Retirement Age: Should it be determined?

Retirement usually happens when people has reached a determined age, that force them to stop their jobs completely. Retirement age in a country, ruled by each government, is difference from retirement age in another country. It varies from country to country, but it is usually between 55 to 70 year old. For some reasons, I agree that a country should determine the retirement age.

Firstly, the age of retirement is important to be applied in a country with high rate population, like Indonesia, due to the regeneration in companies or institutions. The number of work fields in a country increase slowly, on the other hand, the growth of population increase rapidly. It won’t be enough to accommodate all of people to get jobs.

Secondly, the company or institution may get less profit because of the workers are not in their first-rate condition. It is related to the productivity and the capability of each person to do their work in certain age. We know that there is a decreasing capability for some people who get older, even they may loss it. Their contribution to the companies where they work may be less than before, when they are still in productive age.

Later, people who get older tend to be ill more frequently. The increasing number of older people and also combined with the increasing of healthcare cost, make the government has to make the funding post-retirement for this case. It becomes a political issue in every country (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retirement). Thus, we need a policy to regulate the retirement age.

But for some kinds of occupation, such as scientists, musicians, lawyers, politicians, and doctors can work until they are in the late of 70s. Because the more time they do the job, the more experience they have. Such as, doctors who often do surgeries, they will become an expert in that sector.

In conclusion, I just want to say that a country, especially development country, should determine the retirement age. For Indonesia, I think 60 is an appropriate age to retire for employees. But we cannot determine the age retirement precisely for people with jobs, that has been described above. The age retirement in our country can be one of solution of the regeneration in a company or institution, so the productivity can increase steadily.