As life expectancy rates rise and the ratio of Social Security supporters to beneficiaries shrinks, NAPA Executive Director Brian Graff says Americans are going to have to accept the truth: something needs to change about how we as a country view retirement.
Writing in the Winter 2014 issue of NAPA Net the Magazine, Graff implores political and advocacy leaders to “have a national conversation on retirement,” and to look critically at how to reform a retire-at-65 mindset that has changed little since the nascent years of Social Security. Graff writes that longer lives should also mean longer tenures in the workforce, and urges Americans to be honest with themselves about what kind of retirement, and what length, they truly are entitled to.
“As a society, does it make sense to have individuals ‘retired’ for 25%, 30%, 40% or even 50% or more of their lives,” Graff asks. “It certainly does not take a mathematical genius (or an actuary) to determine that at some point it becomes no longer economically sustainable.”
Graff acknowledges that there are plenty of unknowns about any proposal to raise the standard retirement age, and that getting Americans to willingly lower their standard of living is not an easy task. But he says the country can’t keep kicking the retirement can down the road forever, and at some point the country’s leaders will need to openly address and solve the retirement funding problems that are looming just around the corner. Right now, Graff says, even that would be a major step in the right direction.
To view Graff’s full column, click here. To view the full Winter 2014 issue, click here.
