Baby Boomers Don't Deserve Retirement?

Your post has such a "loaded" question at the end... Is it really possible for any intelligent person to answer, "No, boomers don't deserve to retire. They should spend their golden years flipping burgers until they die either of natural causes or high cholesterol."

Boomers aren't more or less "deserving" than anyone else. But they do have two big problems.

First of all, the primary safety net for retirees (Social Security) was not designed to accommodate the huge demographic boom-followed-by-bust that happened in the 50s and 60s. Kind of like the Titanic being designed with too few lifeboats because nobody anticipated it would hit an iceberg. You can blame the designers if you want, but hindsight is always 20/20.

Second, during the boomers' lifetime, the economy has become a much less friendly place to working Americans. Outsourcing, downsizing, de-industrialization, and a mass influx of cheap labor from Third World countries have all taken their toll. Younger workers are already building their life strategies around the harsh new realities. But for many boomers, the realization comes too late. If you've already put in 25 years at a big corporation in hopes of retiring with a nice pension and a gold watch, you can't re-plan a career that is already 2/3 over.

Boomers need to do more to gain enough political clout to ensure that they don't get the short end of the stick when they're ready to retire. There aren't many groups doing much to address these issues. As far as I know, AAFR (aafr.org) is the only one, and they're only getting started.

Ken G. of IL 8:47PM August 22, 2008

Even though many people are not prepared, there will come an age at which they cannot remain employed. From there, they will continue to live----until they don't. It may be the children and the grandchildren of each of these who are even more "unprepared" (emotionally) for how this plays out.

of 3:37PM August 22, 2008