In the packed hall, an audience of flickering bluish faces stare raptly as Janet Leigh's sister looks up, then down the creaky staircase. Having seen snippets of "Psycho," I had found the movie's shower scene only moderately unnerving. But now, as my fellow students cheer and stomp, the sister enters the cellar, turns the chair — and I scream. Just like Janet Leigh.
Grace Kelly and Anthony Dawson in 'Dial M for Murder,' 1954It startles and annoys the more worldly college kids around me, but Alfred Hitchcock would have been proud.
Hollywood's Golden Age is defined as ending in the early 1960s — so as a young boomer, I missed it entirely. Grown up among dairy farms and apple orchards, where our heavy Zenith TV brought in 2½ channels, there was no chance to catch up on much except the annual showing of "The Wizard of Oz."
For a rural kid who, by age 18, had seen just six movies in a theater, this was a revelation akin to being whirled out of the monochrome flatness of Depression Kansas.
But years before the arrival of cable and streaming services like Turner Classic Movies and the Criterion Channel, immersion in 1940s and '50s movies came from an unexpected source. My university had no film course that I'm aware of, but it did offer so many film series in massive lecture halls, library meeting rooms and the student union, that an observant moviegoer could practically minor in cinema.
A Whole World Opens
I saw roughly 200 films over four years. This astonishes friends now when I mention it, but really, it works out to seeing just three movies every two weeks, hardly a startling number. If a roommate, friend or date wanted to go, great. If not, I'd go alone — just me and some 30 to 500 other students, soaking up thrillers and comedies, dramas and vivid musical extravaganzas.
For a rural kid who, by age 18, had seen just six movies in a theater, this was a revelation akin to being whirled out of the monochrome flatness of Depression Kansas.
Through film, I could travel to Ireland, Japan, Morocco. Marie Curie's lab, ancient Rome and Paris during the French Revolution. Never mind that documentaries were not exactly a thing yet and Cecil B. DeMille's epics were often filmed in California . . . that was the magic of cinema, n'est-ce pas?
Sharing a Love of the Cinema
It was also a bit of a family affair. On college drop-off night, the movie shown outdoors for hundreds of families was 1933's "Duck Soup." (Groucho Marx: "Why, a four-year-old child could understand this report. Run out and find me a four-year-old child.") Nothing like a roar of laughter to kick off freshman year.
My grandfather used to say Claudette Colbert was his favorite star and watching "It Happened One Night" (1934) made me see what he meant. She and Clark Gable peeking around her improvised room-dividing curtain cracked me up, as did her showing some leg on the roadside to stop a passing driver. (Three years later, in "Way Out West," Stan Laurel of Laurel & Hardy stopped a stagecoach by doing the same thing.)
It was interesting coming to my own conclusions on some films. In my father's eyes, James Bond was a tough guy, a world saver, a ladies' man. Seeing early Connery and Roger Moore for myself, I decided he was a human cartoon character. Space hijackings, hopscotch on crocodiles . . . James, really?
A Lifelong Love Begins
Part of my college education involved expanding my vocabulary, and the films I watched contributed to that. From movies, for instance, I learned the meaning of "gams" (legs), "gumshoe" (private detective), "stool pigeon" (informer), "a dame" (woman), "kisser" (mouth) and "going on the lam" (fleeing the police or some other threat).
Film noir. My early-1980s campus was awash with these 1940s and early '50s stylized mystery and crime dramas, the atmospheric ones with underworld characters scheming behind Venetian blinds, on dark, wet pavement and in shadows — everywhere shadows.
I was astonished to see Fred MacMurray, the affable father of TV's "My Three Sons," as an amoral murderer.
In "Double Indemnity" (1944), I was astonished to see Fred MacMurray, the affable father of TV's "My Three Sons," as an amoral murderer. (No spoiler here. Per the Hays Code, it's all in the first scene.) In "Laura" (1944), Dana Andrews fell for Gene Tierney's portrait, and I fell for Dana Andrews. In a classic plotline, Ray Milland was an innocent family man in "The Big Clock" (1948) forced to search for a killer while being framed for that very crime.
My spouse and I recently caught two of Hitchcock's best, "Dial M for Murder" and "Shadow of a Doubt." "Noir represents a fascinating meeting point of American and European styles and sensibilities," writes Kat Bello in The Collector blog. "The constant twists, betrayals, red herrings and double and triple crosses aim to constantly disorient the viewer. Film noir is never as concerned with the reveal of the mystery as it is with the psychological dimensions of crime."
I was able to draw the connection between this 1940s genre I instantly adored and 1974's cynical, corruption-ridden "Chinatown" (which took place in 1937). It may have arrived three decades later, in color and with a tremendous amount of sunlight, but "forget it, Jake" — it's still film noir.
Requisite Academic Connections
Several movies actually did complement my college studies. Those wacky 1950s monster and alien flicks ("The Blob!" "Invasion of the Body Snatchers!") and "Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb" (1964) provided insight into the neurotic early days of the Cold War. "The Third Man," filmed on location in Vienna in 1948, offered viewers a you-are-there look at Austria immediately after World War II.
Reading "For Whom the Bell Tolls," Ernest Hemingway's antifascist Spanish Civil War epic, and then watching the movie version filmed in 1943 amid WWII made for a gripping two-fer. (Did Ingrid Bergman, who starred in "Casablanca" as well as "For Whom the Bell Tolls," make a habit of playing stoic wartime heroines?)
Learning about the intricacies of the civil rights movement in the 1950s and '60s was eye-opening; encountering the blackface and cringeworthy racial references in such otherwise delightful films as "A Day at the Races" (1937) and "Holiday Inn" (1942) was eyebrow-raising.
Ever use "gaslight" to mean the psychological manipulation of someone to get them to doubt their own sanity? See the 1944 film that gave birth to the term.
When sociology courses examined the collapse of female employment and the push to diminish women's prominence after World War II, I saw this echoed in the difference between "Baby Face" (1933), in which a young Barbara Stanwyck cheerfully slept her way to the top in business, and "Marjorie Morningstar" (1958), in which our heroine Natalie Wood had romantic misadventures only to (apparently) settle down as a housewife.
Of course, the Hays Code also had something to do with that. But societal changes don't occur in a vacuum.
Why 'Old Movies'?
Not only were some of our best films made in the 1930s through the 1960s, but the best of recent films are influenced by those before them.
"Mank" (2022), which won two Academy Awards and was nominated for eight others (it won two), tells the story of Herman J. Mankiewicz, the screenwriter who collaborated with Orson Welles on the script for "Citizen Kane" (1941); together, those movies make a perfect double feature. "La La Land" (2016) doesn't hide its connections to 1950s and '60s films of all kinds.
You'll get more out of "The Aviator" (2004) if you've seen Katherine Hepburn, Ava Gardner and Errol Flynn rule the screen themselves. "Star Wars" (1977) was said to be a Western set in space, a "yee-hah" rehash of the serials and adventure pics of George Lucas's boyhood. And so on.
Ever use "gaslight" to mean the psychological manipulation of someone to get them to doubt their own sanity? See the 1944 film that gave birth to the term.
Betty Bacall's Pursed Lips
Without knowing old movies, you won't understand some of the greatest lines, either. "Well, nobody's perfect." "Rosebud." "Goodness had nothing to do with it." "Today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth." "You know how to whistle, don't you, Steve?" Eighty years after Lauren Bacall purred that to her future husband Humphrey Bogart in "To Have and Have Not," viewer reaction is still "Whew!"
Whether your exposure to the Golden Age is through a home screen or years of theatergoing, the experience is both enjoyable and enlightening. "To me, the perfection of classic movies is the pure art of the story," says Bennett Garner Green in The Odyssey. The plot and characters keep you gasping, guessing, laughing or swooning . . . no special effects needed.


