U.S. Census data indicate that by 2030, when all boomers will have hit the traditional retirement age of 65, one out of every five people in the U.S. will be of retirement age. (Photo: Shutterstock)
It should be no surprise to find that boomers are still not ready for retirement, despite the fact that 47 percent of the latest survey respondents are now retired.
That means about 34 million boomers are retired in 2019, according to the “Boomer Expectations for Retirement 2019” study from the Insured Retirement Institute, which also reports that U.S. Census data indicate that by 2030, when all boomers will have hit the traditional retirement age of 65, one out of every five people in the U.S. will be of retirement age.
But the news is not good, since this latest iteration of the study indicates that boomers are still “largely unprepared for retirement: unrealistic in their expectations, and undersaved. In fact, 45 percent have no retirement savings.”
Now here's the scary part, according to the study: Lots of respondents who do have savings either aren't aware that they need to do something to turn their savings into sustainable income or don't want to take steps to do so.
And of course younger boomers are less likely to have or to expect pension income than older boomers.
Among the study's findings are the intention of a third of boomers not to retire till age 70, if then; a third of boomers ages 67–72 have already postponed retirement; and only 23 percent of boomers ages 56–61 expect income from a private company pension plan.
In addition, 40+ percent of boomers think Medicare will cover long-term care costs (it won't); only 55 percent have any money saved for retirement; and, sadly, nearly half of the 45 percent who don't did have such savings at one time.
One truly scary statistic is that an average healthy couple aged 65 retired in 2018 could expect to spend $363,946 in lifetime Medicare and supplemental insurance premiums and out-of-pocket costs ($537,334 in future value, according to the report), and that's without considering long-term care costs. Yet someone turning 65 today, it adds, has a nearly 70 percent chance of needing some kind of LTC.
And even though they're not all that confident about how well prepared they are financially for retirement, they're more confident than they ought to be, with 41 percent of those who don't work with a financial advisor saying they're confident their retirement savings will last to age 75; that drops to 33 percent for age 80, 26 percent for age 85, 19 percent for age 90 and just 16 percent for their lifetime.
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Marlene Satter
Marlene Y. Satter has worked in and written about the financial industry for decades.
