A wave of early retirees are fuelling wage inflation according to Dame Sharon White, the boss of John Lewis.
The Great Resignation was not a myth and it’s contributed to the tightest UK labour market in 50 years.
And White told the Today programme that the missing workers are “predominately people in their 50s” and that she would: “…encourage any government to really think much more about how we encourage more people back into work.”
This isn’t working
Mein Gott! Are happy early retirees about to be caught in a crossfire of high inflation and social coercion?
Will we be forced at bayonet point to do routine data entry tasks, buy caramel lattes, and participate in thought showers in government re-orientation camps?
Probably not. Only 28% of White’s missing 50 to 59-year-olds dropped out of the workforce in order to retire, according to the ONS.
Rather it seems the pandemic itself, stress, caring for others, illness and disability, and being made redundant all featured strongly in the lives of those who bolted for the exit.
And while the over-50s’ economic inactivity rate has certainly spiked in 2021, it’s only gone back to 2017 levels:
Source: ONS. ‘Movements out of work for those aged over 50 years since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.’
The data Jedi at the ONS show that the over-50s actually increased their economic activity rate every year from 1971 to 2020.
The pandemic was the turning point.
So perhaps it’s premature to pin the blame for inflation on a section of the workforce who were vulnerable to Covid and may yet come back.
The Institute for Employment Studies says that worker shortages are already easing. It also points out that the double whammy of Covid and Brexit has robbed firms of their ability to react swiftly to changes in demand.
We’re getting a more rounded picture now, eh?
But White does strike a nerve because retirees and aspiring FIRE-es know that endemic high inflation can undo their best-laid plans.
Gonna make you sweat
So let’s say your FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early) sums stop adding up.
Could you face going back to work? What would be your terms?
It’s worth all retirees thinking about this. Call it a backup plan.
I’ve already confessed that strictly speaking I didn’t stop working after I called time on my career.
Monevator doesn’t write itself you know. (Not until Blenderbot gets a bit less lippy anyway.)
I still consider myself retired, but I make some pocket money from my writing hobby.
And here’s why that little bit of work has proven to be a good thing:
- I work when I want.
- If I don’t want to do it then I don’t have to.
- I enjoy the challenge.
- It utilises a skill that would otherwise rust.
- It helps me feel slightly useful.
- I get positive feedback. Sometimes.
- I enjoy the community – both interacting with the Monevator massive, and working behind the scenes with site founder TI to ensure Monevator remains a cult success that never hits the big time. (Coz money is for sellouts, yo!)
Let’s not forget the traditional work negatives that no longer apply either:
- No commute.
- No chronic stress. Only positive eustress.
- No corporate BS.
- No politics. Bar TI’s need to be addressed by his full Monevator job title: Grand Supreme Presidente of Awesomeness for Life.
The point is I didn’t FIRE so I could nod off to sleep in front of daytime TV. And I’ve still got plenty of playtime left to do other things.
But the transformation in how work feels post-FIRE is akin to escaping an abusive relationship, and realising that it doesn’t have to be that way.
I want you back
Others have gained a fresh perspective on how employment should be designed, as the ONS uncovered when it quizzed some 50-to-70 year olds who bailed during the pandemic.
Fully 58% of the 50 to 59-year-olds would consider going back to work! And 31% of the 60 to 70-year-olds are open to returning.
Here are the carrots a prospective employer would need to dangle:
Source: ONS. ‘Reasons for workers aged over 50 years leaving employment since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.’
The top three temptations all offer up more flexibility. Not a surprise.
These wise old retirees probably aren’t going to be selling their soul to Goldman Sachs anytime soon. They want a job that works around their life, not one that rules it.
Only 9% of respondents said they wanted to return full-time.
Here’s why they might make a comeback:
Source: ONS. ‘Reasons for workers aged over 50 years leaving employment since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.’
Money is always a temptation, but it’s interesting to see how many would go back for social reasons (54%) or to improve mental health (35%).
On the income side, the benefit of bringing in a few quid now while I’m vulnerable to sequence of returns risk is overwhelming versus the nightmare scenario of struggling to make ends meet in my eighties.