When the Pictures Were Big

Ellen Ryan

On March 15, the National Association of Realtors announced that it had reached a $418 million settlement with litigants who had won a huge lawsuit that determined the traditional real estate commission structure to be illegal.
Historically, American home-selling transactions pivoted on a convoluted commission structure: the home seller paid 5% to 6% of the sale price to the agent that listed their house, who then split that commission with the agent who represented the buyer.As of July, agents will not be allowed to dictate commissions through listings on the powerful and universally used multiple listing services. At the same time, home buyers who want agents to represent them will have to put that representation agreement in writing.
Sellers and buyers have been handed unprecedented power. Now, they have to figure out how to make the most of it.
In short: if you're selling, you don't have to pay the buyer's agent anything, and you can negotiate how much you pay the agent who lists your house on the MLS.
If you're buying, you'll have to decide how and how much to pay an agent to represent you — if you decide that working with an agent is worth anything at all.
Unprecedented Power
Sellers and buyers have been handed unprecedented power. Now, they have to figure out how to make the most of it.
It'll be a steep learning curve. Until now, there hasn't been much wiggle room at all — which was the entire point of a huge lawsuit that the real estate industry lost back in October.
Even if you've bought and sold houses in the past, you might not be up to speed on how commissions work — not surprising, given that the industry has hidden behind its convoluted system.
Historically, American home-selling transactions pivoted on a convoluted commission structure: the home seller paid 5% to 6% of the sale price to the agent that listed their house, who then split that commission with the agent who represented the buyer.
The MLS as Leverage
Technically, that commission has always been negotiable. In practice, not so much, for two reasons. First, dictates by real estate associations required listing agents to comply with the commission structure as a condition of putting any house in the powerful and universally used multiple listing databases. Meanwhile, agents agreed amongst themselves that they would resist lower commissions anyway.
I've dealt with this for over 40 years as a home buyer, seller and as the former real estate editor for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. My own experience, as recently as December, is that agents count on sellers to fall in line with the commission structure.
As my husband and I started exploring the process of selling our suburban house in Charlotte, North Carolina, I interviewed several agents. When I began negotiating the commission for listing our house and paying the agent for the eventual buyer, they laughed. All of them. Right there at my kitchen table.
Your Choice: Us or No One
Proving the point of the lawsuits, the agents told me point-blank that if we offered anything but the traditional 2.5% to buyers' agents, those agents would direct clients away from our house, using any conjured-up pretext — school district, traffic, noise, a crack in the sidewalk — to push buyers to pursue any house but ours.
I doubt they're still laughing. According to the NAR's announcement, in July, the two new rules go into effect for agents using the multiple listing services (that also feed listings to Zillow, Trulia and other online sites):
Agents cannot dictate broker compensation through MLS listings;Agents representing buyers must have written agreements with those buyers.Whether you're selling or buying, you'll have to find your negotiating voice. (Because this is such a confusing and hot topic, I created a Facebook page where buyers and sellers can share negotiating tactics.)
Here's Where to Start
If You're Selling:
Make sure you understand all the costs of putting your house on the market and how the listing commission affects your net from the sale. If, like many baby boomers, you’ve been living in your house for a long time, you might have to pay long-term capital gains taxes on your house. And, you might have to seriously de-clutter to make sure the house presents and photographs well for those all-important online listings. Be sure you have a complete financial picture so you can understand how the listing commission further reduces the bottom line of your sale.If I were opening conversations now with agents about listing, instead of a few months ago, I’d state my commission expectations up front, so as to not waste time with agents who insist that the rule changes don’t apply to them.Ask a listing agent for a detailed breakout of the tasks they’ll complete so you can see exactly what you’re getting for the commission.If the listing agent insists that you offer a buyer’s commission for any buyer’s agent to take your house seriously, ask them to require every buyer’s agent to disclose the terms of their contract with their buyer, up front. If the buyer’s agent is being paid separately by their buyer, you should know that, so you can scale down or eliminate the buyer’s agent commission.If You're Buying:
Brace for an onslaught of contracts that you’ve never seen before.Ask early for the buyer’s agent agreement so you can understand exactly how the agent will be paid. Within the real estate industry, agents have been increasingly requiring buyers to sign buyers’ contracts, so any agent should have one at the ready.If the agent representing you, the buyer, insists their services are “free” because the seller will pay the commission in full, in the traditional mode, that means the agent will represent the seller’s best interests — not yours.If you don't have to sell or buy for a while, take time to see how the industry resets. It will take a while for contracts and communication to realign with the new rules. Use the time to clarify what's important to you so you can negotiate from a position of strength, and use your new power to get what you most want.


