March 29, 2016

Work Absenteeism Tied to Money Stress

Most of us know how distracting and stressful it is when our credit card balance creeps up or there’s a gap between a bill’s due date and when our paycheck gets deposited.

But financial stress can also create serious problems at work like absenteeism, problems that can turn around and compound the financial problems.

More than one in four employees who said they deal with “financial stress” admit that it interferes with how well they do their jobs, says a new survey of 5,000-plus workers by the consulting firm Willis Towers Watson.

It also increases absenteeism. The study found that workers stressed about their finances are absent from work 3.5 days per year, on average – nearly double the absenteeism of people who are not stressed. And when the worriers are at work, they are “highly distracted” – this distraction can gobble up 12 additional days per year, interfering with how well they do their jobs, the survey found.

The workers expressed broader concerns than their unpaid bills, too, said Steve Nyce, a senior Willis Towers Watson economist. Many are very concerned about their long-term financial future and retirement. …Learn More

March 22, 2016

Rise in Fraud Reports is Unrelenting

A nearly three-fold increase over the past decade in the number of fraud and related complaints filed with the Federal Trade Commission has pushed the total to 1.7 million filings in 2015, according to the government’s consumer 2015 data book released this month.

As Squared Away reported recently, older Americans are often the most vulnerable, as their cognitive abilities decline or they become more socially isolated. Not surprisingly, the FTC said Florida had the highest rate of reported fraud per resident last year (followed by Georgia, Michigan, Texas, and Nevada).

One reason for the increase in complaints is that people are increasingly aware of fraud and more likely to report it. Another is that fraud-reporting agencies such as law enforcement and consumer groups are increasingly aware they can file complaints with the FTC. But 1.7 million allegations of fraud, identity thefts, and other scams is, by any yardstick, a lot of complaints.

The typical loss was $400 for an individual fraud complaint. There is evidence that more people are getting savvy: a smaller share of the people who filed 2015 complaints said they turned over any money to their scammers than in previous years. … Learn More

March 10, 2016

A Familiar Dilemma: to Work or Retire

This profile is the first in an occasional series about individual baby boomers who either have retired or are facing the retirement decision.  

Jane Kisielius is at that age – 63 – when she is being pushed and pulled between the work world and the retirement lifestyle that her husband already inhabits.

She retired once – temporarily – in August 2014 from a stressful job as head of the nursing team for the public schools in Quincy, a suburb southeast of Boston. But with her administrative and nursing skills in such demand, she was quickly sucked back into the labor market, this time as a part-time coordinator of a wellness program for Quincy residents. She was asked to help run the new, grant-funded education program after bumping into the commissioner of the Quincy Health Department.

“The job fell in my lap,” she said. “It was kind of hard to pass it up.”

So here Jane sits, wrestling with when she’ll really retire, as she drinks her morning coffee at the kitchen table in her orderly home, a stone’s throw from the historic home of presidents John Adams and John Quincy Adams. …Learn More

February 2, 2016

No-Free-Lunch Seminars for Seniors

Economists like to joke about free lunches. The subtext is that there’s a cost to everything.

A free lunch is also literally how high-pressure financial companies sometimes lure older Americans into a room to hear their investment pitches. The FINRA Investor Education Foundation says some 6 million older Americans have attended seminars in return for a free lunch. Every year, my mother’s retirement community outside of Orlando hosts a handful of these seminars, which are presented by financial firms, insurance companies, and even funeral homes.

FINRA warns that they can pressure seniors into making “unsuitable, even fraudulent investments.” The above FINRA video explains what’s behind the free-lunch presentations and proposes some questions that people can ask to determine the legitimacy of what’s being sold.

But it’s probably better to do what my mom does: find something fun to do instead.Learn More

January 12, 2016

Retirement Just Might Be Boring

Over the long Christmas holiday, I got a sneak preview of what retirement could be like. Frankly, it was a little boring.

I fully appreciate that most workers don’t have the perk provided by my employer, Boston College, which gives us generous time off between Christmas and New Year’s. By cashing in a few unused vacation days prior to Christmas, I was able to string together 16 glorious days off.

It felt like a lifetime.

After cleaning off my desk, running long-neglected errands, reading a book about the sinking of the Lusitania, wrapping gifts, stocking the pantry, going to a holiday party, exercising at the gym, seeing most of the 2015 Oscar contenders at local cinemas, and getting together with friends, I still struggled to fill my days. It’s even more challenging when the winter cold descends.

I’m developing a better understanding of why some people continue working well into their 60s, even 70s. Research covered in our prior blog posts shows that older workers are more likely to delay their retirement if they have more education. That’s because their jobs are often interesting. I’m a good example – blogging usually doesn’t feel like work. This is much different than trying to continue in increasingly difficult physical work, such as waitressing or working on an assembly line.

At age 58, my growing anxiety about retirement is in stark contrast to my husband’s anticipation that his rapidly approaching retirement – he’s 62 – will be nirvana. After three decades pouring his heart and soul into teaching high school biology in inner-city Boston, he relishes the prospect of a stress-free retirement collecting his pension. I’ve encouraged him to think about how he will be spending his winter days in retirement when activity becomes more important than the relaxation he craves in his time off now. …Learn More

December 8, 2015

Age Discrimination Affects Women More

Some people might plan to work well into their 60s if they can’t afford to retire, or if they just think they’ll be around a long time. But this strategy is more difficult for women to execute than for men.

A study of employer discrimination in hiring found “strong and robust” evidence that female job applicants in their mid-60s were much less likely to be called in for interviews for low-skill jobs than were younger women. Evidence of age discrimination among older men was more mixed, or even non-existent in one occupation.

“It seems there was age discrimination for women – no matter what,” said Patrick Button, an economist at Tulane University.

To conduct their meticulously designed study, the researchers sent out more than 40,000 mock applications for jobs advertised online in 12 cities. The “applicants” fell into three age groups – 29-31, 49-51, and 64-66 – and submitted resumés in four job categories: retail sales, office administration, security guard, and janitor.

The results confirmed age discrimination, showing a clear decline in callback rates in three of the four occupations – administration, sales, and security – as the workers progressed from their late 20s and early 30s into their mid-60s. … Learn More

December 3, 2015

Is Betting on Fantasy Sports Addicting?

“The best adrenaline rush ever,” says one of the barrage of fantasy sports commercials broadcast into living rooms this football season.

An adrenaline rush is known to be a hallmark of addiction to other types of gambling, which can trigger the brain’s pleasure center much like the triggers in a drug addict’s brain, according to University of Cambridge psychologists.

Hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of Americans are playing fantasy football and other sports online for money. The Internet has made this so accessible that it could facilitate the rapid-fire betting associated with problematic gambling.

Playing fantasy sports is “as easy as ordering a pizza online … [or] texting your friends,” a relapsed gambler told the New York Times. He said he lost nearly $20,000 on football, tennis, and Japanese basketball. And losing is easy but the odds of winning are long: an investigation by the New York State attorney general found that 1 percent of players “receive the vast majority of the winnings” paid out by two prominent sports fantasy websites. …Learn More