Still we needn’t speculate about the incentives retirees need to work because one country is already way ahead of us.
The Land of the Declining Birth Rate
The fuse on Japan’s demographic timebomb has already burned down to the detonator. It has responded with reforms to coax its older citizens back to work.
Apparently with some success:
The dystopian version of this would be chain gangs of octogenarians cleaning toilets for minimum wage, 60 hours a week.
I can imagine that happening in the US. But the stories I’ve read about Japan’s ‘Silver Jinzai’1 are generally more heartwarming.
There’s the 70-something who teaches English to primary school children. He keeps the kids entertained with his silly voices and by acting out the roles in the English-language stories he reads to them.
Or the ex-finance worker who helps out at a support group for people with disabilities. Kasa sounds like she has life sussed:
“In order for me to have a meaningful life, I decided to start a job where I would be able to help other people. I don’t have any special skills, but I always work with a compassionate heart.”
The Silver Jinzai aren’t working for big bucks. But it doesn’t sound like it’s about the money anyway.
They’re making a difference. To themselves and others.
Take it steady,
The Accumulator
- Silver Human Resources. [↩]
In my opinion, Sharon White should look closer to home for answers.
In a site ( Indeed) that showed some questions about what it was like working at Waitrose, someone replied…
“… If you want a work life balance then do not work here….”. ( Lots of upvotes for that one )
I’m 70, and would be up for a couple of days paid work a week, not 3 or more, or running around as a dogsbody, which when you look at the job descriptions, that’s what you are. The Title may say ‘Delivery Drivery’ but the smaller print says… assistants, cashier, stacking…
In fairness, Waitrose jobs to me look little different from any other supermarket, even if I admire ( some of ) the business/partnership ethos.
As a student, 50 years ago, I did vacation jobs such as digging ditches, labouring in a paper mill, kitchen portering, dustbinman ( refuse operative ),
and quite literally .. shovelling shit. ( resurfacing interior of rugby club septic tank ). Do I really, really want… another cr*p job ?
No, I don’t.
Just to add…
‘..unpaid meal breaks…”.
You really know that you’re at the bottom of the pile when you have job like that.
I retired at age 52 (I’m now 76) and have had fortunately to date a comfortable retirement.
After retirement I volunteered at a number of “jobs” to keep me occupied and interested. Volunteering can be rewarding “spiritually/socially” if not economically.
And if it doesn’t suit, for whatever reason, it was easy to quit.
I’d guess there is a “hierarchy of needs” at play here.
If the basics are covered then retirees are relaxed about snoozing in front of daytime TV.
At 76 there’s nothing, short of starvation, that would tempt me back to working for wages.
I’m 57 in the Autumn and retired a year ago from a steadily more and more demanding role in the public sector. I would use the term ‘profession’ but, since 2010, the role had declined in terms of respect from the general public and from the employer. Over those 12 years, a decline in recompense (even before this cost of living crisis) of around 30% in real terms confirmed the loss of genuine value in the eyes of society. I’d had enough and won’t be returning. As to going back to any paid work, looking around me, it seems that there are many jobs called flexible that just expect it all in one direction; from the worker. I value my time much more. I might try to look around for something very flexible but the need or hunger is not really there. I don’t get a kick from declaring myself full of busyness like others. Far too often society’s fixation with busyness is a euphemism for burning Carbon…
I sold my events company and retired (after my earn out) 4 years ago. Glad to be out of that business during Covid. Luckily I haven’t had to start drawing on my pension yet.
I also volunteer which I find rewarding.
Yesterday I actually spotted a freelance project which really appealed to me, but I put off applying to think about it overnight, how it might impact upcoming holiday etc. Of course today when I went to look again the applications were closed!
A shame but actually I feel a sense of relief not to be going back into a workplace, although the project looked really fun and interesting and I love live events.
