ability to remain economically vibrant. The other is that outside the workplace people have precious few social connections, and social networks are crucial for many if they are to maintain a positive self-image.

The author thanks the anonymous reviewers at Sociological Spectrum for their insightful comments on an earlier draft of this article, the co-editors for their encouragement to revise and resubmit the article, and Scot W. Rand with Edward Jones for his critique of some of my financial calculations. A variation of this article was presented at the American Sociological Association 100th Annual Meeting in Philadelphia, PA (August 2005).

Notes

¹There is a 13-year difference in life expectancy for those in industrialized countries compared to those in developing countries. This is largely attributed to better health care, immunization against diseases, and nutrition (see Butler, 1999).

²A detailed study by Martikainen et al. (2001) of differences by gender and class among Finnish citizens found that the death rate of manual workers was substantially higher than for non-manual workers.

³Anecdotal evidence relating to retirement came from employees with bankrupt firms such as Enron and WorldCom who lost all of their 401-K funds. Against all conventional market wisdom, these individuals were often invested solely in their company's stocks during the 1990s when the company was posting double-digit increases.

⁴Muller argues that the Boomers' economic prosperity was purchased largely at the expense of family life because they had to work so hard to stay as economically vital as their parents. The changing nature of the family is the subject for discussion in the next section of this article.

⁵In the mid-1990s, McDonald's aired a series of commercials where the gray-haired old man kissed his wife goodbye at the front door and went briskly off to work to “teach those kids” a thing or two. The older worker became a mainstay in the fast food and grocery industry during the 1990s.

⁶Maslow's (1970) well-known hierarchy of needs clearly stresses the critical importance of social interaction once basic survival needs are achieved. The importance of the workplace in fostering a sense of belonging is a firmly established tenet of management motivational theory (Maslow et al., 1998; Stephens, 2000).

⁷Halle (1993) also notes that there are “precious few” (3.9%) photographs of non-kin in people's homes. The decimation of non-kin social ties today is discussed in the section following the family.

⁸McPherson et al. (2006) note that more highly educated people have stronger social support networks. It is not surprising, then, that minorities, particularly Hispanics and African Americans, are groups that typically have lower levels of education, and thus weaker social networks.

⁹McPherson et al. (2006) mention computer technology in fostering social bonds. They acknowledge that this may promote a wider, less localized array of weak ties, rather than the strong, tightly interconnected confidant ties that are traditionally the subject of attention. They go on to recognize that while weak ties expose people to a wider range of information, strong ties offer a wider array of support, both in normal times and in emergencies.

¹⁰Retirees are among the heaviest viewers of television. This should not be surprising since a key motivating force that drives television viewing is loneliness (Davis and Kubey, 1982; Kubey and Csikszentmihalyi, 1990).

¹¹A person often gets a sense of self from his/her master status. In industrial society, one's master status is often connected to one's job. In retirement, one no longer has a job and people often relate to what they “once” did when they were “someone” (productive).

¹²Markert (2004) uses the term bihort to demark those at either end of a 10-year cohort. This distinction recognizes that people at either end of a ten-year cohort may have different values and needs. This is certainly germane to the case in point: a bihort would recognize that some of the values/needs of those 66–70 are different from those 71–75. A cohort demarks the shared views/habits of those within a 10-year frame, much as a generation designates the shared views/habits of those that are connected by a 20-year period.

¹³This calculation is based on the first birth group (1986) entering primary schools at the age of 7 with the last birth group (2005) completing their college education at age 24 (2029).