Faced with bills to pay, including food and health insurance, millions of Americans are working into old age because they cannot afford to retire early.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, In the next ten years, the number of people who are older than 75 years and still working is expected to increase by 96.5 percent and their labor participation rate is projected to rise to 11.7 percent by 2030 from 8.9 percent in 2020, a rate that has consistently increased from 4.7 percent in 1996.
If this trend continues, more old people will work into their old age. The population of old people from age 65 and older in the United States is expected to rise by almost 30 million in 2040 to 80.8 from 54.1 million in 2019.
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In the wake of the pandemic, the number of people who retired was two million more than expected. 50.3% of US adults ages 55 and older said they were out of the labor force due to retirement in the third quarter of 2021, compared to 48.1% in the third quarter of 2019, according to an analysis by Pew Research Center.
Since the year 2000 less American families are participating in retirement plans. Almost half of the families in the U.S. have no retirement savings at all. About 15 million adults who are over 65 years are economically insecure with incomes below 200 percent of the federal poverty line. Black and Hispanic women over the age of 65 are more likely to live in poverty.
“I have no savings, no assets, I don’t even own the home I’ve been renting for 15 years,” Dr. Lisa Natale, 65, a chiropractor in Hawaii who put herself through school as a single mother told The Guardian. “There’s no way I could afford to retire.”
Even with a social security monthly benefit of $1,543 and an adjusted increase cost of living of 5.9 percent for 2022, millions of Americans still can’t retire.
