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Cause And Effect Of Baby Boomers

Decent Essays

The largest generation of baby boomer approaches the age of retirement and they are concerned about the Social Security retirement, which cause a financial challenge to the society. Baby boomers are the first generation and the majority of them is prepared to exit the workplace. From an economic perspective, baby boomers have financial stress that can have an influence on their ability to last the standard life of retirement, which is revealed through the following causes: they have insufficient retirement savings and they are burdened with unprecedented mortgage debt.
A Baby Boomer is someone who was born after the end of the Second World War between the years of 1946 to 1964 (History, 2016). In other words, it is a person who, in the postwar …show more content…

In more detail, much of their savings are tied up towards retirement due to the serious financial crisis of 2008, which means they lack of sufficient retirement funds, even basic living expenses. According to the research of Boomer Expectation for Retirement 2016, which is from the Insured Retirement Institute, illustrates that 25 % of boomers have no retirement savings and 76 percent of baby boomer generation are unconfident about whether their savings can last through retirement (Insured Retirement Institute, 2016). This appears to suggest that boomers might not be prepared for their retirement plan and that they have never tried to figure out how much they will need for retirement. Moreover, they are concerned about not being able to maintain their standard of living. For example, according to a newspaper report from Star Tribune, Judy Davis, 57, of St. Paul, who works for a nonprofit agency, discusses her difficulty of retirement, “If I had to retire I would be broke pretty soon. I could probably survive six months to a year” (Read, 2015). With this in mind, it proves that Davis still works for a nonprofit agency because she does not have any preparation for her retirement or enough money to last through her old age. Furthermore, the lack of retirement savings will reduce their standard of living. Therefore, baby boomers experience significant financial stress because of …show more content…

More specifically, boomers use a part of retirement income to pay for previous incurred debt instead of using it for their life of retirement. They also face a financial issue when they have no income in their age of retirement. According to the research of the Graying of American Debt Meta Brown, which is from Federal Reserve Bank of New York, indicates that the debt of Americans from the age of baby boomer has grown by 59% from 2003 to 2015 and per capita debt at age 65 has increased by 48% (Federal Reserve Bank of New York, 2016). This could possibly mean the old population enters retirement with mortgage debt and that the amount of their debt may continue to rise. For instance, according to a newspaper report from the Globe and Mail, Gordon Hines, 67, who is a retired math teacher, describes his willingness of looking for a new job, “I’m in more debt that I’ve ever been in, and I’m worried about it.” (McFarland, 2015). This reveals that Hines is looking for a job to cover the mortgage payment, even though he has already been retired for a few years. In addition, baby boomers do not have sufficient money to afford their retirement age and maintain their standard of retirement living. Furthermore, baby boomers who are retiring have not paid off their debt completely and they are necessarily spending their substantial amount of income on paying it back. Consequently, baby boomer

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