Retirement without savings feels impossible today

Most people, and the businesses they work for, carry assumptions about what life should look like at 66 or 67. The questions come easily: “Do you have plans to retire?” “When will you retire?” “Haven’t you had enough of the daily grind?”

Yes, I have, but what do you do when you simply cannot afford to retire?

That is my reality. If I were pushed out of my current job, finding another would be nearly impossible, unless I were willing to accept minimum wage. Age, it seems, narrows your options just when you need them most.

The data reinforces what many of us are quietly living through. The National Council on Aging reports that lower-income adults die, on average, nine years earlier than the wealthiest 20%. The same research shows that more than 45% of older-adult households (over 19 million) do not earn enough to cover basic living costs.

Wealth and longevity are closely linked, while millions of older adults remain financially insecure. I never expected to be one of them. I did everything we were told to do: saved money, contributed to an RRSP, bought a home. Yet the mortgage remains, and bills continue to drain what little cushion exists.

Do I feel frustrated? At times, yes. I have spent more than 30 years helping build profitable companies for others. They now live in mansions; I live in a modest, solid home. I am not ungrateful, but I am realistic.

The question that lingers is whether my savings will be enough for my wife and family to manage the costs of the future. Among the people I know, few are wealthy. Most are working- or middle-class, living month to month, paycheque to paycheque. Like me, they assumed things would turn out differently.

I worry about what lies ahead. Research suggests that roughly 81% of older households are unprepared to withstand a major financial shock, whether that is widowhood, serious illness, or the need for long-term care. We are not ready, and the consequences are not abstract.

That divide is not just economic; it is emotional. At this stage of life, uncertainty feels heavier. I find myself confronting fear: fear of instability, of dependence, of leaving my family vulnerable.

Meanwhile, public conversation continues to revolve around wealth: on television, in politics, and across business circles. Money dominates the discussion, even as many older adults feel increasingly excluded from it.

Time moves forward. Savings feel thinner, and optimism becomes harder to sustain.

What remains is hope; hope that something shifts, that the system acknowledges this growing gap, and that people like me are not left to navigate the final chapters of our lives in quiet uncertainty.