What will you do when you retire?

Nigel Luck, 21 September 2012

This started with a concern of mine about the looming prospect of retirement. What would I do and how would I afford it? I've never really thought about it until my son was born and i don't want to stop working in the Arts but one day I might have to and it's a scary prospect frankly!

Some of the people in the discussion had already retired (sort of) although they're still very busy and still working, albeit unpaid. But that's not unusual in the Arts anyway is it. Andy retired as a puppeteer as he felt he could no longer cope with the physical demands of performing but he found he really missed the stimulation and creative input of his work. He's since gone back to performing, not full time but enough to keep him engaged. What was interesting was that he felt the time out had been useful in allowing him a better perspective on his work and time to recoup some energy and enthusiasm.

HERE'S WHAT WE PROPOSE

Retirement shouldn't be a finite cut off date. Not a I'm working, now I'm not. But that we need to rethink how we approach the idea of work, and not just in the arts.

Time out seems important and perhaps there should be a system whereby you get a some retirement time allocated which you can take at certain points n your career to have a break. Or retirement could be worked as a phasing out rather than a complete stop so hours are reduced as you move towards retirement.

Tags: retirement