Tag Archives: Financial Independence

Today’s retirement reality

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MarieEngen
Marie Engen, Boomer & Echo

By Marie Engen, Boomer & Echo

Special to the Financial Independence Hub

We all like to compare ourselves with our peers to see how we measure up to everyone else.

Here are some retirement statistics from the most recent Canadian Census, Statistics Canada and various surveys.

Age statistics

  • In Canada in 2014 the average age was 58.
  • The baby boom demographic, representing those born between 1946 and 1966, represents 30% of the population.
  • Within 10 years, those age 55 and over will outnumber children.
  • One in seven Canadians are now elderly and two thirds of the very elderly are women.
  • Average life expectancy is 82.5 years for women and 77.7 years for men.

Retirement statistics

  • 7% of Canadians aged 55 and over had already retired once. Of this group, 17% returned to work.
  • 48% returned to some form of work for financial reasons. The others had new, interesting job offers.
  • 23% retired initially due to personal and family responsibilities or care giving.
  • 8% retired initially due to personal health concerns.
  • 6% retired because they qualified for full pension benefits.

Continue Reading…

We may be saving enough, yet still not be ready for retirement

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Lisa Taylor

By Lisa Taylor, Challenge Factory

Special to the Financial Independence Hub

Recently, Malcolm Hamilton’s C.D. Howe Institute paper, Do Canadians Save Too Little?, challenged the prevailing view that Canadians are not financially prepared for retirement. His Financial Post column summarized the key findings of his paper and highlighted that many of the assumptions made about retirement are not accurate. Canadians are saving and the determination of how much saving is enough is dependent on many non-financial factors. [See also the Hub’s blog on this: JC]

Indeed, the question of “retirement readiness” is more complicated than calculations predicting financial security.

Meaning of “Retirement” has changed

Retirement has changed. Every formal definition of the verb “to retire” focuses on retreat, withdrawal and conclusion. The original meaning of the word included a complete withdrawal from work, a focus on rest or seclusion, a retreat from battle or the time to go to bed. We retire equipment when it is taken out of service. We retire a bond by taking it out of circulation. Continue Reading…

Retirement Reflections Entering our 25th year of Financial Independence

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Billy and Akaisha Kaderli

By Billy and Akaisha Kaderli

Special to the Financial Independence Hub

In January we began our 25th year of Financial Independence. Few people can say they have 24 years of self-funded retirement by age of 62, and have a higher net worth after spending and inflation than when they started. This is something of which we are quite proud.

As we have aged one thing we have learned is that the long term is getting shorter every day. Life is to be enjoyed now, not someday – the older we get, the more we appreciate that view. Life is continuously full of opportunities and we want to take them.

Opportunities abound

retirement_reflections7For example, last year we were approached by a startup company that sponsored us for several months in Saigon, Vietnam. Continue Reading…

5.8 million working Canadians will see 20% drop in income in Retirement

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benjamin-tal
Benjamin Tal (CIBC)

Almost 6-million working Canadians risk losing the “retirement of their dreams,” according to a CIBC report getting lots of attention today at the Globe & Mail website. CIBC deputy chief economist Benjamin Tal (pictured) says some 5.8 million working-age Canadians will suffer at least a 20% drop in their standard of living once they leave the full-time work force.

The short article is listed as one of the most popular today on the site and has attracted dozens of comments and social media mentions.

Stop me if you think you’ve heard this before but it seems the bank believes the country’s retirement system needs to be reformed as quickly as possible. The most recent move in this direction came from an apparent about-face by the Conservative Government, whose apparent refusal to consider an expanded or “Big” CPP motivated the Ontario government to launch a new retirement system of its own, the ORPP or Ontario Retirement Pension Plan. Then last week, Finance Minister Joe Oliver floated a trial balloon for a “voluntary” expansion of the CPP, which the Hub reprised on the weekend.

Younger middle-income workers with no DB plans at risk

Mr. Tal told the Globe that “it’s not just CPP,” but expressed concern that Canadians still aren’t saving enough money. While many Canadians close to the traditional retirement age of 65 are “on a path to the retirement of their dreams,” Tal’s data also shows millions others, especially younger workers in the middle-income brackets, “are headed for a steep decline in living standards in the decades ahead.”

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Conscious Clients don’t put Retirement plans at Risk

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dougdahmer
Doug Dahmer

By Doug Dahmer, Emeritus Retirement Income Specialists

Special to the Financial Independence Hub

One of the most exciting and rewarding aspects of my job is working with my clients as they learn what I call ‘Conscious living.’ It’s a skill that has tremendous impact on their quality of life and their retirement plan.

My ‘Conscious’ clients have a retirement plan and clearly defined goals. They know what they want to do, when they want to do them and how big they want to do them. They also have the tools to explore the implication of each financial decision or potential alteration to their plan. And they understand the future impact that an ill-considered, near-term expenditure will create – in most cases putting some element of their goals and retirement plan at risk. Continue Reading…