Kevin Page: Have I left it too late to retire?

One could say the light at the end of the tunnel is now somewhat brighter, writes Kevin Page.

My contemporaries and I have begun talking about retirement. Hopefully we've not left it too late.

To be fair though, we've had other things on our minds. The discussion has been one of natural progression.

As we've aged, talk around the barbecue has gone from the football we played earlier that day, to work and the all consuming mortgage, to plans for the kids' 21st and finally to the various aches and pains we have been suffering as a result of all that football we played years ago.

Now, finally, we are starting to sit up and take notice when politicians start to make noises about shifting our retirement age.

Sure, most of us have got a few years to go before we get there - Blackburn Football Club's greatest supporter (yes, they do have one) and his beloved still look like 16-year-olds - but all of a sudden retirement for most of us is not 35, 30, or even 20 years away. It's really just around the corner - or at least it was until some politicians started talking about moving it further away.

I have to admit I've basically ignored the retirement issue for years and left it to the politicians to sort out.

I've pretended I've got heaps of time and I don't need to worry about it. Then I turned 50. Retirement at 65 now seems alarmingly close.

One could say the light at the end of the tunnel is now somewhat brighter, although that could be because I have new glasses.

Anyway.

Apparently, I'm not the only one who has ignored this issue, particularly in how we (you, me and everybody else currently plodding along without a care in the world) pays for it, especially with an ageing population.

Our illustrious leaders, the National Party, are being accused of sticking their head in the sand by their support party, Act. Its leader, Jamie Whyte, has taken his foot out of his mouth over other issues long enough to suggest National needs to be honest about looming superannuation and healthcare affordability.

Not much chance of that though, by the look of it. Big John has drawn a line in the sand and said he'll chuck it all in (and presumably sail off to his own retirement mansion in Hawaii) if the qualifying age for super is raised.

Labour says it needs to go up because we can't afford it. There will be a "fiscal blowout" if we don't do something and a sudden rise in the retirement age would be inevitable.

For the uninitiated in matters of economics, a "fiscal blowout" is not a tyre puncture on a Japanese car. It's a bit worse.

At least a Japanese car has a spare tyre. Okay, it might be a tiny one that looks like it's come off a kid's go-kart. But it will get you home.

It is unlikely the AA will be able to help get us home if we have a fiscal blowout, even if we have been members for 35 years and have all our insurance with them as well.

A "fiscal blowout" basically means we won't have enough money coming in to pay for our retired population. So we'll all have to work longer to contribute more.

Luckily, our crowd understands this and we are all prepared to do our bit to save the country from rack and ruin.

We've all jumped into KiwiSaver with both feet and with a bit of luck I'll have enough saved up for a room when the Rotorua Daily Post finally dumps me off at the rest home gates - presumably at 4am when they deliver the paper and there's nobody around to dob them in for littering.

But in the main, my clever solution is I'm resigned to the fact I'll just have to keep working to fund my retirement. Mrs P has also worked out her Briscoes expeditions cost money, so she's planning to keep working as well.

The one thing in our favour though is that we, and our crowd, are at least talking about it. Whether or not we've left it too late is another thing.

If we have, then getting the AA to fix a puncture on our Japanese car might be the least of our worries.

Kevin Page has been a journalist for 34 years. He hasn't made enough money to retire after writing about serious topics for years so he's giving humour a shot instead.