Longevity & Aging

No doubt about it: at some point we’re neither semi-retired, findependent or fully retired. We’re out there in a retirement community or retirement home, and maybe for a few years near the end of this incarnation, some time to reflect on it all in a nursing home. Our Longevity & Aging category features our own unique blog posts, as well as blog feeds from Mark Venning’s ChangeRangers.com and other experts.

Book Review: Ian Brown’s Sixty

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Sixty+Ian+BrownPerhaps it’s because we are contemporaries who went to the same college and are slightly acquainted, but my wife and I thoroughly enjoyed reading Ian Brown’s recently published memoir/diary: Sixty (Random House Canada, 2015).

While attempting to read some other book, I was constantly interrupted by the laughter Brown induced in my wife. I was soon hooked, in part because some of the names Brown drops were familiar to us.

Sixty started as a Facebook post and a declaration that Brown — a feature writer for the Globe & Mail — would be conducting a diary of his 61st year. It reads more like a personal memoir than a mere day-by-day chronicle of events, although Brown deftly does both.

Not surprising, since Brown is a skilled proponent of what is variously known as creative non-fiction or literary journalism. He has over the years been a literary journalism instructor at the Banff Centre, where we once enjoyed a pleasant dinner with him.

The angst of Boomer envy

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Retire Retirement?

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41a03oj1QIL._SX325_BO1,204,203,200_The notion of “retiring retirement” or at least the term Retirement is coming more into vogue these days as more baby boomers reach the traditional ages of the old-fashioned “full-stop” retirement.

The current edition of Bloomberg Businessweek magazine has a piece titled “Watch out, Boomers, Here Comes 70,” noting that millions of baby boomers around the world are turning 70 this year.

In the U.S. that means they will come up against the Required Minimum Distribution (RMD) rules on IRAs and 401(k)s, with many forced to pay taxes on those forced withdrawals. Canadian retirees with Registered Retirement Income Funds (RRIFs) are in a similar boat by the end of the year they turn 71. (By the way, I’m preparing a Special Report on RRIFs later this month, and welcome input from professionals with expertise here.)

Of course, the Boomers don’t appear set to leave the workforce quietly. In researching my portion of my own upcoming book (Victory Lap Retirement), I came across a 2008 book by Tamara Erickson titled Retire Retirement, subtitled Career Strategies for the Boomer Generation.

Demography favors Boomers’ third phase of work life

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How to eat Healthily without Breaking the Bank

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By Sandy Cardy

Special to the Financial Independence Hub

The price of groceries is on the rise again. However, there are ways you can limit the amount of money you spend when it comes time to grocery shop.

During the holiday season, I wrote an article about over-consumption – the gist being that the over-consumption of credit can leave us with debt troubles and how over-consumption of the wrong foods can leave us with harmful health debt.

There’s a general consensus that it costs too much money to eat healthily all the time. While it’s true that natural food products can be quite expensive, especially if you eat gluten-free or vegan packaged foods, there are ways to stretch your dollar at the grocery store.

The rising cost of groceries has made headlines again; in 2015 the average Canadian household spent about $325 more on food and is expected to spend an extra $345 in 2016, according to the University of Guelph’s Food Institute.

Meat and produce are expected to see the biggest price jump, with meat seeing a 4.5 per cent increase and fruits and vegetables rising between 4 and 4.5 per cent this year.

There’s good news though! Eating healthy doesn’t have to come with a hefty price tag. By stocking up your pantry on a variety of everyday superfoods and pairing them with fresh ingredients, dinners to feed the family can cost you less.

Stock Your Pantry Continue Reading…

Let’s tackle Ageism, not quibble about Age: OAS Eligibility to move back to 65 from 67

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lisataylor
Lisa Taylor

By Lisa Taylor, ChallengeFactory.ca

Special to the Financial Independence Hub

In this week’s federal budget, the Liberal Government will announce that they are returning the eligibility age for OAS back to 65. In recent years, the previous Conservative government had shifted the eligibility age to 67, mirroring moves in many other countries.

Since Prime Minister Trudeau declared this intention, first in the federal campaign and then in this recent Bloomberg News interview, I’ve been asked by many to react.

Most assume that Challenge Factory, with its focus on workforce engagement for people in their 50s, 60s, 70s and beyond would resist this change to lower in effect Canada’s “retirement” age.

Whether the age of eligibility is set at 65 or 67 or 71 is irrelevant if the government doesn’t also take steps to foster the older workers and the intergenerational workforce. Eligibility does not necessarily correlate to when Canadians will choose to leave the workforce and the danger in this new announcement is that the headline remains focused on age 65 as a targeted age for people to make their exit.

We are optimistic that this move marks the beginning of new and beneficial discussions about ageism, aging and the workforce.