The Real Estate Commission War Is Over

Joanne Cleaver

My 28-year-old daughter was my personal dresser for my 70th birthday party. Her mission: to transform me from college prof preppie into a party gal. I planned to teach my 6 p.m. class, then rush to meet my husband and a few friends at a favorite sushi restaurant. I might have been turning 70, but I could still embrace an 8:30 p.m. soirée — avoiding my parents' habit of early bird dinners.
Candy Schulman on her 70th birthdayRummaging through my closet, my daughter inspected the green silk blouse I'd chosen. She noticed a nearly invisible spot on the front. Embarrassed, I wondered if my mother had felt this way in her eighties, when I used to point out small stains on her clothing.
"I haven't bought clothes in two years," I said. The last dress I'd worn had been at my wedding 47 years ago.
It was twenty minutes before I had to leave for class. "I mark my students late, not vice versa."
Oblivious to the time, my daughter rifled through hangers, tossing rejects over her shoulder. "Don't you have anything new?"
"I haven't bought clothes in two years," I said. The last dress I'd worn had been at my wedding 47 years ago.
My closet was turning into a rummage bin. "I never liked your three-quarter sleeved blouses," my young stylist said. "Don't you have a black tank top?"
'When You Get to Be My Age' 
"Tank top?" I said, as if she'd asked me to don my birthday suit for my party. "I don't wear tank tops anymore. I don't like my arms. You'll see, when you get to be my age."
She stood still with a questioning gaze. "I will?"
Immediately I regretted my words. I was a dedicated lap swimmer and a cyclist. When I flexed my arm, my biceps were impressive. Yet I could never strengthen the triceps, the underneath part that connects the shoulder to the elbow, now noticeably sagging. 
My daughter was a size zero. I came from large-boned Eastern Europeans, but she'd inherited the petite structure of my husband's family.
"Don't worry," I said, "your arms will always be awesome."
"Mom," she said in a stern yet supportive tone. "Your arms are the least interesting part of you."
I wanted to savor her comment, one of the most meaningful she'd ever conveyed. It was what I'd always hoped she'd internalize as I guided her into adulthood in a culture of women's Photoshopped faces.
"Mom," she said in a stern yet supportive tone. "Your arms are the least interesting part of you."
My arms were the least interesting part of me. These nine words were the greatest gift. She admired me for my professional achievements, my company, my wisdom (sometimes). On my birthday card she wrote that I was her "best friend and confidante." Raising a daughter who loved all of me, including my drooping triceps, was my greatest accomplishment.
She found a tank top that I wore with my one and only elegant outfit to every special occasion — hoping no one would notice. She pulled out a pair of knit pants, part of a classic suit my mother had bought me when I visited her in Florida after my father died. A designer price tag too expensive for my teacher's salary, the outfit was thirty years old. I'd assumed it had gone out of style.
My daughter held up the pants. "Ooooh, this is the rage now! Everyone loves loose-fitting pants."
Add to her list of compliments: I was cool. Kind of.
She pulled out two pairs of sandals I'd abandoned years ago in favor of sneakers with orthotics. I modeled both pairs until she approved the best look. Admiring her finished product, she said, "You have to feel comfortable."
"I can pull it off," I said, unsure. "But won't my students notice how dressed up I am?"
"No way," she said, laughing. "How about mascara?"
It had been so long since I'd worn the little make-up I owned. Quickly I dabbed my eyelashes and tossed a bright red lipstick in my backpack. "I'll put that on after class."
Updated and Renovated 
She tied a lightweight black sweater over my shoulders and pronounced me ready to celebrate. "The only thing that doesn't match is the backpack," she joked. I was updated and renovated, in old clothes that were now hip. 
The day after making a 90th birthday party for my mother, I escorted her to the mall. In a dressing room in Bloomingdale's, I helped her find a brassiere, trying to fasten the snaps with the finesse of a lingerie saleswoman. 
The first time I saw her breasts was when I was still a flat-chested preteen, yearning to be as developed as my friends; I was shocked at how large they were — she was only a "B" cup, but she looked as zaftig as my well-endowed grandmother. Now Mom's breasts looked droopy and deflated, surrounded by folds of skin that hung from her torso. She stared at us in the mirror.
Did my daughter realize that our roles were making the tiniest paradigm shift? If not, when would she?
"You've become my mother," she said.
Did my daughter realize that our roles were making the tiniest paradigm shift? If not, when would she? Recently she'd mentioned that I'd begun to walk a bit slower, more an observation than a criticism. I'd also noticed that with my mother. She'd been so energetic that I'd have to increase my speed to keep up with her. Then one day I consciously began to slow down my urban pace, as if Mom had suddenly changed gears overnight. It was after her 70th birthday.
I'd been the one who expressed an urge to have a 70th birthday party. "What do you need a party for?" my photographer husband had asked; he disliked being the center of attention.
Good question. It was a big day; an official marker seemed relevant. Throughout the pandemic I'd had to give up socializing and abandon activities that lifted my spirits and soul. I missed holidays, birthdays and other major milestones with friends and family. It was time to come out of hibernation.
My husband and I hadn't been able to celebrate his mother's 100th birthday, as her nursing home kept going into quarantine with COVID outbreaks. We sang "Happy Birthday" on FaceTime.
"Have I died yet?" my mother-in-law asked. We reassured her otherwise.
"My best friend here's starting to act old. I don't like that," she said.
Plenty of Life In Me 
I had plenty of life left in me. Which is why I brainstormed birthday ideas with my daughter, deciding on something intimate yet jubilant. Just our closest friends, including my husband's best friend since first grade.
 The entire restaurant sang "Happy Birthday," which would have humiliated me decades ago.
On the big night, I dismissed my class ten minutes early, telling them it was my birthday. They cheered, many still in their early twenties. They could not imagine ever turning 70, just as I couldn't anticipate me at 100. 
I dashed into the ladies' room, mostly to pee and also to apply the Hot Mama lipstick I rarely wore. In the mirror I gazed at the pair of small diamond stud earrings in my lobes, inherited from my mother. I was bringing her memory to the party too.
I walked to the restaurant more tentatively in my sandals than in my New Balance sneakers. The ages around the table ranged from 28 to 75. My daughter brought her homemade strawberry shortcake, a two-day project. One sparkler surrounded by six candles. The entire restaurant sang "Happy Birthday," which would have humiliated me decades ago. 
My daughter snapped a photo on her phone before I blew out the candles in one breath. I was beaming, bare-armed in my sleeveless tank top.


