http://theweek.com/article/index/210682/baby-boomers-turn-65-the-4-key-questions

Baby boomers turn 65: The 4 key questions
With the first boomers hitting retirement age this year, the graying demographic's impact on the economy is raising concerns
posted on January 3, 2011, at 1:25 PM

Between 7,000 and 10,000 baby boomers a day will be turning 65 over the next 19 years.  The first of the baby boomers hit age 65 on January 1, and between 7,000 and 10,000 more will pass that mark every day for the next 19 years. Needless to say, both the country and the economy will be hugely affected as this massive population wave — 79 million Americans in total, or 26 percent of the current population — reaches the traditional retirement age. (Watch a Fox News discussion about boomers' future.) Here are four looming questions:

Can Medicare handle this group?
These boomers "appear poised to start sucking down federal benefits like a college student on free beer night," says Barbara Marshall in The Austin American-Statesman. Medicare will be the first federal program to feel the strain, says Samuel Goldsmith in the New York Daily News. With 2.5 million Americans enrolling this year, and another 70 million or so over the next 18 years, the "Baby Boom floodgates" will "swamp" the Medicare system, "raising concerns that the health care program could go bankrupt — a devastating blow to baby boomers who have paid into the system their whole working lives." But we still have time to fix that, says the AARP's John Rother. The boomers won't start racking up the big bills until "their mid-70s and 80s."

Have they saved enough to retire?
"Through a combination of procrastination and bad timing, many baby boomers are facing a personal finance disaster," says the Associated Press' Dave Carpenter. Factors working against these would-be retirees include a rocky decade on the stock market, a sharp drop in home values, and the dying out of traditional pensions. "But just like with every other stage of life they've gone through, baby boomers are expected to transform how we think about 'retirement,'" says NPR's Jennifer Ludden. Many will be forced to continue working, but remember: Boomers tend to "derive more of their identity through work," and an AARP poll of those hitting 65 this year found that 40 percent have no plans to retire — ever.

Are boomers prepared for the challenges of aging?
Unfortunately, positive thinking only goes so far, says Susan Jacoby in The New York Times. Boomers need to let go of the "vision of an ageless old age" held so dear by the "'90 is the new 50' crowd." "Our generational credo" has long been "that we can transform ourselves endlessly, even undo reality, if only we live right," but the reality is that, should we live to "old, old age," we need to plan for "unremitting struggle, ideally laced with moments of grace."

Can the rest of us survive the boomer retirement?
"Beyond new certainty that company-sponsored yoga classes aren't going away, it's hard finding positives in the approaching boomer glut," says Ron Stodghill in The Charlotte Observer. The refusal (or inability) to retire is a "threat to business innovation, whose lifeblood depends on pushing out old ideas to make room for new ones." And "you can almost bet there's a breakthrough in medicine, engineering or education languishing somewhere" among underemployed 20-somethings.

I will turn 65 in June, although I have been on early retirement for the past 5 years.  And I am worried about medicare.  Its the demographics, but  also the political will to find a fix.

It is the politics that worries me.  There is more than enough money, the problem is where it is concentrated and what it is used for.

It is the politics that worries me.  There is more than enough money, the problem is where it is concentrated and what it is used for.


War.  There's never enough money for war and there's never enough war for money!
::)

War.  There's never enough money for war and there's never enough war for money!
::)


No Max, there's always always enough $$$  for war, but never enough for the rest of the stuff

Most Boomers are probably going to work until they're 75 because some want to retire...but can't. So they'll quasi-retire and my mom will be 65 in 2021 and my dad will hit 65 in 2022.

They don't have much money so...will they be fudgeed more than they are now?

My parents will probably be doing so as well; working till at least age 70. My mom turns 65 in 2016 and my dad in 2018. Furthermore, both of them enjoy working and can't see themselves retiring anytime in the near future.

Some haven't thought out what would happen if we boomers, en masse, decided to keep working. 

Aaaah, the time has come hasn't it?

No Max, there's always always enough $$$  for war, but never enough for the rest of the stuff


Don't worry.  They'll just print more.

I am irritated by some of the blowhards of my youth who were mad about having to pay social security.  They loved working under the table and for cash to avoid paying any taxes...and now they are in their sixties and they are just loving social security and medicaid...and I am the first one to remind them.