One day last week I was trotting around a big-box store, using the Shopkick* app. I hadn’t planned to buy anything; I was there simply to rack up hundreds of points by scanning universal product codes with my phone.
Out of habit, I checked the clearance rack and saw a slightly dented can of tomato soup for 55 cents. Since winter is coming and I loves me a grilled cheese sandwich with tomato soup, I grabbed it.
The last Shopkick scans were right outside the store’s beauty section, which has its own cash register. Rather than go to the front of the store and stand in line, I asked if I could pay there.
The cashier wore one of those clear face shields to protect against the virus. She looked tired, pale and a bit stooped. As she scanned my order she said, “It’s my 73rd birthday today.”
I wished her a happy birthday and she smiled just a bit. Then I remarked that I was on my way over to visit a retired friend in her 70s, and would now tell her to get off her lazy behind and get a job.
The woman smiled again, a touch wistfully. “I can’t afford to retire.”
Boy, did I feel like a horse’s patoot. Here she was, obviously fatigued and having to stand for her entire shift, and there I was, making a clumsy joke about working in one’s 70s.
I took a closer look and she seemed older than 73. DF’s mom is 20 years older than that, but doesn’t seem“old.” Sure, she has a lot of wrinkles and is increasingly frail – 93 years will do that to a person – but she still takes both a daily walk and a lively interest in the world. Heck, she gives her great-granddaughter art lessons every week.
The cashier, on the other hand, seemed beaten-down by life. Perhaps she’d had bad luck: illness, job loss, a divorce that didn’t come out in her favor. Possibly she’d earned very little during her lifetime due to social pressures to stay home with a family and/or social mores that didn’t encourage women to seek highly skilled (or highly paid) employment. Could be she’d made bad money decisions due to a lack of financial education.
Whatever happened has left her where she is: weary, and working because she has no choice. Which is why I wanted to share her story with you. The moral of that story is simple:
Plan for retirement.
If you are very, very lucky you will grow old and start a brand-new phase of your life. But if you fail to take even a few basic steps, that phase of your life won’t be new. It will just be more of the same – only worse.
Faking normal
Why worse? Because:
Your time won’t be your own. After decades of employment (in or outside the home), it won’t be possible to enjoy the fruits of that labor. Instead you’ll either be working or looking for work while trying to make that month’s Social Security cover 30 days’ worth of living.
Health issues. Many of us fear a specific condition like COPD or cancer, but it doesn’t have to be that severe to disrupt your life. A less-than-stellar immune system might leave you susceptible to every bug that comes along. Worn-out joints could make daily living painful. A typical day might have no more than five or six hours of reasonable energy. Imagine going to work with some (or all) of that – or imagine sitting jobless at home, trying to heal yourself with limited financial resources and wondering if you can afford to stay in that home.
Your expenses could be higher. Even if you eat your Wheaties you probably won’t have the physical confidence and/or energy to do everything you used to do. Thus you might need to job out stuff like yard work, snow removal, minor repairs and housecleaning. You might buy more convenience food and/or takeout because you’re too tired to cook, or you might be on a specialized (read: expensive) diet because of those health issues. Maybe you’ll have to modify your home (wheelchair ramp, bathroom grab bars), paying out of pocket. And so on.
Same responsibilities, less energy. Probably your kids (if you have them) will be gone, but you’ll still have to deal with housework, bill-paying and all the corollary chores like shopping, laundry, cooking, pet care, and home and vehicle upkeep. Or at least to make sure they get done, which once again means paying someone. If you’re lucky, your kids or other relatives will live nearby and assist on occasion – that is, unless you’re…
Pretending everything’s fine. A lot of people are too proud to ask for help, either from family or social services. So you pretend to them (and yourself) that you enjoy being home all the time. That you love dry beans enough to eat them four or five times a week. That you don’t need to buy another bottle of ibuprofen because you don’t hurt that much (the real reason being you can’t afford it).
Plenty of people manage this way, but it isn’t much fun. And speaking of fun: no senior day at the movies or pay-what-you-can previews at local arts events, no early-bird specials with friends, no unnecessary trips because that quarter-tank of gas has to last until the next month’s Social arrives. In the words of author Elizabeth White, you’ll be “faking normal.”
Will it get any easier to save?
Sound gloomy? Sure. But for a lot of folks, it sounds like reality.
While going broke during a midlife divorce, I sometimes thought, “I can’t afford to retire, ever,” even though I had some money in a 401(k) from my newspapering days. But things got better and I started a Roth IRA, then a SEP-IRA. That 401(k) has grown in the 14 years since my divorce, too.
I’m fortunate because I like what I do. Doubly fortunate that I can work at home, where I can take a half-hour nap if I need it or take parts of days off to spend time with friends or family. Even so, I’m looking longingly at retirement because I want to spend more hours with my partner.
