Investing

The Retirement Decision No One Ever Talks About

Austin Smith

Published: July 20, 2024 9:55 am

Retirement Is Full of Important Decisions

Today, Lee Jackson and Doug Mcintyre focuses on retirement considerations, specifically Social Security and asset allocation. It highlights the importance of deciding whether to continue working, the impact of income levels on retirement decisions, and the potential need for part-time work. The conversation also touches on the importance of planning for where to live in retirement, considering cost of living and taxes.

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Transcript:

Let’s move on to another issue when it comes to retirement, Social Security, asset allocation.

There are some people who will take Social Security.

They’ve made their decisions on asset allocation, but part of their decision is based on the fact that they want to continue to work.

Right. So is that something that… late 50s, you should start to ask yourself, maybe your spouse, do I want to work? If so, how hard? What percentage of my time? And what do I think I can make?

Yeah, I think it’s all the above. Because for many people, and it certainly was in my case, is that I needed something to do.

Because my golf game isn’t that great. And I don’t have the swing I used to.

And you It’s important for those that are seeing retirement come up to remember that if you walk out of your job, you have no place to go and nobody to be around and to discuss things with.

So for many people having a job, especially a 1099 job where they’re not actually an employee, but they can get paid on a regular basis is a good idea, I think.

Yeah, it also depends, I think, on your income level.

Right. One of the things that I noticed and have for quite a while is that the number of people who are probably over 65 at places like McDonald’s, Starbucks.

I see a lot as well.

Walmart, Costco. Again, I don’t think that people who are going into retirement with hundreds of thousands of dollars are doing that.

I think if people are looking at something where they’re going to have their Social Security, maybe they’re going to make another three, four thousand dollars off of investments every month.

I think a lot of those people have to ask themselves, do they want to work in sort of a low skill, low tension, low hourly pay job? Because it is an option.

Yeah. And I always feel a little bit, not sad, but I do see a lot of older citizens working exactly the jobs you said.

They work at McDonald’s or they work at Walmart and places like that. And I’m thinking like, What did this person do for the bulk of their career? And how did they end up having to work here at 70 or 68 or whatever it is?

And it’s something you have to be pretty well aware of. But I think in many people’s cases, they have to do it. The Social Security check is just not enough.

Right. So I think there are two groups of people when you’re looking at retirement. The first group is people who want to work.

Right. And I think you’ve got to think about that hard.

Because as you said, when you walk out the door of a full-time job, you know, are you going to become a 1099 employee? Are you going to stay with your same employer? They, you know, want you to be there part-time.

Or as a consultant.

Or as a consultant. A lot of that goes on. You continue to work for the place you work for. It’s just in a different role.

Yeah. You know, that’s sort of the happy end of it. The sadder end of it, but certainly very important for people millions of people is to be able to look out 10 years ahead and say I’ve done the calculation on my social security I can’t live on it.

Right.

I don’t have the kind of job I haven’t had the kinds of jobs where I can just literally leave job A and go into job B and make fifty thousand dollars a year.

Those people have to ask themselves is it worth looking at a part-time job hourly at big box retailer, fast food place. And quite frankly, in some of these places, you do get some level of benefits.

Well, they get a level of benefit. They’re working at McDonald’s or any fast food place. They get food, you know, and for many people in this day and age, when food costs have skyrocketed over the last three years, that probably is something that is a big positive for some of these people.

Yeah, I think that’s true.

Well, look, next time we come back, I think one of the things that we’re going to start to look at is where do you live in the country and how does it affect your decision about retirement and social security?

And that’s for a lot of reasons. Cost of living and taxes are the primary ones.

So when we come back, we’re going to look at where should you live when you retire based on lifestyle, taxes, and income.

Sounds like a good idea. I’ll talk to you about it then.