Boomers' unexpected ethos: Work until we drop?

Baby Boomers are not going gently into retirement, a new study suggests.

Men and women in their 50s today are much more likely than earlier groups of 50-somethings to say they will be working full-time after the traditional retirement age of 65. That is one of the findings highlighting the changing landscape of aging in America presented last week in Washington at a congressional briefing sponsored the Institute for Social Research (ISR) and the Consortium of Social Science Associations.

The presentations were based on data from the ISR Health and Retirement Study, funded by the National Institute on Aging. Started in 1992, the study surveys more than 22,000 Americans older than 50 every two years, on topics including physical and mental health, insurance coverage, financial status, family support systems, labor market status, and retirement planning.

U-M economist Robert Willis, who directs the Health and Retirement Study, addresses "Will the Boomers be working or retiring in 2010? And why do we care?" His findings, including a preliminary analysis of 2004 data, provide a window into the future on the crucial issue of whether the Boomers will retire early or late. Willis compared the work and retirement expectations of nationally representative samples of 51- to 56-year-old men and women with various educational levels surveyed in 1992, 1998 and 2004.

"Past research shows that subjective expectations tend to be fairly accurate, and that there is a strong relationship between measures of expected retirement and actual retirement," Willis says.

The new analysis provides good news for Social Security and Medicare, showing an across-the-board increase in the proportion who see their working lives lasting well into their 60s. The largest jump occurs among men with some college. In that group, 32.4 percent surveyed in 1992 expected to be working full-time after age 65, compared with 46.3 percent who were surveyed in 2004.

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