My Bare-Armed 70th Birthday

Candy Schulman

Baby boomers' decades-long domination of the economy, power and culture in America is ending, says Washington Post columnist Philip Bump in his new book, "The Aftermath: The Last Days of the Baby Boom and the Future of Power in America."
The result, he writes, is "a historic disruption of the American Empire."
Author Philip BumpThe 69.6 million U.S. boomers — down from their 78.8 million peak — were born between 1946 and 1964 and are now age 59 to 77. The generation has been surpassed in size by 72 million millennials, who are age 27 to 42 and often the boomers' kids.
Because of the boomer generation's large size relative to the country's overall population, it has long been referred to as "the pig in the python" of the nation and Bump told me during our Zoom interview that "we're now at the tail end" of that.
Intergenerational Tension
In our conversation, Bump — a Gen Xer who lives in upstate New York — shared his insights about the aftermath of the boomers' ascendancy and what this means for them as well as the rest of the country. Following are highlights of the discussion, edited for brevity and clarity:
Next Avenue: There are still nearly 70 million boomers, including me. Why did you call the book 'Aftermath?'
Philip Bump: The predicate for the book was always this generational shift from older to younger. . . . There has been this increasingly obvious tension between those two groups.
"America has to figure out how it's going to do more to take care of its increasingly large older population"
What became very apparent while working on the book was that a lot of this tension derives from the scale of the boom itself and the effect it had on the United States and on boomers themselves.
We've gotten to the point of transition that we're seeing it really is about the baby boom losing the power it accrued over the past 60 years. So, the book became a look at the aftermath of this shock to the American system.
The baby boom has at no point until now actually faced real competition for its power, both economic and political. Even Gen X (people born from 1965 to 1980) didn't compete with the boomers; there just weren't that many of us.
And the millennials?
America has to figure out how it's going to do more to take care of its increasingly large older population, but this increasingly large younger population is saying, 'Hey, we need a lot of resources, too, for child care and schools.'
A Historic Disruption Is Afoot
Why do you say we're living through a historic disruption of the American Empire?
That language is definitely grandiose, but it is the case that the United States as it exists today is a function of accommodating the baby boom. America's decision makers have for a long time been responsive to the scale of the baby boom — marketers, politicians, everybody. Now, we are seeing the baby boom's grip on the direction of the United States lessen.
What's going on from the standpoint of a power structure and why?
For political power, Congress is a good metric. The average age in Congress, which had increased steadily along with the age of the baby boomers, is starting to dip back down. You see the Democratic party make the decision to overhaul its leadership to be younger as a symbolic manifestation of the shift in generational power.
You see a very real transition of economic power in the sense of institutions that bolster young Americans
The cultural power of the baby boom is still very, very robust; Bruce Springsteen is back on tour, for God's sake. But at the same time, it's nostalgia based, as opposed to innovation, to a large extent.
Boomers' Greatest Hits
If you were going to tick off the most significant positive impacts of the boomer generation, what would they be?
The baby boom helped propel American economic growth. The baby boom was good at pushing back on archaic institutions which led to negative outcomes, like the military industrial complex and Vietnam War. When the baby boom emerged, the civil rights fight was largely over, but it required tending and I think the boom was good at ensuring that those advancements were retained.
The thing that confuses me about the 'OK boomer' phenomenon is that the boomer generation has, by and large, a very good relationship with its kids and vice versa.
There are real reasons why younger Americans feel frustrated. And it's not because older Americans collectively take actions disadvantaging younger people.
"There are real reasons why younger Americans feel frustrated. And it's not because older Americans collectively take actions disadvantaging younger people."
Older Americans are more likely to own homes and are going to try and protect the value of their homes because they see that as a storehouse of wealth they are going to need in retirement.
So, when a city wants to build a big apartment building, [the older people] say; 'You know what? I'd rather not do that because it's going to decrease my home value.' When you have a lot of that happening, it makes it harder for younger people to own a home, even in an apartment building.
And so, there's hostility. It contributes to this sense that the older generation is standing as a blockade against the younger generation when it's not intentional. It's just an aftereffect of the way the system works.
Now we're at this point where because of all these births in 1946 to 1964, we necessarily have to put a lot of resources into what's happening with older Americans. You can see why it's frustrating to younger Americans as a result.
Imagining the Aftermath
When I was reading the book, I felt like you were saying there were some things we know about what the aftermath of boomers is going to mean, there are some things we have a pretty good idea about and some it's impossible to predict. Can you talk about each?
There's very little that we know with certainty. We know that the population of older Americans is going to continue to grow as a percentage of the population over time, barring a shock like COVID.
We know that the Census Bureau expects American demography to grow more diverse, but there are a lot of caveats to that. Younger Americans look different and have different cultural values and backgrounds than older Americans; that contributes to a lot of cultural and political tension.
We don't know what the full effect of climate change is going to be. We know it's going to affect where people want to, and can, buy property. But we don't know what the scale of that looks like.
The Cost of Living Longer
We don't know how long people are going to live. And that's important from an economic standpoint, because if you live to be 105, you're going to spend the last 15 years of your life presumably requiring more care than when you were 30. That costs a lot of money. So, if you have a lot of money now, but then you live that long, you'll have less money to leave to your kids.
One thing that surprised me in your book was the importance of boomer women in leading the resistance in America. Can you talk about that?
This is one of the ways in which the baby boom is maligned by younger Americans often unfairly; it's seen as arch conservative in a lot of ways.
Baby boomers make up a larger percentage of the Republican party than the Democratic party, which I think fosters this perception. But when you look at the backlash to Donald Trump, the immediate response from November 2016 into his presidency, that was really led by an aggregation primarily of older women with college degrees who were speaking out against Donald Trump and reacting forcefully to his politics and particularly his gender politics.
Boomers Are Not All Alike
It's a reminder that the boomer generation isn't homogenous.
One question you raise in the book is whether boomers are disproportionately wealthy and powerful? Are they?
In the aggregate, they have a collective enormous amount of wealth, but there's an enormous number of them. When you do the division, it sort of lands where you would expect.
"Every generation has a broad reputation that is in some ways deserved, in some ways not."
I think this topic fuels some of that generational tension, because younger people are like, 'Look at these wealthy boomers who own their homes, yada, yada, yada.' And the individual boomers respond, 'What are you talking about? I'm not wealthy. I'm scraping to get by, trying to afford my mortgage.'
Of course, when you layer wealth inequality on top, you have a number of boomers who are extraordinarily wealthy, and they add to this cumulative wealth total for the boomers. But then you have a lot of baby boomers who aren't wealthy at all.
Reshaping Retirement
How are boomers redefining retirement?
Boomers who are reaching retirement age are engaging in the workforce in a way that wasn't necessarily the case previously.
There are also a lot of people over 50 who say that age discrimination is keeping them from getting jobs.
There's no question.
Social Security and Medicare are facing solvency problems in the coming years. What's the boomers' connection to that?
There was a huge influx of money into Social Security over the several past decades that now is being drawn down on as boomers are retiring. The question is: Will there be the level of support that people expect and are requiring for their retirement from Social Security?
A Shift on Social Programs
The party that has long been concerned about cutting down spending on Social Security and Medicare has been the Republican party. But the Republican party is now a quarter of people who are of retirement age, much more so than the Democratic party.
So, if you use Fox News as an indicator, Fox News has been talking a lot less about those things in recent years, in part because baby boomers are a large part of the Fox News audience and are going to use these systems in short order.
I think it's likely that the very nature of the Republican party will help inspire it to potentially take a different approach.
Boomer No. 1
You met with Kathleen Casey Kirschling, described as the first baby boomer because she was born on January 1, 1946. I felt like she was apologizing for the baby boom generation and also raising concerns about prospects for the millennials. Am I right?
You are. She's fairly liberal, not hard left; she's a fervent Catholic. I think she does see ways in which America has changed for the worse and for which baby boomers and older Americans can be blamed potentially. So, I think she feels some actual guilt for that.
But she's also very self-aware and probably aware that she's a representative of the baby boom generation and that a lot of younger Americans feel frustrated with them.
She has a house in New Jersey and a house in Florida where she winters. She has that sort of idealized life and I think recognizes that's not as accessible to her kids and their grandkids.
As a Gen Xer, how do you feel about the baby boom generation?
I mean, it's my parents. My parents are both born in '48. Being Gen X is useful here because it allows me to be somewhat clear-eyed about both the boomers and younger people.
Every generation has a broad reputation that is in some ways deserved, in some ways not.


