CAN I EVER RETIRE?

The first question posed in the last posting was,"when could you reasonably retire?" You’ve had plenty of time to think this over, and I’m guessing that many of you have already come up with the obvious answers, one of which is not soon, if ever.
Very many of the baby boom generation have lived their lives spending all the money they have on hand at any one time, and that involves living from one paycheck to another. And frankly, for most it has been a pretty good life! Unfortunately, this lifestyle has not included saving for the proverbial rainy day or investing for future income. So now what?
As the hints mount up that a person will not usually be able to work on until the day they die, this requires some serious thinking about what else you can do once you cannot continue to work. The first place a person usually looks to for income when they can no longer work is to their social security payments. If you can wait and work until age 70, you get bigger payments from social security, but you probably also collect for a shorter period of time. Whatever, most people find it impossible to live only on income from social security payments. You definitely need some additional source of income besides social security, as the social security program was never meant to be a sole income source.
If you do not have savings or investments to supplement your social security income, and are still healthy enough to work, at least part time, what do you do? Well of course, either you try to continue working part time at a job which you already know how to do, or you look into training for new work. Such training is available in various places, but you need to realize that many programs are aimed at the young who will seek full time jobs or professions. This impacts your ability to participate in the class in the first place, as well as having a learning environment that is appropriate for your purposes.
One way to experiment with possible part time employment is to do some volunteering in the field that interests you. There are tons of volunteer programs available, and your computer can help you find one that fits your needs. You should also consider talking to those who are still working who are a bit older than you are, to find out just how they hooked up with part time work. Here too, your computer will be helpful, as there are blogs and chat rooms and all kinds of sites where this very topic is being discussed. One thing you want to be conscious about in all this is making sure you do not take on jobs that require more than you can or want to do at this point in your life.

So, does all this mean you cannot ever retire?  And the answer is probably not comfortably, unless you win the lottery, or figure out some other way to add to your social security income.  We will be thinking about all that in the next posts.