saving for retirement a myth

When Audrey’s children left home she wasn’t at all concerned about having an empty nest and looked forward to pouring all of her energies into income related activities to ensure that her retirement would be comfortable, but the incredible ageism she encountered increasingly at at work made a myth of that oft touted mantra that you can catch up with retirement savings - you can't!

"The reason why adult children leave home is the same reason why young workers dislike older workers," explains Audrey. "They don't need you any more, you're superfluous and should disappear."

“When the young things at work look at me, or talk to me, they are really looking at and talking to their mothers and they don’t like that,” explains Audrey. “Not only do they see in me their dumpy, mousy haired mothers cleaning the toilet, but they also see someone who wouldn't know a Numlock from a Capslock (which I do, but they refuse to believe I am any different from their mothers).”

"They actually talk in code around me," laughs Audrey, "as if I am as dumb as they perceive their mothers to be. Not only do I understand everything the young things say in code, but I bet their mothers do, too. After all, we invented the code thirty years ago!"

“It really annoys me that they expect me to be as clueless about things that their own mother is clueless about,” says Audrey. “They forget that it was me who taught them the ropes when they first started with the company; and it was me, not one of them, who won the general knowledge competition at work.”

“It doesn’t seem to click with these young things that I am a person in my own right,” says Audrey. “I may be the same age as their mothers, but I am by no means anything like their mothers.”

Audrey feels that the ‘age discrimination’ shown by the young things may also be due to the fact that there is a greater difference between ages when you are young.

"For instance," says Audrey, "the ten year difference in age between a 15-year old and a 25-year old is far more marked at that age than it is between a 35-year old and a 45-year old."

"I’m doing my best to cope with the incredible difference between how they see me and how I see myself," laughs Audrey, "but the fact remains that I am seen as a dinosaur at my workplace and there’s not much I can do about it because I will have the same problem wherever I go – unless, of course, I want to apply for a job that the young things consider to be suitable for a person of my age, such as a toilet cleaner – which is how my own children saw me.”

“The empty nest situation merely shifts the generational problems from the home to the workplace,” explains Audrey. “You don’t notice it so much when the kids are home, but as soon as they leave you are wide open to it at work - workplaces are full of kids who've left home to get away from their parents!"

"How can any older person save for retirement under these conditions?"