Left my lifetime profession at 56, totally disillusioned with it all and would never go back. As the commentator above says, the hunger isnt there (I’ve done it and got the T shirt!). Might consider part-time (one day a week max!) working in a totally different job (far removed from what I was doing) if the need arose, but it would have to be enjoyable with a good working environment and reasonable autonomy (which might be very hard to find).
I reached FI at 55, having started out on that journey at 43 with a mortgage and modest savings (always worked in the not-for-profit sector: no final salary pension for me!).
I then succumbed to working a further 4 ‘just one more’ years, lured in by my employer’s offer of going very part-time, working at home, at a generous daily rate.
When I finally retired fully, it felt like coming home. That was almost 6 years ago and I can’t think of anything that would coax me back into the workforce, ever.
I am always busy, never bored, and can’t think how on earth I ever found the time to have a career. Mind you, my retirement year turned out also to be the year I became a Granny…
There seems to be something un-discussed here – do employers want to employ people over 50, or in their 60s?
Anecdotally, at least, it’s very hard for older people to find work. They’re screened out by algorithms and there’s a surprising amount of negative stereotyping about older people. My own experience is that they make excellent employees, but I’m not sure the average HR bod would think the same.
My situation is similar to Jane reaching FI in my 50s, doing some one more years then working part time.
I found myself retired at 57 after being made redundant from my employer of 23 years during the pandemic on a Teams call.
I think there was some ageism in my industry (software / tech) which was why I stayed at the same place so long. I didn’t think I’d easily get another job in my industry after 50, so I stuck with it – luckily it paid well.
I won’t be going back to work if I can help it. I do some volunteering, enjoy hobbies, taking more exercise and some travel around the UK so far. I don’t know how I had time for work now. My parents didn’t live long – my father died a couple of years after taking his retirement at 60 – this does make you appreciate having more time to do whatever you like in life.
What would it take for me to go back to work? I suppose some sort of melt-down in the finances, compulsory “call up” or the government coming up with some wealth confiscation scheme for anyone who saved up for an early retirement.
Really sorry for anyone who is having to consider going back to work after retiring due to the current economic climate. I would recommend trying to get a part time situation if that allows you to make ends meet while keeping some of your time. It worked well for me for a while.
Retired at 52 last October, would never go back.
I planned well (I believe) and am flexible enough to cope with the high inflation and high bills for some time to come, SIPP comes on line in 2 years which will eliminate most worries completely, apart from dying of course 🙂
I really didn’t enjoy the last few years of my job and would rather cut expenditure than work for anyone ever again; unless of course I find something very cool to do in the future.
So far, we are coping well and I’m enjoying being free.
Just retired at age 61.6 although achieved FIRE a couple – or more – years ago. I’ve got a gig with my employer to do locum work for them if needed – and there are always opportunities for health care professionals to do locum/freelance work with other health providers as and when as a bit of an insurance. Am about 2 weeks in but it’s early days (and am recovering from Covid from recent flight to UK!) but I’ve been planning on doing a heap of things including continuing hobbies, hitting the gym, using my ebike more and volunteering (just taken up opportunity to manage a new trap line for a predator free NZ although the recent flooding will have caused some issues on Wakapuaka Flats) and helping spouse in garden. Looking forward to the journey.
Seems to me we may have seen peak RE (the FI bit is totally arbitrary anyway).
To massively simplify the low inflation world stood on three pillars:
first, cheap labor kept service sector wages stagnant in the west.; second, cheap goods from China raising living standards amid stagnant wages; third, cheap Russian gas powering German industry and the EU more broadly.
So western consumers soaked up all the cheap stuff the world had to offer: the asset rich bought high-end stuff from Europe produced using cheap Russian gas, and lower-income households bought all the cheap stuff coming from China.
All this has worked for decades, until nativism, protectionism, and geopolitics destabilized the low inflation world. And underneath this, the iceberg that is demographics is rotating back to a labor shortage.
The question then is: what is the best hedge for these risks in any asset portfolio? Is is equities, linkers etc? No. Seems to me the best hedge is simply a job. All the high frequency data is showing early retirees capitulating on their decisions of 2020/21. They seem to be thinking the same.
