Hiking and cycling are done in short bursts not 10 hours a day for 5 or six days a week and do not involve not standing all day. I can adjust the amount of time I do these activities depending on how my feet legs and back feel – and yes I certainly could claim disability if I wanted to – I could even have taken early retirement on medical grounds – indeed I was offered it. couldn’t afford it however.

Look for an in demand skill.

I plan to go into semi retirement as a handyman doing light work.

But yes it sucks. I’m expecting the retirement age to pushed out again for me. yay. and my main pension is linked to my normal retirement age. so in effect as it moves out it devalues my pension a big chunk too.

anyway we are all in it together so it is time to suck up the unfairness and get on with a plan

I don’t have the skills or training to do research. Nurse education is masters only entrants. community work? What area – I am not qualified as a community nurse.

That’s my point. Older people need support, training etc to move jobs. In other words, the workforce needs investing in, and not just when it’s young. It’s a national resource that needs managing positively.

Apart from other health issues, arthritis in my hands means I couldn’t do my old job. So under the new scheme I’d need re-training for a final four or five years. But once one’s passed sixty, learning for a new occupation will be slow and inefficient. Companies will chose to invest in younger staff. I’d be unemployable.

Mol – alternatively people could be flexible rather than expectant. We will all need to be prepared for it….

Companies will chose to invest in younger staff.

Yes, they would – that’s why I’m saying we need a new approach. A government programme to get old people contributing what they are able to without being at the mercy of a cruel market.

No point waiting for givernments to respond – DIY is much better and far more likely to work. With initiative and flexibility lots of things to do in the third age.

With initiative and flexibility

Is that available to order online?

I think some people may need help in this area THM.

teamhurtmore – Member
No point waiting for givernments to respond – DIY is much better and far more likely to work. With initiative and flexibility lots of things to do in the third age.

Here is a small hint, the people who need this sort of thing the most don’t have the resources to make it happen.

But as pointed out a lot will have changed by the time this comes to pass, in my lifetime agricutuiral labour has been slashed by machinary, manufacturing has moved and been automated, driving could easily be next. For those of us that use our brains more than our hands we have some time but the rapid rise of other nations will eat into that.

With automation there is some thinking that the things which will survive are around problem solving, particularly linked to physical skills, so stuff like plumbing. The other is where people want human contact so service jobs, medicine/care – although elements of these could be automated already.

But the point is with all this is reducing need for human input and workforce generally even if output/overall wealth increases.

If you look back to 60s and 70s a lot of sci-fi was utopian – automation increased wealth of society as a whole and the dividend was taken as greater leisure time for the general population. This is essentially a socialist idea, and not consistent with market driven economics – maybe that’s why all our sci-fi is now dystopian!

The pension issue and the linked cost of elderly care are two of the biggest issues we have to face and raising retirement age towards 70 isn’t going to make people fit to work or create jobs. I couldn’t do what I do now when I’m in may late 60s it’s not at all physical but is intellectually challenging,fast moving, competitive and stressful. If we need old people to contribute then need to think how to structure working life to accommodate third age careers which draw on experience of older workforce but simply don’t just take entry level work away from the young.

Not going to be easy and I think it will need Government to take a more active role in labour market management – but difficult for a single county in a global economy. Maybe need to look to Scandinavian models?

I’ve depressed myself now, hopefully the weather will calm down soon so I can go surfing.

This is essentially a socialist idea

Indeed. It seems automation could increase profits and reduce wage bills*. So more money flows to the people who run those companies, and less to the people who no longer work for them. So free-market capitalism then would ensure more money would flow to the few. We’d need a more socialist government to allow us all to benefit and not suffer.

* however this is not a given. If automation puts people out of work then it reduces the market and the available money for that service. Automation is already very possible in many areas, it’s just not financially viable, because the market for whatever it is can’t support the extra initial cost. Automation requires a large investment to save future costs, and it’s that large investment that stops it in many cases. However if the potential reward is big enough it happens and then reduces costs and presumably then increases profits much more. So the more money you have, the more you can make, in other words. Same as usual.

Having said that, if costs are low, profits don’t necessarily go up. You can keep the same profit and reduce prices to sell more, then reduce prices more and so on. See car industry. The upshot of automation there isn’t to make the car companies richer, it’s to make cars cheaper and better, from which we all benefit (arguably)

Economics in ‘bit more complicated than it looks’ shocker.

Dunno why you are all on about automation. This is just a straight up rob of money from my pocket.

You’re also going to have the impact of the Gen-X looking after their decrepit Baby-Boomer parents due to lack of social care provision – my wife hasn’t worked for years due to her having to care for her house-bound, disabled mother. No one accounting for the fact that large numbers of people being economically inactive due to inadequate social care?

Very true Molgrips, and I wasn’t suggesting a socialist utopian answer. I was partly making an observation about how differently it’s played out.

I was going to write a long response, but the weather is improving so I’m off out. But generally I think we need to work back from an answer rather forward from the problem and part of that answer has to be a different balance between the pure market and social dividend – and politics being less tied to entrenched dogma.

This video of the Ocado warehouse is cool and also a bit scary, especially the R2D2 robots.

the-ocado-warehouse-run-by-robots

Companies will chose to invest in younger staff.

Unless we continue with mass immigration, these will be in very short supply…

younger staff….
Unless we continue with mass immigration, these will be in very short supply…

good – young people should be very highly valued and their scarcity will only enhance that – it’s a bl00dy travesty for society to expect the young to clean up (metaphorically or literally) after the oldies

“I believe the children are our future, teach them well and let them lead the way” clever chap that George Benson 🙂 yes I know it was Linda Creed the lyricist

it’s a bl00dy travesty for society to expect the young to clean up (metaphorically or literally) after the oldies

It’s also how most families and societies have operated for 1000s of years….

I wasn’t suggesting a socialist utopian answer

I was 🙂

But yes – you put it very eloquently and I agree entirely.

Anyone think the citizen’s wage idea would be the start of this project? Allowing us to contribute to society without needing to be directly salaried on the basis of activity?

Poss but only as a replacement for the benefits system (sensible approach) NOT as an addition (John McD IIRC)

seosamh77 – Member
Dunno why you are all on about automation. This is just a straight up rob of money from my pocket.

What if I said the money was never Er in your pocket to start with. In fact the money doesn’t even exist.

I was thinking about this last night listening to any questions but has thier ever been any consideration for retirement age differing by job, outside the public sector? So physical workers retire younger than office jockeys? I waa thinking each job category has a code and you accrue points say 1 a year for farmer, labourer, bin man etc. 0.9 a year for sedentary work and you have to work towards a points total, say 45 to retire.seems a bit fairer although I know all other kind of health issues come with age, not just those from a physical life

mikewsmith – Member

What if I said the money was never Er in your pocket to start with. In fact the money doesn’t even exist.I’d say somebody finally gets it. The numbers don’t matter and can be manipulated any way we like. We are in an utterly insane situation where we’re constantly told the numbers dictate the path we need to take, **** that. It’s stupid. We should decide what we want to do then make the number fit.