America After the Baby Boom

Richard Eisenberg

"Some of the women I interviewed felt there was a definite connection between their coming out and menopause, whether or not they thought they might have been attracted to women earlier."I was at dinner one winter evening with seven friends. All of us had gone through or were in the midst of going through our menopause. Outdoors, the temperature was a brisk 32 degrees. Yet as I looked around the table in the restaurant, I had to laugh. 
Most women begin this journey from menstruation, to perimenopause, and then to menopause in their mid-forties.
Jane wore a tank top and constantly mopped her face. Marie kept her winter jacket on, zipped up to her neck. I wore a heavy sweater. The rest were clothed somewhere in between. Other than Jane, who complained that it was too hot, we were all comfortable — for the moment.
Most women begin this journey from menstruation, to perimenopause, and then to menopause in their mid-forties. With menopause comes new physical and emotional symptoms. Hot flashes or cold chills, mood swings, crankiness, feelings of sadness or anxiety are just some of the changes that might manifest themselves at this time. Trouble concentrating or feelings of fatigue are others.
Menopause and Women's Sex Drive
Stephanie Faubion, medical director of the North American Menopause Society and director of Mayo Clinic Center for Women's Health says, "Some women also experience lower sexual desire, primarily due to the lack of estrogen. There is a shift from a more spontaneous desire pattern to a more responsive sexual desire pattern where [given the] right place, right time, right partner, right situation, the woman is willing to be sexual, but she may not have spontaneous sexual thoughts or fantasies."
While it is natural for some menopausal women to lack sexual drive and it is true that dryness can make sex uncomfortable (although there are remedies for that), some women, like Evelyn, who had not been keen on having sex with her husband for years, and had been faking headaches, said, "Menopause was a good excuse to cease sexual activities completely. I no longer had to fake headaches."
During menopause, it became obvious to some women that they were in stuck places.
Some women, like Margaret, whose stories are included in the book "M-Boldened: Menopause Conversations We All Need to Have," edited by Caroline Harris, saw menopause as a sign that they were no longer a full woman. 
Margaret said, "I knew exactly when I had my last period. It was heavier than any period I had ever had. For one split second I felt bad. I could never have another baby. I felt like I had lost the ability to feel like a real woman. I felt as though sexually I was facing an end."
Others, in good relationships, noted an increase in sexual activity as, no longer fearful of unwanted pregnancies, they felt freer to enjoy sex.
During menopause, it became obvious to some women that they were in stuck places. They spoke of the chaos and confusion in their lives at that time: from kids leaving home to older parents needing care, and all had retirement looming ahead. While some took up new hobbies, others felt an overwhelming need to make more drastic changes: returning to school, finding more challenging jobs, leaving their marriages.
While some women found little, or no correlation between their sexual desires and menopause, others who left unsatisfying marriages found more compatible mates. And some ended up having better sex than ever before.
Coming Out and Menopause
Some of the women I interviewed for my book, "Married Women Who Love Women and More," felt there was a definite connection between their coming out and menopause, whether or not they thought they might have been attracted to women earlier. Those who had been married wondered if there had been signs they'd just ignored while busy doing what they were supposed to be doing as wives and mothers. They wondered if they had been playing a role while raising their children.
Maria realized that she was attracted to women when she returned to college. She said, "My husband and I had focused on our careers and raising two kids together. Who had time to think of anything else? Then I took a women's study course and my mind seemed to open up. I fell in love with my professor and realized I wanted to be with women."
For Rebecca, menopause and gayness came about almost simultaneously. "I thought it was menopause that was causing me to feel attracted to women. I think that had a lot to do with me waking up to who I authentically was."
The main thing I've learned about menopause is that it is consistently inconsistent.
Betsy said, "I suppressed my attraction to women for three decades until I decided — after 30 years of marriage, a year and half after the hysterectomy that triggered the start of menopause, that I did not want to do that any longer. After more than a year of therapy, I now have a girlfriend. I hope to preserve my marriage and maintain my relationship with my girlfriend forever. She and my husband have met and like each other but my relationship with each of them is separate. We are navigating our situation better than most."
Weight gain, which frequently happens during menopause, hampered the sexual enjoyment for some because cultural ideals equate being thin with being desirable. Some of the women who identified as lesbian or bisexual, however, seemed to be less concerned with their body images, as they were less affected by heterosexual ideals of what a woman should look like.
Joanna said, "Deep inside I've known and had these feelings my whole life. I crushed on and obsessed about girls, and later about women until I finally broke the closet door down. That said, menopause hasn't diminished (maybe enhanced?) my sex drive. My first relationship with another woman was after I began my menopause at 55."
The main thing I've learned about menopause is that it is consistently inconsistent. Very few women shared identical stories. The luckier ones said, "it was easy," or, "nothing really exceptional." Several said, "My period just stopped."
Women in menopause were once expected to be irritable, tired, depressed or all three and we fed into that ageist culture. Fortunately our beliefs have shifted dramatically. We are now seeing more media coverage of strong, energetic menopausal women. We are looking younger and sexier and are changing our cultural negativity about aging and menopause.


'When I Realized I Was Gay, Menopause Arrived.' Was There a Connection?

Carren Strock

With the future of their startup, OME Gear, hanging in the balance, South Carolina entrepreneurs Jules Weldon and Stacey Pierce believed that they had to either give up their dream of owning and running a family business or "go all in" and sell their last substantial asset, their beloved house.
From left, Stacey Pierce and Jules WeldonIt was two days before Christmas 2020, and this was the hardest decision that they had faced in their 10-year, tight-knit relationship, including five years as a married couple.
After maxing out their credit cards, draining their bank accounts and closing their 401(k)s, they were low on options for raising capital needed to keep the business running. They asked each other how much they believed in OME; both answered 100%.
They were convinced of the importance of moving forward, "even when the dream or goal looks impossible," explained Weldon. Added Pierce, "We always look at roadblocks as new opportunities to learn."
Betting the House and Its Contents
Committing wholly to the outdoor-products company meant they had to downsize their lifestyle and lower their personal overhead, Weldon, 52, and Pierce, 51, sold, gave away or threw out 95% of their stuff, including furniture, clothes, kitchen items, a boat, a truck and a golf cart. They put the remaining 5% in storage.
"We were broke, broken and stressed to the max." 
The story of OME Gear began at the shore some 25 years ago when Weldon's parents, Jerie and Paul, saw a single mom wrestling with her beach stuff while spending time with her three children on the sand.
Shortly afterward, her parents invented a two-in-one lounger/dolly initially intended for the beach. But despite their hard work, and success in securing a patent, they lacked sufficient capital to take the product to market. Her parents didn't have the money to keep OME afloat while caring for their family needs and responsibilities. They didn't have the know-how to make it happen, and her mom was busy operating her bakery.
Weldon and Pierce picked up the family dream and pursued it with more hard work, redoubled determination and four additional patents. They persisted despite many setbacks, including the COVID-19 pandemic, which made raising money and manufacturing products extremely difficult.
Trading Down to an RV
The decision to downsize their personal lives came as a result of needing to rescue 2,500 units of their products that the manufacturer was holding in a warehouse in Utah and would not release until Weldon and Pierce came up with the money. "We were broke, broken and stressed to the max," explained Weldon.
Jules WeldonOnce they made the decision to go "all in," a buyer snapped up their single-family house in Charleston, South Carolina, four days after it went on the market. At the time, they did not even know where they were going to live.
They decided to hit the road for two years in an RV, leaving their three-bedroom home in a lovely neighborhood and moving into a 250-square-foot RV with one small closet. As further evidence of their commitment to the business, they wrapped the motorhome in plastic printed with OME Gear branding to promote their outdoor furniture company.
Weldon settled in within a few weeks, but Pierce, a self-proclaimed nester, took a few months to consider the RV her new home.
Stranded in 'Nowhere, Arizona'
They also enjoyed the adventure of being on the open road for two years and learned to laugh at the pitfalls, like the time their car came off the hitch in "Nowhere Arizona" and slammed into the back of the RV they were driving . . . not once but twice.
They quickly learned about life on the road in an RV, such as the fact that everything has to be secure and you have to unhook the toilet and the power each time you pull away from a campsite, and you can't run the microwave and the hair dryer at the same time or you will blow a fuse.
They also moved 55 times and slept in 63 beds in the two years while traveling an eye-popping 73,000 miles.
By being willing to put everything on the line and embrace the possibility of failure, they believe that they set themselves up for success.
While they were on the road, they made more than 200 "cold call pitches" to a variety of small and large companies. "There is no shame in this game," said Pierce. "If people have ears, we are telling them about OME Gear and the Wanderr."
The Wanderr is an innovative, transforming cart that holds up to 150 pounds of gear, rolls easily over any terrain, including soft sand, and can transform into a low beach chair, recliner/lounger, higher off-the-ground camping chair or camping cot. With three optional straps, it can be used as a "hauler" to transport kayaks, paddle boards and surfboards.
Blueprint for a Rich Life
Their quest was about so much more than a product or a business. It became a blueprint for leading their richest and most productive lives, regardless of the obstacles.
"It is imperative that you figure out what you are willing to give up in order to reach those dreams," said Pierce. "When the going gets tough — and it most definitely will — you've already made the decision to not quit. The words 'give up' are not in our vocabulary."
These resilient entrepreneurs say having one another to lean on is the key to getting them through the tough times.
"There are many entrepreneurs who would have given up by now, but having a partner on this journey makes the tough times seem just a little easier," Pierce explains. "One of our mottos is in having each other, our joys are multiplied and our sorrows are divided. This is so true in every aspect of our personal and entrepreneurial lives."
Have a Reliable Partner
Their relationship is absolutely one of the top factors in their tenacity and perseverance levels.
"We embrace the theory of the 'little red wagon,' " Weldon said. "I think having that support from Stacey is everything. Being in our position as an entrepreneur who invented a product is one of the loneliest places that you can be because people don't understand how difficult it is to take a product to market."
"When you have someone else to validate the mission that you've been called to, it makes it so much easier. There have been so many times when we would have given up if we didn't have each other."
This helps them through the rough patches. "People have told us that they think we are crazy," Weldon adds. "But the resilience of the human spirit is nothing short of amazing. We look at one another and wholeheartedly disagree. When you have someone else to validate the mission that you've been called to, it makes it so much easier. There have been so many times when we would have given up if we didn't have each other."
"My husband Paul and I and the entire family are immensely proud of these two women. It means the world to us," said Jules' mother, Jerie Weldon.
"When you look at the extreme struggles they have gone through, we are so proud that they keep persevering, and keep going like the Energizer Bunny," she added. "They might bump or fall down, but it's wonderful to watch their progress."
Jerie Weldon took her own leap of faith when a friend invited her to learn how to decorate cakes early in her 59-year marriage. The mother of two learned a new skill and as her family increased to six children she grew her dreams into The Master's Baker, a successful business now operated by one of her four sons, Chad, in West Chester, Pennsylvania.
In fact, she notes that five of her children are following in her entrepreneurial footsteps. "It's exciting to watch Jules and Stacey step out of their comfort zone and thrive, especially when I know a lot of people would be too frightened to take that first plunge," Jerie said. "How can I not admire their courage and tenacity?"
A Calling, Not a Product
OME stands for Oceans + Mountains = Earth, or Outdoors Made Easy. The idea was to have the company appeal to many outdoor activities. As a result, its products are made for a wide cross-section of nature lovers and adventurers, including those who frequent the beach or the lake, as well as those who enjoy camping, fishing, hunting, tailgating, soccer games and other sporting events.
What Pierce and Weldon love about OME Gear goes beyond the products for which they secured patents. These impassioned entrepreneurs say the major purpose of the company is to open the door to the outdoors for people who find it difficult or decide to avoid it because of all the "stuff" that is required to enjoy a day out in nature.
"We believe we're supposed to have a global impact with our company," Weldon explained. "When I am called to something it is impossible for me to give up."
Sharing Their Story
Beyond building a successful company, these two inspirational women plan to create a platform of influence and positive change. They have won several prestigious innovation awards, are effective motivational speakers, and recently spoke at TEDx Wilmington in Delaware.
In building OME Gear, Weldon explains, "we have come up against some pretty significant obstacles and roadblocks, and our heartbeat is to help fill in the potholes so that those who come behind us, particularly women, will have an easier go at it," she added. They want to grow their company so that they can give back in a big way.
"We have come through so much and persevered," Pierce says. "We know it will be worth it, but even more so, it is worth it now. Who we are becoming as a result of this journey is what this is all about!"
"We have come up against some pretty significant obstacles and roadblocks, and our heartbeat is to help fill in the potholes so that those who come behind us, particularly women, will have an easier go at it."
They hope to buy a new home in South Carolina in the near future, after two and a half years of not having a permanent address, and have no regrets about gambling big on their business. Their beloved RV is on the market ready for the next owners to make their memories.
"There have been moments when Jules and I have been brought to our knees, but the wins have kept us going," says Pierce. "I just never wanted to live in a shoulda, woulda, coulda world. We believe this is so close to being a breakthrough for our future that if we stopped now and looked back, I think we would have regretted that for the rest of our lives."
Weldon adds that, "the hard truth about our journey is that it has required us to give up more than we thought we could."
"But," she continues, "it goes back to the commitment we made during our wedding vows, to live a life with no regrets and one that is filled with lots of adventure!"


