Retirement is fictitious. Usually it is a mistake financially. Governments carry national debts. They can never and will never be paid. These debts are all too real. All governments depend on inflation to minimize these debts. Inflation is backdoor taxation and very necessary to manage these enormous national debts. We work and slave to create savings to allow financial security during "retirement". Often our preparation is inadequate. Consider also that our expenditure is not linear with age. Yes, our housing cost will be reduced along with our clothing and food costs, but our medical costs will escalate with age at an exponential rate where statistics say we will spend the majority of our lifetime medical costs in the last few years of our lives. Considering the erosion that inflation has on the value of our life savings and the financial burden of increasing medical costs, should we really retire?
We spend our entire working life waking up early in the morning with something to do. When this magical retirement thing comes around with nothing to do or place to go in the morning, the change is traumatic! Do not discount this trauma. It is real and many die because of it. So, it is safe to say that if you retire, you must have a new life with things to do and places to go. Your life depends on it.
Consider also that if you are not working, you're not making money, but with all the free time your retirement delivers, you have more time for recreation. Recreation is never for free. Do you really thing your life savings will support this extra expense?
So when retirement strikes, most of us end up working again, not at our old job but something else and usually for much less money. Be a boy scout and be prepared!