I’ve been retired a bit less than 2 months and so far no wish to return, or plans to- I’m enjoying the summer off for the first time since leaving university! I can conceive perhaps of wanting to go back to work for social reasons, or possibly for an interesting one off project. However my plans for the next few years do involve some sort of volunteering, and more travel which should fill those gaps (and I hear you @Jane in London- my eldest daughter is in the process of buying a house with her boyfriend and the pitter patter of tiny feet may not be far in our futures…)
A prolonged period of high inflation might make a return to paid work necessary but I’m hoping it won’t come to that
@Fox, that’s an excellent question. I suspect many HR bods would indeed prefer younger recruits, but if the labour market stays tight will take who they can get. They may need to update the stereotypes
It’s a big “NOPE” to work from almost everyone so far, ZX excluded.
Autonomy is key to the bits I do. I couldn’t do it if I was being ordered around or exploited. But I’m relatively happy if I can bring some passion to a task and that makes a difference to people. I think that’s at the heart of the positive stories emerging from Japan’s Silver Jinzai.
Nobody’s mentioned entrepreneurialism yet. The American-led FIRE movement was spearheaded by people who retired then started generating new cashflows via blogging, podcasting, book-writing, DIYing, property ownership, events management etc etc. Is this more of a US thing? Has nobody out there accidentally created a business out of their hobby, spending a few days a week on that? Or does that not feel like work?
@ ZX – re: demographics. I have a question about this that I haven’t seen anyone address but you might well have a view… For a decade plus after the Financial Crisis, there was much commentary about how automation was going to take away most people’s jobs. Now, during a tight labour market, the fear is about declining birth rates stoking inflation over the long-term. Do you have any thoughts on how these forces may balance out?
I also wonder whether an inflationary world may help drive the integration of Africa into the global economy?
Agree on ageism. That kind of discrimination could fall away remarkably quickly as older workers are drafted in, prove adept, and the original prejudice is exposed as BS.
I would have thought for most people the simple answer to this question is increases in the cost of living that outweigh your portfolio.
If inflation does hit near 20% as forecast by Citi followed by let’s say a halving to 10% next year that would be a 30% increase in the average consumers cost of living.
Plenty of early retiree’s have factored in a healthy 30% margin in their fire budget, which in two years could be eliminated.
All of the above ignores that (a) inflation next year might be much less than 10% once would hope (b) I assume no growth in your portfolio.
Absent that and an inability to fill your life with meaning or social engagement, which if you rely on work to do that means I suggest you need to broaden your horizons a touch, I can’t imagine why you’d go back.
It must be a shocker having to go back to work if you think you’d fully pulled the pin.
Dare I say it, given the state of the parlous UK finances, raising the state pension age to 75 seems possible. When the state pension was first put in place 25% of people had died before drawing it whilst the average life span was 5 years once drawing. Obviously that would be electorally disastrous so isn’t going to happen any time soon.
It strikes me that employers are going to have to re-evaluate the employment package if they want to lure early retirees back to work. By definition people have already decided that aspects of work no longer worked for them and that diversity should probably also reflect the different needs of the unretired e.g. no attraction of “jam tomorrow” or career progression as an incentive to work unpaid overtime or sacrifice personal time or put up with tedious internal admin. And endless box ticking training courses etc are probably not attractive either.
Some of it is already happening as they try to position to be attractive to Gen Z etc but I think there are probably too many businesses where the concept of flexibility being one way still rules the roost.
Recently on the Sam Harris podcast, he speculated that if AI removed a lot of people from the workforce, and assuming that we could pay them a liveable Basic Income, then what would all these people DO with their lives? Where would they find meaning and fulfilment that many will have got from their jobs? I don’t often see this aspect of retirement seriously discussed. The assumption, especially in FIRE circles, is that jobs are an awful, spirit-crushing, enforced activity, wasting your life while working for The Man. Ehrm, sorry, some jobs are great, life enhancing and compelling, and many of us miss employment. A good job offer would easily entice me back to work, no problem, which is not to say that I don’t enjoy retirement. I think too many people see retirement/work as a binary choice where it would be much better to think of it as blend, especially as you grow older.