Give Up Your Stuff, Not Your Dream

Debra Wallace

In the spring of 2021, we found ourselves at a crossroads. The house was becoming too much —especially the stairs, which were beginning to feel like Everest.
Additionally, we were retired, our kids were grown and the pandemic handed us a gift. With people fleeing the city for the suburbs, the housing market tipped in our favor — both as sellers and buyers — because we chose to go the other direction.
"I needed something more than sunshine and low taxes. Now that the two most fulfilling phases of my life – my career and my marriage – were over, I needed to find ways to expand my orbit, not shrink it."Many of our friends were surprised that we settled on a small condo just north of downtown Chicago instead of some gated or senior community in the Sunbelt. I'm sure my decision was a reaction to growing up on a dead-end street in a homogenized subdivision, where the houses all looked like they rolled off an assembly line.
After college, in my 20s, my first newspaper job brought me to Davenport, Iowa — not exactly the "single girl in the city" escapades of my dreams. Then, marriage and family followed in other zip codes always described as "a good place to raise kids."
Many of our friends were surprised that we settled on a small condo just north of downtown Chicago instead of some gated or senior community in the Sunbelt.
So, after more than four decades in the suburbs, we packed up and moved to where we could get Chinese food delivered at 3 A.M.
My husband and I were like tourists, marveling at all our neighborhood had to offer. Just a short stroll from our front door was a real movie theater showing foreign films rather than the mall multiplex with superheroes on three screens. We could buy freshly-baked croissants, empanadas, sushi and matzo ball soup — all on the same block. 
For one year, we gorged on live theater, free concerts by a world-class symphony and strolling the path along Lake Michigan. Do you want a cafe with a menu devoted to marshmallows? We've got that. How about a store where you can de-stress by cuddling bunnies or a school for pole-dancing?  We've got that, too.
An Ominous Turn 
But then this new chapter took an ominous turn. We were stepping out of an Uber for a Sunday matinee when my husband said suddenly, "My legs aren't working." Our friends each took an arm and dragged him to our mezzanine seats. Afterwards, they went to dinner, and we went to the ER. 
His colon cancer was back with a vengeance; four months later he was gone. This was not part of the plan.
I knew not to make any major decisions while I was in this early fog of widowhood.
Once again, people started asking me about relocating. Don't I want a fresh start? To get out of the place where he had endured so much pain? I could barely muster the energy to get out of bed, how could I possibly manage a move? Besides, I knew not to make any major decisions while I was in this early fog of widowhood.
But it isn't surprising that people push moving because so many of us are uprooting themselves. Baby boomers now make up 39% of all home buyers — the most of any generation —  according to a study released earlier this year by the National Association of Realtors (NAR). This is an increase of 10% over 2022.
"Coming out of the pandemic, people have reconsidered how they want to live," said Jessica Lautz, the NAR's deputy chief economist. "They are living healthier and longer. They want convenience, entertainment and walkability. They are buying condos in the city or inner suburbs — not retirement communities. That's a change dynamic."
Additionally, older adults have the upper hand in the buying market, Lautz explained. "They have the housing equity to afford all the amenities and find their ideal neighborhood, unlike younger generations."
Expanding My Orbit 
Boomers have flipped the script at every stage of life — from women entering the work force in record numbers to getting married later — so it's not surprising that we are revising this next chapter, too.
While "best places" lists typically tout retirement meccas such as Florida, Arizona and Texas, I needed something more than sunshine and low taxes. Now that the two most fulfilling phases of my life — my career and my marriage — were over, I needed to find ways to expand my orbit, not shrink it.
As boomers wrestle with this decision, it really comes  down to one question: How do you want to spend your remaining days? For some, it might be on the golf course or the bridge table. For me, it was culture, food, friends and the arts.
All the activities of this vibrant neighborhood make it easier to build a new life on top of my old one.
So, I've stayed. An art fair here, a yoga class there. Lincoln Park Zoo and the nearby Conservatory warmed me during those dark days of winter, when I feared sliding into the abyss. Sometimes, I met former colleagues at the Michelin-starred restaurant, just 267 steps away. (I know because I counted them). 
To be sure, it's not all roses. Wailing ambulances and honking horns provide a constant soundtrack to urban living and I routinely get hit up for spare change. Shoplifting is so rampant that at my local Walgreens even laundry detergent is kept under lock and key. Rising crime is a concern, of course, as it is in all big cities.
Still, that doesn't stop some well-meaning relatives from worrying that I walk over shell casings to go shopping. What they don't know: All the activities of this vibrant neighborhood make it easier to build a new life on top of my old one. I am alone but rarely lonely.
Steve Leder, in his excellent book "More Beautiful Than Before: How Suffering Transforms Us," shares a story about Yitzhak Perlman, who was about to begin a concerto at Carnegie Hall when one of his strings snapped. The violinist changed the fingerings and played without missing a beat. Perlman later told the audience: "It is my job to make music with what remains."
It doesn't take much — even stumbling across my husband's handwriting in the checkbook — to lob a grenade to my heart. And I am certainly not suggesting that a few farmers markets and street performers will tame this beast called grief. I'm just trying to make a little music.