Because I planned, I will be able to quit some day. Not quit-quit; I expect I’ll keep writing because it’s in me to write. But I’ll be able to pick it up and put it down I feel the inclination.
The woman I met can’t afford to do that.
Maybe she likes her job some of the time: chatting with people about a new face cream or a flattering shade of lipstick, or joking around with coworkers during her breaks. But it doesn’t matter whether she likes the job. She has to do it no matter what.
Please learn from her example. If you’re in your 20s, don’t assume you’re too young to be thinking about all that. Compound interest is your new best friend.
If you’re in your 30s, don’t let life’s increasing expenses – rent or mortgage, car payments, pets, kids and the like – fool you into thinking that you can’t afford it right now but that next year you’ll definitely get started with retirement planning.
If you’re in your 40s and feel you need to keep putting the kids through school or helping out your parents, ask yourself this: Will it get any easier to save for retirement in my 50s?
Again, I don’t know what happened to that cashier. Maybe none of what happened was her fault as such. Maybe all of it was. But if she could go back in time and change her money habits, I bet she would. Especially if it meant not having to celebrate her 73rd birthday on her feet in a big-box store during a pandemic.
Readers: Got any advice to share about retirement planning, either specific or abstract?
Related reading:
- Towards a care-free retirement
- Is it ever too late to start saving?
- Challenge yourself to save (a free chapter from my first book)
* It’s very easy to use this app; I’ve earned a bunch of gift cards already. If you decide to download Shopkick, using my referral code (WIN358965) at setup is one more way of helping me keep the blog lights on.
My mother and father were very frugal. Dad died after 3 months in a nursing home, but Mom lasted 8 years. They had over $200,000 and when Mom died, there was only $600 left. Had she lingered longer, we would have been forced to put her in a state-run institution which was a horrible place. I guess what I’m saying is that no matter how hard you plan, old age gets expensive.
Oh yes, living a long life can be expensive. My point wasn’t that we can plan for every aspect. It’s that if we don’t do at least some planning, we could quite literally live to regret it.
Thanks for reading, and for leaving a comment.
SO SAD TO HEAR THAT!
A similar thing happened with my grandparents. They scrimped & saved all their lives. Renovated houses & flipped them to make more $ in their youth. Worked hard all their lives & saved for retirement. Retired debt free owning a $1 million + house & plenty of $ in the bank.
They both lived into their ‘90s and ended up needing 24/7 medical care in a private rest home. Were forced to sell their house & the medical expenses chewed through their entire Estate & they died virtually penniless. So like you said, you can plan all you like & still end up broke.
On a side note, don’t expect to inherit anything from your parents or grandparents for the same reason.
Oh & I missed the most important bit. On my last ever phone call with my nan she said, “We scrimped & saved all our lives, bought everything second hand, hoping we could leave a little bit for your mum & you. But we lived too long because we took good care of ourselves & we ended up with nothing to pass on anyway. I wish we’d lived it up & died younger & then we’d probably have also had something left over for you & your mum.”
I told her “it doesn’t matter Nan.”
But even as I said the words, I knew that it did matter to her. She died with a broken heart.
So remember. ot to be TOO frugal.
You only get one life & you deserve to live a little too.
So heartbreaking.
Thanks for today’s post. I agree that the working years do go by quickly and the savings need to start early, even when it seems impossible to put a little something by. At first, that 3-5% taken out of a paycheck seems difficult, but then it becomes the norm.
I got divorced at 33 and decided that I needed to plan to take care of myself, so I started seriously saving for retirement then. I’m very grateful that I could and did.
Thanks for sharing your own object lesson.
I got divorced at 34 and it made me a real super saver. I always was thanks to my Mom’s nearly Mennonite upbringing. I took on extra work and saved 1/3 of my income. Not easy, but doable.
I am caring for my parents who are like Marie’s. I have a lot to do for them but I don’t have to worry about supporting them financially. My husband and I are in our 50s. We have paid off our house and are now doing maintenance work so it will be in good shape when we retire. Our kids are debt free, but rent.
I think what I have learned from my parent’s experiences is to take care of your health. My mother neglected her health until it was too late. No amount of retirement savings can give her the ability to take more than a couple of steps. Once a week I order takeout food for lunch rather than brown bagging. Today I had a choice a $8 salad or a $4 fried chicken sandwich. I choose the salad. I hope I can get off work an hour early to walk. When I walk, my cadence will be, I am not my mother…
Why is it that in places like Britain, cashiers have chairs to sit on so they don’t have to stand for hours on end? I think about that every single time I go to Safeway. That is tough work, no matter what your age, but I cannot fathom having to do it in my 70s. I worked on the North Slope during the pipeline. I was in my early 20s and had guys 60 plus working as laborers. It was hard work at 60 below and 120 below wind chill some days. Brutal and I cannot believe it was by choice. Hope for the best, plan for the worst has always been my motto, even from a young age.