@trufflehunt #2 – you think so?
In the jobs I know of (my own, close family) lunch breaks aren’t paid, and I reckon this is fairly typical.
One may be contracted for a 37 hour week, but would be at the office for say, 39.5-42 hours to include a 30-60 min break each day.
Lucky you if your employer pays you to go out shopping, take walks in the park, meet friends for a coffee, etc.
I retired over 20 years ago aged 33 and haven’t done a day’s paid work since. Having thus spent the majority of my adult life retired, and avoiding having been conditioned that a job need be the focal point of life, I’ve no issues finding meaning and fulfillment from things other than a “job”.
Who as a kid dreamt of doing the 60%+ of cruft that nearly every job comprises? No one. If you’ve the financial capacity, why expose yourself to that cruft when you can just do the other 40% of art?
However, per 48k above, I imagine a durable economic regime shift has/is occurring, such that the ludicrously fortunate path I was able to follow, and the fortunate path others have written about above, is rapidly disappearing, with ever fewer able to follow in future, and some likely to find themselves returning to the coalface through necessity.
Me? Utterly and completely unemployable after a two-decade sabbatical where in theory (if not in practice) I could do what I pleased. Fingers crossed then that the world as we’ve known it only semi-implodes. Portfolio- & life-wise, I’ve done what I can to make me/us as robust as possible to different scenarios, but ultimately everyone’s plan will fail if stressed sufficiently and the gods will it.
So, the best of luck to everyone who’s clambered out of their career hamster wheels and sought to open up new chapters of their lives before they’ve run themselves into the ground too much and seen their health depart them for good.
@ZXSpectrum48k #12
Re “Seems to me the best hedge is simply a job”
I wouldn’t class getting a job as something simple. As someone who FIREd a few years back in early-forties, returning to paid employment would be an utterly life-changing decision, way, way more complex than some of the other decisions which you mention around e.g. asset allocation.
Whilst I wouldn’t rule out exchanging my time for money should it be necessary, it’s definitely not something I’d relish.
Would be interested in sources behind “all the high-frequency” data showing folk returning to work, as it’s not what’s coming out in the anecdotal coverage that I’m reading, albeit I wouldn’t be surprised if the great resignation was a Covid blip, that in time diminishes once people feel normal life has returned.
I got an unsolicited offer of a job a couple of weeks back. I turned it down on the spot. It was nice to be asked; but after some six years of doing as I wish the idea just did not tempt me even though it was genuinely about as flexible an offer [to my benefit] as one could imagine.
I have just FIREd recently but I will reassess the situation at the start of the new tax year. The main reason is inflation. My wife and I are starting a kitchen extension but we also building a lake house in a wine growing region abroad. The kitchen extension alone would be fine with the inflation spike. Unfortunately, it’s starting to seem like that the lake house will require more funds than we had set aside before the Covid and the planning permission delays. I’d really rather not go back to work ever again but might be forced to 🙁
@Scott. IES data has been showing a turn in the employment trend since the start of the year. Third party surveys from various employment agencies are showing greater demand from inactive workers. Globally participation rates are rising and economic inactivity indices are falling. There is also a glut of workers who will come back from educational channels in late 2022 and late 2023 (who used COVID to do a 1 or 2 year diploma/Masters etc).
The labour market is easing. Whether it get backs to pre COVID levels is debatable. There is clearly some hysteresis. More relevant the global slowdown should reduce employment opportunities. Higher input costs, higher wages and low productivity is a recipe for employment demand destruction.
@TA. Automation will destroy many jobs (it will create new ones aswell but that happens with a longer lag). That is the long term trend. Against that though we have the retirement of the boomer generation. That will ramp up over the next 10-15 years or so. It will lead to terrible dependency ratios across the Western would. Very large percentages of inactive supported ever smaller active workers. Even in China, the labour force will start shrinking from 2023.
