Actually, a great many people have the interest and financial capacity to plan realistically and get started early enough to make the dream of early retirement come true – and where there's a will to succeed, success often follows. Even if early retirement is not in the picture, a lot of people are strongly motivated to build personal financial security through sound pre-retirement planning, consisting of long-term savings and investments, life and disability insurance, and long-term care insurance for their aging parents as well as for themselves.

Older people, who are at or close to retirement age now, may still be among the many generations of Americans who have enjoyed traditional defined benefit pension plans, which require no employee contributions and provide guaranteed incomes. Those who also had the foresight to get busy on aggressive long-term wealth accumulation plans, and who stuck with them, may be about to settle down on "Golden Pond" financially secure and comfortable.

But what about their children and grandchildren? What can they expect? The typical pattern for young people getting out of college is to overspend their way through their 20s and realize, at about age 30, that they'd better slow down. It's important to wise up before family responsibilities make saving and investing more difficult. For those who are thirty-something or older and who have not begun serious wealth accumulation planning, the financial security goal posts are going to keep moving further and further back.

Back to Top | Next

Ohio National is not affiliated with, nor does it endorse or sponsor, any particular prospecting, marketing or selling system.

168