Just as the gray tsunami was due, boomers have new economic and social reasons to keep their jobsLast October, Kathleen Casey-Kirschling made headlines as the first of an estimated 78 million baby boomers to file for Social Security benefits. Born on New Year's Day, 1946, in Philadelphia, the retired teacher seemed to herald a gray tsunami of Americans born from 1946 through 1964 who would soon be exiting the workforce.
Companies from cruise lines to retirement communities and financial consultants have been planning for this mass retirement. They hope to profit grandly by selling goods and services to tens of millions of relatively young boomers with bulging nest eggs and decades of free time ahead.
But demography is not destiny—and it may not even make for a good business plan. It looks like fewer of those 78 million will be either rich enough or young enough at retirement to meet the expectations of businesses catering to boomers released from the workforce. This shortfall, and how it may dash such hopes, is the focus of a new study co-authored by Kevin P. Coyne of Atlanta's Coyne Partnership. In coming decades, "the size and growth rate of the U.S. retirement market will be much smaller than is widely believed," he says.
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