Thread: Retirement age 'should reach 85'

Retirement age 'should reach 85'
By Paul Rincon
BBC News science reporter, St Louis

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4726300.stm

The age of retirement should be raised to 85 by 2050 because of trends in life expectancy, a US biologist has said.

Shripad Tuljapurkar of Stanford University says anti-ageing advances could raise life expectancy by a year each year over the next two decades.

That will put a strain on economies around the world if current retirement ages are maintained, he warned.

He also told a science meeting in St Louis that 50-year or 75-year mortgages may not be unusual in the future.

Dr Tuljapurkar was speaking at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting in the Missouri city.

"People are going to do things they didn't get round to in their working lives. Current institutions are really not equipped at the moment to deal with such long lives," Dr Tuljapurkar said.

"We are going to have to plan a lot more carefully, which people are not very good at."

Lifestyle trends

The Stanford researcher has been looking at relationships between historical trends in ageing, population growth and economic activity.

Based on this, he came up with a scenario in which anti-ageing technologies will increase the most common age of death by one year per year between 2010 and 2030.

Dr Tuljapurkar then applied this scenario to four countries: the US, China, Sweden and India.

In the US the cost of social security and medical care would almost double if people retired at 65
He found that his projected trends in life expectancy would have profound effects on the economy, lifestyle and population demographics.

"It might be possible to go through two mortgages, for example, or even have 50-year or 75-year mortgages," Dr Tuljapurkar explained.

In the US, the cost of social security and medical care would almost double if people retired at 65 under Tuljapurkar's scenario.

But an increase in the retirement age to 85 would bring costs down to today's levels.

However these trends would also create a "permanent underclass" of countries where opportunities for increased life expectancy were not the same as in the industrialised world.

"We can't even get retrovirals to some countries now," he told journalists.

How can an American retire if he doesn't have a job to retire from (specifically if his job went to a Tata employee in Bangalore, India, or to a H-1B, or to one of the 36.6 million H-5B amnesty recipients)?

He's just laying groundwork for our third world future in America and raising the retirement age to 85 to draw social security.

I'd like to see the good Dr. Tuljapurkar mopping floors when he's 82 for minimum wage to make those last 40 mortgage payments on a 75 year mortgage.

HA!!

And what exactly is a biologist doing spewing around about "mortgages"?

Isn't that something that Morgan Stanley or Bear Stearns might be better suited to discuss?

Folks, if we don't do something soon, our nation is going to lose its mind.

Senior citizens in the 70's and 80's have difficulty seeing, driving, walking, eating and many are staying alive taking 18 pills a day. They can take care of themselves, get to church, get to the store, babysit and have good quality of life...but to ask people of this age to be in the work force is obscene.

But that is what our generation is facing...those of US younger than the Baby Boomers.

They are getting ready to nail US big time, if WE don't nail them first.

I personally want to see the Dr.'s "papers". It's hard for me to imagine an American Citizen would make such an outlandish proposition.

Originally Posted by Coto

How can an American retire if he doesn't have a job to retire from (specifically if his job went to a Tata employee in Bangalore, India, or to a H-1B, or to one of the 36.6 million H-5B amnesty recipients)?

I suspect that the government will have arrived at a more practical way to deal with those who are "old and in the way", if you get my drift.

Otherwise, how are we going to accomodate those 10,000 to 20,000 illegals per week that break into the country?

CountFloyd...I've thought the same thing now for several months. Our seniors are in danger...especially the ones that signed up for changes in the Medicare Prescriptions.

Originally Posted by CountFloyd

Originally Posted by Coto

How can an American retire if he doesn't have a job to retire from (specifically if his job went to a Tata employee in Bangalore, India, or to a H-1B, or to one of the 36.6 million H-5B amnesty recipients)?

I suspect that the government will have arrived at a more practical way to deal with those who are "old and in the way", if you get my drift.

Otherwise, how are we going to accomodate those 10,000 to 20,000 illegals per week that break into the country?

Exactly. And I can hear the Wackident now...."it's hard work".

God Help Us.

They set a retirement age for one reason, to make sure most people will die before reaching the age, so the government keeps the dead people's retirement money.

T


-pA

Right on Guest and Welcome to ALIPAC!

It's called a Pyramid Scheme and is an illegal business in the United States.

But Alas...when has "illegal" been a problem for the US Congress or the Executive Branch or even our astute Judiciary Branch.

Let's face it, "Illegal" is in for those circles of our society.

I am a baby boomer! Yep, the scourge of the earth!
Our politicians talk about us like we are the one's that is ruining everything, not the illegals that are sucking out all of our taxes.

And who messed up S.S. anyway? Who dipped into our funds?

They want these illegals here, grant them amnesty just to fund S.S. and other things...like get union dues from them, State & Fed. taxes....etc.

I am one baby boomer that does not want S.S. funded by illegals taking other American's jobs.

The House and Senate, need to use their own funds and retirement $$, to put back into what they stole...plus stop all this foreign aid and pork, and put it in S.S.

I do think S.S. needs changed for our kid's future.....but I am just tired of they way they talk about the baby boomers!