Baby Boomers delaying retirement is not news to the Baby Boomer Generation. With the economic downturn we have also seen a dramatic down turn on our 401Ks. What was once our retirement income is now gone.  Throughout our  baby boomer years in the workforce we have been encouraged to invest in the 401Ks and our own private investments.  This was to be our saving grace from company retirement pensions. This has proved to be a bad retirement plan according to most of the boomers that I know. We know see no retirement in our near future.

So many baby boomers delaying retirement have lost all their retirement money in the market do to the Bernie Madoff’s $50 Billion Ponzi Scheme. I have friends and relatives that have lost all their savings since the scandal of Bernie Madoff.  Many of these baby boomers were already in retirement and have had to get back into the workforce just to survive. These boomers now have no retirement funds and see no retirement in their future at all.

Baby Boomers are delaying retirement also because of the need to support the family group. With the high unemployment and stall of economic growth, baby boomers are now finding them selves supporting there grow children who have become unemployed or cannot find jobs suitable to replace their lost income. Also Social Security for boomers parents have canceled a cost of living raise for this population. This leaves more financial burden on the working baby boomer generation to help in financial assistance for their parents.

The boomer news I am hearing is that most of us will be working an extra 10 years just to recoup from this crises. Thank goodness boomer health is much stronger than it was in past generations for we are going to need it to keep working.  There isn’t going to be any rocking chair lifestyle for us in the near future.

Baby boomers delaying retirement is just bad news for the structure of our economy. Baby boomer years of extra work in the workforce means the younger generation finding it harder to replace these workers. This seems to be a catch 22 and one that seems to have little resolve. The baby boomer generation and there big spending has slowed the economy as well. The baby boomer generation known for their big spending and philosophy of like for today and let tomorrow take care of itself has made a big shift to tightening spending and worry more about today taking care of tomorrow.  We as a group have never quite had to re-invent ourselves in such a fashion and I am sure we as the baby boomer generation will finally have to grow up and be more responsible.