The last 30-40 years was about being short work vs long capital gain assets (thinking of work as being an an income generating “asset”). This may well now reverse for a period. It’s correlated with real yields. The trend in real yields is lower on a multi-century basis. Doesn’t mean, however, you can’t have a decade or two of rises.
Demographics will support that, de-globalisation may do in the short term. Work was a great asset to own in the 70s since it outperformed RPI substantially. It also did well at the end of the Gilded age (having done terribly during the Gilded age). All highly speculative though.
Interesting. Given increasing automation means higher productivity per worker, I wonder if lower dependency ratios in the future will be more sustainable than is feared.
And as attitudes to immigration are partly tied to employment rates, I guess the UK will become amenable again to shipping in workers from abroad. Immigration has already fallen down the public’s list of concerns so I can easily imagine a succession of ministers talking tough on the issue while quietly ushering people in to fill vacancies in this or that industry.
@TA. Chalk me up as one of the accidental entrepreneurs. I’m not RE yet due to being stuck in the family business, although I’ve been FI for a few years. Several years ago, I started selling parts from items that I routinely came across in my line of work that usually went to landfill. It was more in the interests of recycling than income, but it turns out that there was a surprising niche.
It brings in a steady income stream, and I’d still do it if I ever manage to retire from my ‘real’ job. It’s completely flexible, and I can do as much or as little as I like. It has the benefit of preventing a lot of waste going to landfill. It’s a good economic hedge, as people ‘mend and make do’ more during uncertain times. And just having the possibility of a flexible secondary income stream is priceless for my own peace of mind. If I ever retire fully it would feel far less like stepping off a cliff with only savings as a safety net.
As for whether I’d return to the workforce properly afterwards, I think it would only be for the pursuit of new adventures rather than a monetary desire. In the past I’ve considered applying for lower-paid roles that would take me to new places, or teach skills/knowledge that I’m interested in. RE would allow me to take up those sorts of opportunities, but as for taking a job that I’m not that interested in ‘just because’? I highly doubt it.
I see RE as a slow glide (I went part-time four years ago) and a few years ago in my late 40s, for the third time in my life – a hobby has turned into a paying gig. As I said to my manager, when they were bemoaning the unreliable nature of some employees while praising my work ethic, “this gig is a hobby for me, and I treat my hobbies far more seriously than any job.” They were a little shocked.
I’m lucky in that my day job, rather than the side gig above, offers most of what people would go back to work for – and hence I’m willing to stay in it. If that ever changes, I’ll be looking to exit sharpish. Looking back, with the odd blip here and there, I’ve been extraordinary lucky with my jobs. They’ve all been fun.
@ tinkertailor – that sounds great. A completely flexible income stream that relies on your own eye for an opportunity and passion for making a difference. Who could knock it?
I agree completely that things would have to be pretty desperate before I’d consider a job that was just another soul-destroyer.
Funnily enough, I got sight of that recently when I helped out a friend for a day on one of their projects.
I just couldn’t face going back to that world.
@ G – I am jealous that you’ve consistently found a way to make your passions pay. It’s the dream but it sounds like you appreciate your good fortune 🙂
Just to return to my musing on immigration, this is a revealing and balanced report on the UK experience post-Brexit:
https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/reports/how-is-the-end-of-free-movement-affecting-the-low-wage-labour-force-in-the-uk/
It’s a muddy picture but interesting to note how much EU migration has dropped while non-EU immigration has increased to compensate. The one positive I can take from the entire Brexit fiasco is that it’s taken the heat out of immigration as a political issue. We haven’t closed the door much as we’ve repeatedly smashed ourselves in the face with it. With luck, the lack of hysteria creates new political space for manoeuvre and we’ll develop a rational response to our labour problems over time.
Personally I’d hope for better investment in skills for young workers entering the labour force, assistance in retraining for those left high and dry by capitalism later in life, and a flexible immigration system designed to give the impression of “control” while it quietly facilitates the needs of British industry and the life chances of people trying to succeed in this country.
A team of wild horses….
I’d only return for the money, and if the economic situation were that parlous, I think unemployment would be so high they wouldn’t want me.