Abolishing the Retirement Age
It looks as if the formal retirement age is to be abolished next year. Although we will still be able to retire and draw a state pension at 65 new legislation will enable us, if we wish, to continue working and making contributions to our pension beyond that age. Which has profound implications for the way we view our careers and what we want to do in our retirement.
As we live longer, healthier lives, more and more people are seeing their retirement as an opportunity to do the things that they have always wanted, but never had the opportunity to do. This might include volunteering, travelling, playing sports, spending time with the granchildren. But it might also include taking one’s career in a new direction, fulfilling ambitions that were unattainable during the bulk of one’s working life. At Career Energy we meet older people all the time who have dreams of a new career. The problem they have had up to now was how to make a start in a new career when a compulsory pensionable age was looming. Who was going to give a 64 year old a job in a completely new career?
It may not look as if abolishing the statutory date at which we receive our pensions will make it easier for an older person to change career. After all a 64 year old is a 64 year old whatever their pensionable status, and notwithstanding the age discrimination laws, that is always going to be a difficult age at which to make a career change. But now that we know we have a realistic opportunity of working longer, those who want to will be able to plan and implement their final career sooner, perhaps making a change at age fifty or thereabouts, confident that their new career will keep them going well into their seventies.
Abolishing the statutory pensionable age will give us more flexibility in our working lives. Of course there will be many who leave it to the last minute to decide whether or not to retire, and this decision will generally be based on financial considerations. But for others there is now a real opportunity to plan for a whole new career direction, and to put in place a career management strategy that will allow them to attain it.
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Tags: Age Discrimination, Ageism, Career Advice, Career Change, Career Consultant, Career Energy, Career Managment, Career Planning, Pensions, Retirement, Volunteering
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