“Hope for the best, plan for the worst…”
“…and don’t be surprised by anything in between.”
That’s my motto. And it beats me why cashiers aren’t allowed to sit down. I feel bad for them.
Aldi’s allows their cashiers to sit and they seem to work much faster…I really enjoy your articles, I have been following you since your MSN days. It feels like I’m talking to a good friend.
Wish we had an Aldi up here.
And thank you for your kind words. I appreciate your sticking with me.
My advice regarding to retirement is an old cliche: pay yourself first.
Also take care of your health and get a physical at least once a year.
A 401K with or without a company match is a great way to ensure a cushion to supplement any Social Security or defined pension you may get through your employer. Since pensions are rare, it’s great to have income above a potential Social Security check.
My husband and I did without a lot to ensure a comfortable retirement. We drove old car. We had old furniture. I bought my clothes from Thrift Stores.
Fast forward to now: my husband’s biggest worry currently is what day to quit his job at 60 years old.
I like your motto. “Hope for the best, plan for the worst…”
“…and don’t be surprised by anything in between.”
Life, summarized.
Reading your blog posts continues to be a blessing during these difficult times. Thank you for continuing to post your wisdom to share with us.
Thanks for your kind words, and for sticking with me all these years.
I started retirement savings at 40, when our younger child started school and we no longer had day-care expenses. I started with $40 a month, because I wasn’t sure we could get along if I saved $50 a month. I made sure to raise that amount every year and increased it even more with any raise that came along. I am now 70, widowed (7 years ago), and retired. I have a very comfortable retirement with the money my husband and I saved over the years and with my social security. We lived fairly frugally all our married life and I still live frugally, but not uncomfortably so. My present self thanks my former self (and my late husband) for those savings.
The other thing I did was start our children on retirement savings as soon as they had part-time jobs. I taught them about savings and matched whatever they saved in a Roth IRA each year until they started full-time jobs. By then, they were in the habit of retirement savings and it was just natural for them to continue with IRA’s or 401K’s.I consider this one of my successes of parenting.
I consider it a success, too. Well done!
Well said!
My mother might have been like that lady, except she had a stroke when she was 71 and was paralyzed on one side. Even then, my parents refused to meet with the elder financial planner I got for them. My father died a couple years after my mother’s stroke, worn out caring for her, and now my mother is upset that she lives in a nursing home on Medicaid and has $50 a month to herself.
It’s just maddening when older adults won’t listen, and they’re not incompetent so there’s nothing you can do.
That sounds terribly difficult. I’m sorry this is happening to your family. And you’re right: You can’t force an adult to do anything. We can only take object lessons from it.
I was irritated by “making bad money decisions because of bad financial education.” Both my brother and I had the worst financial education from our parents, and we both became very thrifty. It is not that hard to understand that you should spend less than you earn. In my twenties I took myself to the library and would peruse the personal finance books. I think people should take personal responsibility for their own choices and education.
I didn’t say that people who had bad financial education always make bad decisions. But it happens.
Sometimes it just takes a person longer and with others, they just do not want to learn. I had two that spent like crazy (siblings) and myself and one brother that were very careful with money. Guess who did well and who did not.
I agree.
That poor woman.
She’s living my nightmare.
But… I’m retiring in 9 weeks at 57 years of age. I’m so glad I’ll have time to call my own – for the first time in my life.
My dad was, and still is, a great teacher of frugality but also enjoying life. He taught us financial skills which included suffering the consequences of poor decisions; he was and is our greatest cheerleader. My husband and I have tried our best to pass along these skills to our adult children and it seems to be sticking, so far so good!
In all fairness, our priorities change according to our season of life.
I asked a smart, beautiful, educated twenty-three-year-old what she would do with a $5000 windfall.
Her answer shocked and depressed me: Boob job
But then I started thinking about foolish things I’d spent money on in my 20’s. And about the pressures that social media puts on young people. And the fact that she’s working full-time and has no dependents — It must seem like the money tree will keep producing abundantly. And I’m sure her work environment (lots of millennials) plays a part.
I just hope that she (and her friends, for good measure) wake up soon and realize that an emergency fund is a better use for a windfall than a boob job would be!
If people only understood that living frugally does not equal deprivation, we would all be better off. My parents retired at 55 and 51 completely debt free. They were very conservative spenders, learning in their 20s that things didn’t make them happy. I’m hoping to retire by the time my youngest graduates high school in 2 years and am currently evaluating every money decision with that goal in mind. We aren’t wealthy but we’re make strides in the right direction and it might take some effort to achieve these goals but it’s so worth it.
That’s my theme song: Frugality does not equate a life of joyless lack.
I’m hoping that the current unpleasantness will help people realize this. However, I’m not holding my breath.