Why I Don't Live in a Gated Community

Bonnie Miller Rubin

The Best of 2023
Through Dec 29, we're looking back at the 10 stories that most captivated our readers in 2023. The Next Avenue editorial team is pleased to highlight this as one of our most read stories of the year.
It's no secret that grandparents are extraordinary people. They can magically convert a couple of cardboard boxes into a medieval castle, make spaghetti and meatballs out of a misshapen lump of play dough, handle the intricacies of pandemic Zoom school, or calm a sobbing artist whose green crayon has broken at just the wrong moment.
I am not a grandparent, and sadly, I will never be one.
I envy grandparents who receive sticky-fingered kisses and crayoned cards that they plaster all over their refrigerators. I envy that they get to hug their grandbabies, swing the little ones high into the sky, or proudly show off their tween granddaughter's award.It's 1990. I am at a party with a roomful of five-year-olds. My good friend is the birthday boy's mother. A clown is making the children laugh. They stuff pieces of birthday cake in their mouths, and Josh rips open the paper on his presents and says "thank you" just as he's been taught.
I don't have children, and now, I don't have grandchildren. It's the grief that keeps on giving.
Half an hour into the party, I am standing next to a woman with a diamond the size of a large walnut on her finger. As we look at the little ones scampering around the room, she says, "They are so cute! Which one is yours?"
"None of them are mine," I answer. "I don't have any children." There is an awkward silence. "Well, you probably get lots of sleep, then!" she says brightly, and I politely chuckle. No one knows what to say when I tell them I don't have children. It's okay. I'm 38, and I'm pretty used to it.
It's no secret that grandparents are extraordinary people.
Now it's 2021, in a backyard at a still somewhat socially distanced birthday party. The guest of honor is three years old and bright as a copper penny with a smile that could light up the darkest room. Her mother runs around like the proverbial chicken, doing the things moms do at backyard parties.
An older woman stands next to me. We watch a chortling toddler spinning in delirious, delicious circles. "He's so cute," the woman says, adding, "My granddaughter is over there," as she points to a pigtailed munchkin wearing a flowery dress and high-top purple sneakers. "Which one is yours?"
I don't answer. The lump in my throat is too big. None of them are mine. I don't have children, and now, I don't have grandchildren. It's the grief that keeps on giving.
And I didn't realize that not being a parent meant I would never become a grandparent.
Why don't I have children? The answer is complicated — a marriage that ended in divorce at 33, a long period of being single during my prime getting-pregnant years, and a second happy marriage to a man nine years my senior who couldn't envision having a child in college when he was nearing seventy.
A Complicated Answer 
We didn't try to avoid getting pregnant, but we didn't try all that hard to have a baby. There are, of course, other reasons so poignant and confusing that I can't even articulate them to myself, let alone to anyone else.
The bottom line? I didn't have children because I didn't want them enough. Not enough to go through the hurts, disappointments and indignities that others who didn't get pregnant the easy, old-fashioned way went through.
Not enough to have infertility workups or to bombard my body with drugs and needles, to go through intrusive adoption home studies and mounds of paperwork. Not enough to convince my husband that we would make wonderful parents even though we'd be older.
I did none of these things, and then it was too late. And I didn't realize that not being a parent meant I would never become a grandparent.
Our friends are married or coupled, single, straight, gay, childless or parenting. We've laughed and cried at their children's weddings, admired pictures of their grandkids, and tried to ease their sadness when they couldn't be with them during the pre-vaccination COVID days.
One of our friends never had children but married a man with grown sons and became a grandma to two smart, much-loved girls. Last January, my friend Paula became Nonna to tiny Jack, her daughter's first child, finding herself madly, deliriously in love with "this little dude who just lights up my life."
Sandy watched her granddaughter's Zoom wedding and sobbed through the whole thing because she couldn't kiss the bride. Another friend spent an entire year pushing her grandson Mason through virtual first grade, comforting him when he begged, "no more Zoom school, Me-Ma."
The Human Emotion of Envy
Envy is not a pleasant emotion, but it is a human one. I sometimes envy my friends' lives; their Facebook-perfect holidays spent with their grown-up children and their not-so-grown-up grandkids (even though I know and love many of these children and grandchildren.)
Envy is not a pleasant emotion, but it is a human one.
I envy grandparents who receive sticky-fingered kisses and crayoned cards that they plaster all over their refrigerators. I envy that they get to hug their grandbabies, swing the little ones high into the sky, or proudly show off their tween granddaughter's award for first place in a citywide essay contest or their grandson's newly sprouted facial hair.
They deserve, rightfully, to celebrate the unique joy of loving the child or children of their children. "The heart that gives thanks is a happy one, for we cannot feel thankful and unhappy at the same time," writes Douglas Wood, a children's author and songwriter.
I have had a wonderful life with abundant riches, even though children and grandchildren have not been part of the package. It's been way too easy for me to focus on the things I don't have instead of on the many good things I have.
I am trying to be mindful, to be thankful, and to develop the gift of gratitude. Finally, now, it's time for the grief to end.


