This idea makes a lot of sense, after you’ve decoupled health from age to a much greater degree than today. However, at that point I think the better idea would be “There is no longer a compelling reason for retirement or long gaps between jobs to be a matter of public expense at all, unless you’re doing it for some set of purposes the public cares about.” I think we need to normalize the idea of years-long gaps on resumes, among other things. But I don’t feel compelled to share the expense of different people’s career paths and life choices.
The reason we originally set the retirement age approximately equal to the average lifespan was to ease the burden on people planning for their own futures, so that no one had to suffer for living longer than they’d expected. The fact that we now live many years in relatively poor health near the end of our lives is a very different situation. and we’ve adapted the policy tool we had to try to cover it. The idea of retirement as a long vacation or reward for having worked 40 years is an anomaly. In the near term, we shouldn’t force people to work when they’re not able to, regardless of age, but we also maybe shouldn’t be paying living costs just because someone hits a certain age. Protests and strikes aside, I think a better solution would be to eliminate age-based pensions, and greatly expand disability-related and poverty-related social security programs to the point that everyone who outlives their ability to support themselves is still covered. If you like, phase it in gradually over the next 30 years so that anyone not near the beginning of their careers doesn’t have to worry about it. I realize this would still be a political firestorm, of course, but as noted, this is a scenario where every available option is considered unacceptable to large swaths of the population.
This idea makes a lot of sense, after you’ve decoupled health from age to a much greater degree than today. However, at that point I think the better idea would be “There is no longer a compelling reason for retirement or long gaps between jobs to be a matter of public expense at all, unless you’re doing it for some set of purposes the public cares about.” I think we need to normalize the idea of years-long gaps on resumes, among other things. But I don’t feel compelled to share the expense of different people’s career paths and life choices.
The reason we originally set the retirement age approximately equal to the average lifespan was to ease the burden on people planning for their own futures, so that no one had to suffer for living longer than they’d expected. The fact that we now live many years in relatively poor health near the end of our lives is a very different situation. and we’ve adapted the policy tool we had to try to cover it. The idea of retirement as a long vacation or reward for having worked 40 years is an anomaly. In the near term, we shouldn’t force people to work when they’re not able to, regardless of age, but we also maybe shouldn’t be paying living costs just because someone hits a certain age. Protests and strikes aside, I think a better solution would be to eliminate age-based pensions, and greatly expand disability-related and poverty-related social security programs to the point that everyone who outlives their ability to support themselves is still covered. If you like, phase it in gradually over the next 30 years so that anyone not near the beginning of their careers doesn’t have to worry about it. I realize this would still be a political firestorm, of course, but as noted, this is a scenario where every available option is considered unacceptable to large swaths of the population.