The great baby-boomer retirement wave is upon us. According to Census Bureau data, 44% of boomers are at retirement age and millions more are soon to join them. By 2030, the largest generation to enter retirement will all be older than 65.
The general assumption is that boomers will have a comfortable retirement. Coasting on their accumulated wealth from three decades as America’s dominant economic force, boomers will sail off into their golden years to sip on margaritas on cruises and luxuriate in their well-appointed homes. After all, Federal Reserve data shows that while the 56 million Americans over 65 make up just 17% of the population, they hold more than half of America’s wealth — $96.4 trillion.
But there’s a flaw in the narrative of a sunny boomer retirement: A lot of older Americans are not set up for their later years. Yes, many members of the generation are loaded, but many more are not. Like every age cohort, there’s significant wealth inequality among retirees — and it’s gotten worse in the past decade. Despite holding more than half of the nation’s wealth, many boomers don’t have enough money to cover the costs of long-term care, and 43% of 55- to 64-year-olds had no retirement savings at all in 2022. That year, 30% of people over 65 were economically insecure, meaning they made less than $27,180 for a single person. And since younger boomers are less financially prepared for retirement than their older boomer siblings, the problem is bound to get worse.
As boomers continue to age out of the workforce, it’s going to put strain on the healthcare system, government programs, and the economy. That means more young people are going to be financially responsible for their parents, more government spending will be allocated to older folks, and economic growth could slow.
Not a boomer, sorry. I’m actually capable of feeling bad for the suffering of people that I don’t identify with.
But you’re right: Texas is a shit hole and yet we can feel bad for those who don’t habitually vote for those who maintain it as a shit hole but have no ability to leave. So maybe you do understand nuance, so understand I was replying to someone telling boomers to “fuck themselves” in response to an article about how countless boomers are facing poverty as they retire. Those who are certainly weren’t benefiting from a rigged system and pulling the ladder up from under them to make sure the rest of us are screwed too. And as I replied in another comment to you, only about half of boomers actually voted for Reagan, who is absolutely the president most responsible for the ultra-capitalist hell hole we’re in today. So maybe extend some more of that empathy to other age groups that you give to geographic locations. Like I said, many of the boomers who will suffer have been screwed just as much as the rest of us, and a hell of a lot of them certainly didn’t vote for it.
Lumping anyone together with the worst members of any arbitrary demographic they belong to, even if it was a (narrow) majority, is how irrational hatred persists.