February 2008
Retire right
In a surprising new survey, 6,700 retired readers share their dos and don'ts
Illustration by Carl Wiens
What's the secret to a successful retirement? Our retired readers turned out to be a good group to ask. In a recent survey,
a stunning 93 percent of them told us they were satisfied overall with their retirement, with 32 percent saying they were
completely satisfied. Forty-one percent said retirement had actually been better than they expected. Only 5 percent said it
had been worse.
If there was one widely shared regret, it was that they didn't have even more money to enjoy themselves. About 35 percent told us that, looking back, they wished they'd started saving earlier, and 30 percent said they would have put away more each year. Eight percent said they should have retired earlier, but the same percentage wished they had done it later. More than a third, when asked about their regrets and given a list to choose from, checked the box for "None of the above."
The Consumer Reports National Research Center surveyed 17,877 subscribers to ConsumerReports.org, ages 55 to 75. Some told us they were fully retired, some semi-retired, and others still working full-time in their main career.
Most of the retirees could probably have stayed in the workforce longer and piled up more savings had they chosen to do so. A third retired between the ages of 55 and 59, and another 38 percent between 60 and 64. Only 18 percent waited until 65 or later. The median age at which the group had retired was 60.
The group that was still working full-time expected to retire later. Forty-eight percent of that group told us they planned to retire between 65 and 69, with 14 percent saying they expected to wait until age 70 or later. That jibes with other research showing that today's workers expect to retire later, either because they enjoy what they do or simply because they can't afford to stop doing it.
For this report we focused our analysis on the 6,723 readers in the retired group. To be sure, our retired readers might not be representative of the U.S. population as a whole. For example, they are likely to be somewhat better educated and more affluent than the average American. However, they're apt to be a lot like other Consumer Reports readers. In other words, you.
If there was one widely shared regret, it was that they didn't have even more money to enjoy themselves. About 35 percent told us that, looking back, they wished they'd started saving earlier, and 30 percent said they would have put away more each year. Eight percent said they should have retired earlier, but the same percentage wished they had done it later. More than a third, when asked about their regrets and given a list to choose from, checked the box for "None of the above."
The Consumer Reports National Research Center surveyed 17,877 subscribers to ConsumerReports.org, ages 55 to 75. Some told us they were fully retired, some semi-retired, and others still working full-time in their main career.
Most of the retirees could probably have stayed in the workforce longer and piled up more savings had they chosen to do so. A third retired between the ages of 55 and 59, and another 38 percent between 60 and 64. Only 18 percent waited until 65 or later. The median age at which the group had retired was 60.
The group that was still working full-time expected to retire later. Forty-eight percent of that group told us they planned to retire between 65 and 69, with 14 percent saying they expected to wait until age 70 or later. That jibes with other research showing that today's workers expect to retire later, either because they enjoy what they do or simply because they can't afford to stop doing it.
For this report we focused our analysis on the 6,723 readers in the retired group. To be sure, our retired readers might not be representative of the U.S. population as a whole. For example, they are likely to be somewhat better educated and more affluent than the average American. However, they're apt to be a lot like other Consumer Reports readers. In other words, you.
