Friday, May 16, 2008

What age should be people retired?

The retirement age varies from country to country. In some countries the average worker is obliged to retire at the age of 50, while in others people can work until they are 65 or 70. Meanwhile, there are some politicians both in our country and other countries enjoy power until they are eighties. So, what age should be people retired?

This essay will explain my argument about until what age people should be encouraged to remain in paid employment.

The variation of retirement age among nations is not apart from many factors. They are political, social, and economic sectors. For instance, the retirement age in developed country is different with developing country, like Indonesia which has different conditions with another country. Thus, it is a little bit difficult to determine the standard of retirement age.

In my opinion, the retirement age is approximately at 65 or 70 because during those ages, people still can work well. Productive age of people is in the range of 20 to 70 (J. Schwartz 2007; The Magic of Thinking Big: 20). According to Wikipedia searching result, it is known that in the United States, most view 65 as normal retirement age. However, the Old Age Survivors Insurance or OASI, better known as the Social Security system has age 62 as the earliest retirement age. Normal retirement age for Social Security has historically been age 65 to receive unreduced benefits, but it is gradually increasing to age 67.

However, the retirement age is not an absolute thing because we must see from many perspectives, not only from one side. Therefore, we can not determine how old a person must be retired, while he has a great potency which is quite beneficial for his surroundings. For example, a professor, lawyer, politician who is really good in their work, it is fine to employ them until death if they want.

In conclusion, the age people encouraged to remain in paid employment is in the point where a person’s productivity decreased dramatically. It is estimated about in the range 65 and 70.

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