New definition needed for the word “retirement”

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Financials, across our Life Course: Financial Gerontology Part 3

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fusionBy Marie Howes & Suzanne Cook, PlanetLongevity.com 

Special to the Financial Independence Hub

Financial planning. Financial security. Financial literacy. Financial gerontology. Is it any wonder there is confusion with all this terminology floating in our heads? Not to forget the fusion.
As we complete our current series on this subject, maybe it’s not a coincidence that we are now entering the annual income tax season in Canada.You can count on a barrage of advertising and news editorials to start any time now, reminding consumers about their retirement plan contributions and other related financial considerations. Turning our concern to personal financials however, should not be a once a year high anxiety moment; nor is it strictly a retirement discussion. Attention to financials issues cuts across our life course.
As a financial planning consultant, Marie says in part one of this series (Nov.30, 2015), personal financial planning is the process of helping individuals and families to use their income and assets to be meet their life goals now and in the future. In that same post, as the researcher and social gerontologist, Suzanne adds that economic and financial issues are important in people’s lives on the journey of aging, but they are also important as public policy issues.
Financial gerontology – public policy issue
Marie Howes (1)
Marie Howes

Sticking with this term financial gerontology, Marie picks up here by saying that in the macro sense it is an urgent public policy issue.

Financial gerontology should become the study of aging and the implementation of measures that will meet the needs of Canadas’ aging demographic. For example, financial, psychological, and general health planning to encompass all citizens from native peoples to immigrant and ethnic communities. The risk is that it will become yet another means of marketing financial products.The problems associated with an aging demographic are not confined to governments to solve.
To be sure, there are roles for all levels of government, but there are also roles for dedicated private groups and for individuals and families. Older adults must also be part of finding their own solutions.Since we have scarce resources, what is the best use of public monies to meet the unique needs of an aging population?
Given the shift and size of aging demographics, it would be very easy to allocate too many scarce resources to satisfying the needs of the aged at the expense of younger people. For example, reducing education funding for younger taxpayers. In consideration of how to determine the best use of these public resources for everyone, would it not be more beneficial that we have a creative inter-generational dialogue?
If financial gerontology is a society-wide, broadly based approach to the costs of aging, then personal financial planning is the specifically focused approach to an individual’s finances – whether they are young or old.Improving public awareness of how these two professional fields work, (both separately and in fusion), is the challenge, and worth repeating, says Suzanne – financial and economic issues, such as low-income seniors, pension plans and retirement savings are gerontological issues, and they are important personal and public policy issues. Financial security is important for quality of life, and this cuts across our entire life course. However, quality of life goes beyond financial considerations. 

Financial & gerontological collaborations

So how do we square the circle around the potential good coming from financial & gerontological collaborations? Let’s go back to the American Institute for Financial Gerontology and their aim to educate a Registered Financial Gerontologist (RFG) on how to “deliver financial solutions in a comprehensive manner with increased knowledge of the older client’s broad based needs.”

suzanne.cook
Suzanne Cook

There is one significant difference where we say, Suzanne suggests, develop innovative ways on how to better serve “unique needs”, as opposed to deliver solutions to “broad based needs”. Terminology again. When you serve, you determine needs and respond; it is person focused. When you deliver solutions, you provide a product.

So is it possible to effectively combine Financial + Gerontology for older adults; or is it better that two different specialists are required for older client’s broad based needs?
From Marie’s viewpoint as a financial planning consulting – good advisors keep themselves up to date on developments in the financial world, and on general issues of aging, from senior housing to risk prevention in public and private spaces.

But the financial advisor is not in a position to give comprehensive advice about such things as behavioural issues, or health impacts on communities. The gerontologist can offer good background information to the financial advisor, just as the financial planner can offer realistic advice on basic financial issues for the benefit of the gerontologist.

We live in a world of specialization – mainly because there is so much knowledge out there that we cannot be effective if we try to offer services beyond our competency. Keeping up with our own specialties is a full time job!

We are also in the world of collaboration! That is the joy of thinking and writing this series together.

Marie Howes, PRP is a financial planning consultant, writer and commentator. She has a special interest in the effects of public policies on seniors, particularly in healthcare funding and delivery, and in the regulation of financial and investment advisors which can best protect aging consumers. Marie is a panelist on Planet Longevity -“Forward Thinking on Aging Issues” www.planetlongevity.com

 Suzanne Cook, PhD, is a social gerontologist and researcher with a strong belief that longer life spans require a new vision of aging. Her business, Carpe Vitam, links lifelong learning with healthy aging to develop innovative programs and policies for organizations. Suzanne is a panelist on Planet Longevity -“Forward Thinking on Aging Issues” www.planetlongevity.com