Baby Boomer Retirement Economic impact of the impending Baby Boomer Retirement

Within the next two decades, the largest segment of the American population will be retiring, leaving a huge void in America's workforce, as well as creating the largest single pull on the struggling Social Security system that America has ever sncountered. According to Dailey (1998) over one third of the American population is composed of this generation. What will be the effects of pulling this group of productive American workers out of the wealth producing sector of our economy, and transferring them to the non-working sector? The American economy, which has reoriented itself to an information economy rather than a manufacturing-based economy may face pressures to adapt further as it relied on less professional, executive leadership which has been provided by the Baby Boomers, and has to learn to rely on Gen X and Gen Y citizens in order to form a cohesive and reliable economic balance.

According to Freedman, Roma and Harris, (1999) There are now five times as many older adults as there were when Social Security was introduced in the mid-1930s, and ten times as many Americans over 65 as there were in 1900. The major force driving these numbers is the dramatic growth in longevity, alongside reductions in infant and child mortality. In 1900, the average American could anticipate living to age 47. Today the figure...

The addition of three decades to the average life span is surely one of the great wonders of the twentieth century. That change amounts to a 62% increase in the number of our days. As a result, an American woman reaching age 65 today can plan on living nearly twenty more years, while men can expect more than a decade and a half of continued life -- most of it in reasonably good health. Demographic expert Chulhee Lee of the University of California, Berkeley, has projected that the average man aged 20 in 1990 can anticipate spending one-third of life in retirement.
As remarkable as these numbers are, the real revolution is yet to be felt. Beginning just after the year 2000, the first wave of 80 million baby boomers will reach their late fifties and begin transforming America into a place where, for the first time ever, there will be more older adults than children and youth. By 2030, the number of older adults will have doubled again, to 70 million

As the oldest baby-boomers begin retiring in the approaching years, the implications for the workforce could be enormous. According to Dohm, "the current tight labor markets could be exacerbated, hindering prospects for economic growth and putting a greater burden on those remaining in the workforce, perhaps forcing them to work longer hours."…