Posted on 12/17/2004 12:15:42 PM PST by Constitutionalist Conservative
Try this on for size. You’re seventy five years old. You live in the comfy home you’ve always lived in. You play golf in good weather. In bad weather, you travel to where it’s warm and sunny. When your grandchildren call, you take them out on the lake in your new boat. Your wife takes classes in the local college and paints. This is your life in retirement and it’s everything you always hoped and dreamed it would be.
Or, try this scenario: you are seventy-five years old. You live in a tiny apartment with the smell of boiled cabbage and noisy neighbors all around. You live in a scary neighborhood and you dare not go out after dark. Eating at restaurants is just a dream. Your apartment is too small to have your kids or grand kids visit. If you get sick and you have to spend time in nursing care, you don’t know how you’ll afford it. Your life is pure fear.
The fact is that if you are a baby boomer, one of the 77 million racing towards retirement, you have -- to a large extent--your choice of which of these retirement outcomes is yours. You get the good outcome or something like it if you start early, get a sensible, solid financial advisor, make a solid sensible plan for retirement savings, stick to it through thick and thin, accumulate diversified savings of stocks, mutual funds, bonds, real estate, variable annuities and foreign investments. You should accumulate an amount equal to roughly fifteen to twenty times what you need annually to live on–with allowances for pensions and social security. It’s a tall order, and it’s a bit scary to think about, but if you even come close to it, you get to have that great retirement life.
The point is, making sure you have a swell retirement is up to you. Not to Uncle Sam, usually not to your employer, not to your kids. You have to max out your IRA’s, your Keoghs, your 401K’s and do it sensibly, and then some. And you have to start with that all important plan.
Or, you can just be the happy go lucky grasshopper in your working years, not think about retirement, and then later, you get to live in terror. Which sounds better to you? I thought so. No matter how old you are, get started now and do the best you can.
Oh, you should know I am honorary spokesperson for National Retirement Planning Week. And, yes, I get paid for preaching to you. But your doctor also gets paid to tell you to stop smoking and eat green leafy vegetables. That doesn’t make us wrong.
Bueller?...Bueller?....Good post, Ben Stein is a smart guy.
Or you can Win Ben Stein's Money!
My husband and I discussed this subject quite a lot since we started having children 6 years ago. What we have ultimately decided to do is save for retirement, rather than for college funds. Our boys will have to learn that good grades and hard work will take them where they want to go, not Mom and Dad's money. That being said, we will certainly pony up cash for trips home, and even transportation and living expenses (to an extent) especially while they live in the dorms. By the same token, we don't expect them to take care of us in our old age.
Call us harsh, but this is what we have decided to do. We can't get academic scholarships to fund our retirement, and by the time we retire, SS benefits will only be a fond memory.
I think this is a little extreme. Why kill yourself saving for retirement. I can't see myself traveling the world in a wheelchair. I would rather enjoy my youth and retire comfortably. It should not be a matter of dying with a pile of money in the bank. I plan on breaking even when I die.
He seems to be very reasonable, I find I can do it on even less but I have no property or boat. I do have a nice trailer and tow vehicle, and go to warm places in the winter and nice places in the summer. thanks Ben
I couldn't agree with your plan more. It is my plan also.
Great minds, LOL.
How old are you?
The problem with planning a break even death is that you don't have a drop dead date to plan for.
That sounds like fun! Mr. Ex and I have talked about getting one of those outrageously expensive RV's and travelling around the country when we retire, for as long as our health will permit.
We'll keep our house (that we plan to buy very soon! yay) after it's paid off, and make necessary accomodations, rather than sell. That way, we can have our cake, and eat it too. :)
Guess you don't live in a state that forces you to contribute to your kids' college education, whether you can afford it or not.
My kids can have a car if they get a full ride scholarship. If they don't get one, I will only pay for community college for 2 years. So far, 75% of my kids are on track for the car.
Not to my knowledge. I wasn't even aware there was such a thing.
and happy hanukkah
That's not a bad plan, either! LOL
We are doing the same for our grandson....you might want to look into Paul Merriman's "Crummy Trust".....he's got a plan with annuities for his grandchild that takes $10,000 does what you are planning....we've debated whether to do this or stocks, but this way the grandson cannot get his hands on the money until later, unlike other methods, AND, you don't have to MANAGE, or pay OTHERS to manage it. Just a suggestion.
Medicare in New York is bankrupting cities in New York NOW, not in 10-20 years. The fact is, how many seniors have a pension and savings to afford paying a $1,000+ a month for housing (even if your home is paid off in 30 years your taxes will grow enough in 30 years to equal what your mortgage payment is now), $100-200 a month for medicine, 300-400 a month for healthcare supplements, not to forget food, gas etc.
The fact is, this country will soon be crippled financing seniors because seniors think someone else owes them.
Hmmm...that sounds interesting. Worth a look-see, anyway. Thanks for sharing!
Merry Christmas.
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