One poll this year found that almost one in three Americans say they may never retire. The majority of the nevers said they could not afford to give up a full-time job, especially when inflation was eating into an already measly Social Security cheque. But suppose you are one of the lucky ones who can choose to step aside. Should you do it? …
But can anything truly replace the framework and buzz of being part of the action? You can have a packed diary devoid of deadlines, meetings and spreadsheets and flourish as a consumer of theatre matinees, art exhibitions and badminton lessons. Hobbies are all well and good for many. But for the extremely driven, they can feel pointless and even slightly embarrassing.
That is because there is depth in being useful. And excitement, even in significantly lower doses than are typical earlier in a career, can act as an anti-ageing serum. Whenever Mr Armani is told to retire and enjoy the fruits of his labour, he replies “absolutely not”. Instead he is clearly energised by being involved in the running of the business day to day, signing off on every design, document and figure.
Who exactly is this article being written for?
Clearly, it’s not written towards anyone working the average job. It presupposes that your job must be the most fulfilling and useful thing you could do.
It even calls out tech professionals as retiring early. But how many programmers can’t think of a more useful or fulfilling open source project to work on than what they do at their day job?
How does that work exactly? In most countries, surely you only get access to any state pension at the ever-increasing retirement age. My point being, if you are able to retire early, it's on your own dime, right?
In most systems your pension taxes are not stashed away until you retire and then handed to you. Instead your taxes are used to pay the pensions of people currently retired, with the understanding that the next generation will pay for your pension. If you stop working too early and you stop paying taxes, the system breaks down.
That said, I really don’t think that this is a real problem. The real problem is that baby boomers are now retiring in droves, turning from the major contributors of the pension system to the biggest drain, and with a population shrinkage, it’s uncertain how we’ll be able to keep funding the system.
That's all true. But then they're not really a drain, and while not paying income tax any more they're usually spending their retirement in other ways which produces tax income still.
I'd agree we have a problem though. I'm Gen X and my state retirement age is already +4 years on what it would have been. I cannot see that getting any better any time soon.
I’m Canadian too. Here’s the absolutely batshit thing. They do have it down in the states but they don’t call it Kraft Dinner. To them it’s just “Kraft Mac & Cheese”. Their boxes just say Macaroni and Cheese with a Kraft brand on top of it. They actually have to distinguish between boxed and baked mac and cheese…
The mindset of “this kind of works for us, don’t change it, even if what you have is better” is at the root of most issues with America. Healthcare or Kraft Dinner, American Exceptionalism is damaging.
Excuse me but our health care doesn’t even kinda work for us. It’s a full on disaster. The duct tape (Obamacare) is helping but before that if you lost your job after you had cancer nobody would ever insure any cancer treatments for you again.
Nobody calls it Kraft Mac and cheese. It’s just Mac and cheese. I love that you can’t fathom the lack of “Kraft” at the beginning though. Also many of us never buy that shitty ass boxed stuff. We just boil macaroni noodles and add cheese sauce. Wild, I know.
Butter flour milk and cheddar cheese in a pan makes the most delicious cheese sauce ever. If that’s sinful then send me to hell because it’s fucking delicious
It’s the early adopter problem. We invented both things so didn’t really have room to distinguish. So it’s lazy Mac and cheese vs bar Mac and cheese vs honey did you really need to buy three cheeses and make a full ass brick roux Mac and cheese
I went to Columbus a few years ago and I was surprised how every restaurant I went no matter if it was a hole in the wall or a fine dining establishment they all had a version of Mac and Cheese on their menu.
From a simple version to versions with lobster I tried them all. Years later when I was in Montreal I noticed a similar theme where they all offer their version of Poutine.
I couldn’t imagine if KD made Poutine it would taste anywhere near what I ate in Montreal just as regular KD was nothing like the stuff I ate in Columbus that week.
If the argument is which country has a better name for it, we Americans are calling it what it is, Kraft’s Mac & Cheese. It’s also served as a side dish a lot of the times, so calling it a “Dinner” implies it’s used as the main course.
It already was implemented in remote exams sooooo… As soon as society opinion is ready, and wait till musk will roll out his crazy neuralink, those of us who can’t tinker with tech are doomed indeed
And the things we find horrifying now will just be normal to the next generation. Remember when we used the term “creepshot”? The youngest adults today don’t understand what that is.
The fact that a sentence starting with “NASCAR is significantly more progressive than” can possibly make sense says a LOT about how society is going these days…
Take care of yourself my dude. Definitely not worth it, always reach for help and you’ll be surprised that people actually care! Also, therapy and probably meds, if you aren’t doing it already.
I’ve been on meds for decades my man. I’m currently going through something of a crisis: I kinda collapsed at work yesterday and walked out. Of a 8 yr "career’. Now I don’t just have my inner demons to contend with, but I also risk homelessness! Isn’t society grand?
If you collapsed probably there were lots of bad stuff accumulated over your working time, but yeah, I get that. I had a job that made me life miserable (billing department over phone), but I was afraid to quit because, you know, we have to sustain ourselves. Everything will be alright, but you’ll have to start looking for something soon, lol.
Yeah except in 1999 you could go to Sam Goody or The Warehouse or whatever, and listen to the album in the store before buying, especially if it was a new release.
Personally, I was going to the public library and checking out it CDs from there.
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