Planning to Retire

A New Look at Healthcare Costs in Retirement

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Posted: June 5, 2008

Health benefits for retirees are a relic of the past. Fewer than a third of current workers have any employer subsidy for retiree health insurance, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute. In the past, I've written that retired couples will need between $205,932 (Boston College Center for Retirement Research estimate) and $225,000 (Fidelity Investments estimate) to cover healthcare costs in retirement.

A new analysis by the nonpartisan EBRI puts the number for a couple currently age 65 at a staggeringly high $635,000, and that doesn't include long-term-care costs. This ultraconservative calculation is higher than the other estimates because it is designed to give the retired couple a 90 percent chance of having enough money to cover all health bills beyond what Medicare covers.

However, if you are willing to accept a fifty-fifty chance of being able to pay your out-of-pocket expenses, $212,000 would be sufficient for a couple (right smack in the middle of the other two estimates).

EBRI also calculated that a 65-year-old single man will need $331,000 and a single woman $390,000 to be almost completely certain of covering all out-of-pocket retiree health costs. If you're willing to accept a fifty-fifty chance, those numbers can be halved, EBRI says.

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ain't it grand folks.

And this folks is what we get for living in the land of "milk and honey". WHATEVER. People are fighting tooth and nail to get into this country when every hard-working decent American would float away if they could to some other country where perhaps they could AFFORD to retire. The retirement myth is just that...."a myth". My generation will be working until we are no longer able to work. We'll just die right where we are....at work. I won't have the retirement that my grandparents enjoyed. I most certaintly will not be able to retire as my parents did in their late 50's. There is no way that I will EVER see retirement. I've seen my company-sponsored retirement plan plummet to almost nothing. I've seen all my employee benefits take a nose dive. I live frugally. Far more frugal then my parents did. I drive an old car. I have a modest mortgage. I work far more hours a week then my father EVER worked and yet, I just can't seem to get ahead no matter what I do. It's frustrating as all get out. And NOW I have to worry about how I'm going to save upwards of $600,000 to cover my future medical expenses. Give me a break. Like THAT is ever going to happen. By the time I retire Social Security won't be around and Medicare will be a long-ago benefit.Wonderful. All those dollars taken out of my paycheck for what will end up being years and years and years for absolutely nothing. I see nothing of any great benefit when I hit retirement age. There won't be any fancy RV rolling along the highway, no social security check to help cushion the loss of fulltime income and most certainly no medicare to help pay for my medical expenses in my old age. Life past 65 is going to pretty much be a pathetic stage of life for my generation. That's Great. JUST great.

Tc of FL @ Nov 12, 2008 15:33:05 PM

And this folks is what we get for living in the land of "milk and honey". WHATEVER. People are fighting tooth and nail to get into this country when every hard-working decent American would float away if they could to some other country where perhaps they could AFFORD to retire. The retirement myth is just that...."a myth". My generation will be working until we are no longer able to work. We'll just die right where we are....at work. I won't have the retirement that my grandparents enjoyed. I most certaintly will not be able to retire as my parents did in their late 50's. There is no way that I will EVER see retirement. I've seen my company-sponsored retirement plan plummet to almost nothing. I've seen all my employee benefits take a nose dive. I live frugally. Far more frugal then my parents did. I drive an old car. I have a modest mortgage. I work far more hours a week then my father EVER worked and yet, I just can't seem to get ahead no matter what I do. It's frustrating as all get out. And NOW I have to worry about how I'm going to save upwards of $600,000 to cover my future medical expenses. Give me a break. Like THAT is ever going to happen. By the time I retire Social Security won't be around and Medicare will be a long-ago benefit.Wonderful. All those dollars taken out of my paycheck for what will end up being years and years and years for absolutely nothing. I see nothing of any great benefit when I hit retirement age. There won't be any fancy RV rolling along the highway, no social security check to help cushion the loss of fulltime income and most certainly no medicare to help pay for my medical expenses in my old age. Life past 65 is going to pretty much be a pathetic stage of life for my generation. That's Great. JUST great.

Tc of FL @ Nov 12, 2008 15:32:16 PM

Democrats vs Republicans

As an independent it is really easy to see why our country really has very little chance of surviving over the next 25 years. Both parties (D's and R's) look only at the votes they will get and not the long term consequences to the country. The D's want to give everyone a health care that will attempt to keep everyone young and alive forever no matter what the costs to the tax payers may be. The R's want healthcare to be market based and thus run by free enterprise. To me both sides are totally misguided (which should be no suprise to anyone). There has to be a middle ground but both parties despise and distrust each other so much that I do not see that happening until it will be way to late for the country to be rescued. The D's have to get over trying to keep everyone alive forever and stop trying to get government involved in health care (I would love to have someone tell me one program that the government hasn't screwed up). The R's need to stop believing that the health care system is fair. When hospitals are allowed to charge their insured customers 10% of what someone without insurance is charged there is a problem. Medical schools limit the number of graduates under the guise of quality control when in reality it is used to keep doctors incomes up. This is not anything but robbery. Why can't the two sides work together and (OH!! escuse me that's a stupid ides). Every one deserves a very basic health care plan and that does not need to cost an arm and a leg. My hope is that we get someone with some common sense (Obviously that means they would not be a politician) to figure this out before we have to swallow another entitlement program the size of a watermellon.

Doug of IA @ Nov 12, 2008 13:27:04 PM

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