4 Topic Commentaries

When will I be able to retire?

• 

  Nicole Maestas, PhD

  Associate Professor of Health Care Policy

  •

  Harvard Medical School

  The research to date is mixed, but it tends toward the positive — that is, for many people, there are health benefits to working longer.

  [Source]
• 

  Lotte Bailyn, PhD

  T. Wilson (1953) Professor of Management, Emerita

  •

  MIT Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

  It’s a process. It takes time. It can take many years.

  [Source]
• 

  Joseph F. Coughlin, PhD

  Director, MIT AgeLab

  •

  Massachusetts Institute of Technology

  We have this story, which itself is only about 100 years old, that birthdays predict everything, that at a certain age you retire, hold back from life, and don’t do certain things.

  [Source]
• 

  Olivia S. Mitchell, PhD

  Professor of Business Economics and Public Policy; Executive Director, Pension Research Council

  •

  The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

  We are revisiting what we mean by retirement, and it’s very clear that the definition of what people do even into their 70s is changing a lot, and people are continuing to work full time, continuing to work part time, and that has increased more for women than for men.

  [Source]