Thanks for sharing your own good examples.
People seem to cut back during hard times and then when the economy does well, up goes the spending again. If they would only learn that a prospering economy gives them more of an opportunity to save/invest and spend wisely.
This. All this. I’m old enough to have seen multiple recessions/economic slowdowns and I’ve said, more than once, “Have we learned nothing?!?”
2 years ago I dropped the term of my mortgage from 28 1/2 years to 20 years (I live in NZ so you can drop the term with no penalty when you refix your mortgage rate) and I put a calendar note in my phone to my future self that literally said “well Future self was it worth the struggle of dropping the term and increasing your payments” and it was! I underestimated how much the me of right now would be grateful to past me for making a positive financial decision.
So I just dropped my mortgage term again AND increased my retirement allocation and I have another note to “future self” as a reminder to be gracious to past me !
I like the cut of your jib, ma’am.
I made that decision today. I “should” be okay for retirement. But…I’m an only child with an elderly mother who cannot drive…in a small town with no services.
After the Covid crisis, I took a job at Dollar Tree stocking shelves early morning (5-10). Ok, I’m in reasonable shape. Because I show up everyday and am reasonably competent, I ended up working five shifts a week instead on two or three. The grind was taking a toll on me mentally and physically so I decided to clean houses instead and gave two weeks notice. I can at least control my time and destiny a bit.
Until this morning, I was trying to dig large, heavy boxes out of a pile to stock from a extremely over-packed stockroom. The bottom of the boxes I needed to get to were about 7 feet up… and a whole bunch came tumbling down. Two weeks or not….I walked out and I’m done.
So what does all that do with the story? We hired a woman who appears to be in her 60’s to stock recently. She is retired but needs to make some extra cash for some repairs. I don’t think she’s married and drives an older sedan. In other words, she has to go back to work. What if that pile had come down on her? She needs the money. She lacks the choice. While my finances are a little thin right now day to day, I will manage for the time being to help my mother. This gal isn’t as fortunate.
I walked by some mirrors in a store the other day all dressed up in my dirty stocker’s uniform. (Its less gas to go after work then drive another 30 miles round trip) I was tired and sore from five hours and stocking 75-80 boxes of merchandise. And for a moment, I looked just like my co-worker…worn and struggling.
I’m done….I’m not going to be her.
I left out the part that mother’s had nearly 40 appointments for doctors and physical therapy over the last couple of months….not very easy to work a “regular job” around it.
Wow. That all sounds very physically and emotionally stressful. I hope you can find time to heal, in and around caring for your mom and getting her to appointments.
Thanks for sharing your story.
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I’d also add that saving for retirement doesn’t just benefit you when you’re in your 60s or 70s. If you start in your 20s, even with a modest percentage of your income (say, 5%), by the time you’re 50 or 55, you’ll have a significant amount of savings. Even if you can’t afford to retire, the stress level comes waaaay down because you’ll at least have a solid safety net under you.
I’m 50 and am now able to contemplate quitting my job and moving to a cheaper area and starting a different chapter of my life (without needing a jor or only needing a modest part time one) because I got serious about paying off debt and saving at 26. If I do quit, it still won’t be an easy choice, but it’s one I couldn’t have even contemplated if I hadn’t gotten serious about my money in my 20s.
Interesting post…arrived via link from Elizabeth White whom I discovered via NPR (TED Talks)this morning.
I’m a 64y-o big box worker, in my case, a well respected Texas grocery chain that pays benefits to p-t workers. My wife is retired and we both take SS. I’ve been able to save all my raises since starting 4 years ago so my take home pay has stayed the same. They promoted me to full-time so now my savings(401k) exceeds my take home pay. The main point for us is the saving is easier if it’s automatic, plus the early withdrawal penalties are enormous (income tax, SS excess income, etc). I do get the additional benefit of exercise (5-7 miles a shift) plus since I work in the garden center I’m outside doing what enjoy, caring for plants. We spent 35 years enduring poor money management and now we’ve eliminated debt and are saving. Late in career but it can happen.
Very glad that the two of you got control of your cash. Thanks for sharing this story.
Late to the “party,” but here goes: no one should have to live like that cashier does, regardless of whether it was or wasn’t “her fault,” as to why she can’t afford to retire. Everyone should be able to afford to retire at age 62, or 70, at the latest, and not starve or go broke. SS should be given to all who need it and reduced for those who don’t need it as much. Health care should be government run and 100% free. Rent assistance should be dramatically increased. Lawyers for tenants who are poor should be free. There’s so many things that could be down to help that lady and the countless people like her, but the will to do them is not there. Too many judge too much. That is my take. Also, we revere wealth and scorn those who struggle. If they are addicted, we blame them. All this and more are why old age becomes a nightmare for so many, with death their only true escape. And we let it happen because we are doing ok even if they are not.