I Will Never Be a Grandparent

Barbra Williams Cosentino

Inflation is slowing down, hopefully for good. But real interest rates — what you can earn from investing in safe government bonds over and above inflation remain high. Since 2022 real yields on Treasury Inflation Protected Securities (TIPS), also known as inflation-indexed bonds, have gone from below zero to roughly 2%. Where savers were once willing to lend their money to the U.S. government in exchange for limiting their loss, they are now being compensated quite handsomely.
The goal is to have the TIPS provide inflation-adjusted income — a combination of interest and principal payments — in each year to meet some or all of your spending needs.Figure 1. Real interest rates have risen dramatically over the past few years
Source: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
For those preparing for or already in retirement, this is especially good news. Buying individual TIPS that mature across different years — a strategy known as building a TIPS ladder – can help you lock in a stream of inflation-adjusted income for as long as 30 years.
Let's put this into perspective. When real rates were 0% back in early 2022, it cost about $1 million to build a TIPS ladder producing $100,000 of inflation-adjusted income each year for the next 10 years. Now, with real rates near 2%, the same decade of $100,000 of annual inflation-adjusted income costs about $900,000.
Think about that for a minute. The same stream of dollars, precisely the same purchasing power, now costs $100,000 less, letting you spend $10,000 more per year.
Your Financial Plan
What does this mean for your financial plan? Now's a good time to build your TIPS ladder. Doing so can help you lock in a higher living standard without taking unnecessary risk.
Let's be more concrete. Consider the Johnsons, a 70-year-old retired couple with $40,000 a year in Social Security income and $2 million in savings, including $1 million in retirement accounts and $1 million in taxable investments. Back in early 2022, when real rates were 0%, if they had created a financial plan using a planning tool such as MaxiFi Planner, an application sold by a company I run when I'm not teaching, they could have built a TIPS ladder to support their spending over the next 30 years. They could safely afford to spend about $49,671 on discretionary spending, adjusted for inflation, each year through age 100. Discretionary spending is spending on top of fixed expenses, like housing, taxes and Medicare premiums.
Now, with real rates at about 2%, the Johnsons, with the exact same financial goals and resources, can safely afford to spend $69,579. In effect, the higher real return on TIPS has safely increased their discretionary spending in retirement by $19,908 every year for life. That is a 40% increase in their standard of living.
Figure 2. Higher real rates have increased how much the Johnsons can safely afford to spend on their living standard
How to Build a TIPS Ladder
In practice, building a TIPS ladder means buying inflation-indexed Treasury bonds of different maturities, either from your regular assets or a brokerage account in your IRA. The goal is to have the TIPS provide inflation-adjusted income — a combination of interest and principal payments — in each year to meet some or all of your spending needs.
Figuring out how much real annual income you need the ladder to produce, and for how long, is probably the most important question to address first. Start by considering how to build a TIPS ladder that produces at least enough income in addition to Social Security (and any other guaranteed income you may have, like a pension or annuity) to cover all your fixed costs in retirement.
Building a ladder is relatively straightforward. Use an online application like Tips Ladder to determine the best bonds for your situation, and then buy those bonds through your discount broker. It can be done in an afternoon — although getting a real human on the phone is usually best.
Let's consider the hypothetical Johnson family again. Between paying their taxes and covering housing and Medicare-related costs in retirement, their annual fixed spending is projected to be about $60,000, adjusted for inflation, for the next 30 years.
Figure 3. The Johnsons expect to spend about $60,000 per year on fixed expenses in retirement
With $40,000 of inflation-adjusted annual Social Security income, this means the Johnsons will require an additional $20,000 of inflation-adjusted annual income for the next 30 years to cover all of their fixed spending ($60,000 – $40,000 = $20,000). At today's real rate of 2%, this will cost them about $450,000. (Note that when TIPS rates were 0%, the equivalent ladder cost $600,000.) If they wanted to cover some portion of their discretionary spending as well — the turquoise bars in figure 3 — they could invest even more into their TIPS ladder.
Upside Investing Basics
Let's say you want to use TIPS to safely cover all of your fixed spending plus some minimum acceptable level of discretionary spending in retirement — what we'll call your living-standard floor. Having locked in this living-standard floor you can now engage in so-called upside investing, by investing your remaining savings in risky assets like stocks.
If the stocks underperform (or go to zero) you can still safely maintain your living-standard floor. And, if they perform as (or better than) expected you can safely increase your living-standard floor each year by converting a portion of the stocks to TIPS over time. Let's consider the Johnsons again.
The Johnsons desire a discretionary spending floor of about $40,000 per year, adjusted for inflation. To accomplish this, in addition to covering all their fixed spending in retirement not already covered by Social Security, they invest about $1.35 million of their savings into a TIPS ladder that produces about $60,000 of annual real income for 30 years ($40,000 to pay for their living-standard floor and $20,000 to cover their residual fixed spending).
Then, they take their remaining $650,000 of savings and invest it in stocks, like a low-cost S&P 500 index fund. Each year they sell a portion of the stock — gradually, so they do not risk exhausting this cushion before they die.
Invest that capital gain in TIPS and you can consistently raise your living-standard floor throughout retirement. If stocks perform poorly (see dark blue line in Figure 4), the Johnsons' living standard floor may not rise much. But, if stocks perform as expected (see light blue line), the Johnsons will be able to spend well above their floor by capturing the upside.
Figure 4. The Johnsons use TIPS to lock in a $40,000 living standard floor, and then invest the rest in stocks, hoping to increase discretionary spending in the future.
In a sense, upside investing is like having your cake and eating it too. By using TIPS to cover your fixed spending and lock-in a desired living-standard floor in retirement, you can safely invest in stocks for their potential upside. The lower you set your living standard floor, the greater is your potential upside, and vice versa.
Summarizing the Strategy
With real (inflation-adjusted) interest rates higher than they've been since the Great Recession, you can now safely afford to spend more without having to take unnecessary risk. This strategy involves building a "TIPS ladder" — that is, a portfolio of individual Treasury Inflation Protected Securities that mature on different dates over the coming years.
Locking-in a stream of real income payments in retirement via a TIPS ladder can both safely cover your fixed spending and create a living standard floor. Surprisingly, this approach can also make investing in stocks less risky from a living standard perspective. By setting a comfortable living-standard floor using TIPS, you can effectively afford to take more risk with your remaining investments in hopes of increasing your living standard throughout retirement.


Retirement Investing Tip: Take a Look at TIPS

Jay Abolofia

Laurence J. Kotlikoff

This article is part of Navigating Change, a Next Avenue initiative made possible by the Richard M. Schulze Family Foundation and EIX, the Entrepreneur Innovation Exchange.Rick Bulan was watching television in 1994 when he saw something he wanted: A 1,000-pound, 12.5-foot-long piece of deteriorating handrail removed from the iconic Golden Gate Bridge a year earlier. "I remember thinking it would make a cool headboard for a bed," recalls Bulan, now 53.
Paul Block in his studioOn impulse, he bought the weathered relic. Later, with money he had been saving for a down payment on a house, he bought more handrail sections and founded Golden Gate Furniture in San Francisco, where he makes lamps, tables, bookends and jewelry from the steel.
Flip from Food to Furniture
Paul Block, while working as a chef 27 years ago at a winery in California's storied Napa Valley, was inspired to try turning discarded wine barrels into tables, chairs, benches and more.
Over time, he stopped cooking and opened Wine Barrel Furniture in Fairfield, California. In 2012, he began fashioning desiccated grapevines into candleholders, chandeliers, table bases and whimsical fencing. Now 55, Block aims to work as a zero-waste manager at a winery.
"A lot of people like to talk about what others should do with their lives, but when it boils down to it, it's just a matter of knowing what you want to do and making it happen."
Through the decades, both men have crafted careers by making something new from something old, using discarded items as raw material for creations that are both artistic and functional. Along the way, both have taken creative risks, pivoted when necessary and learned new skills.
Block designed and built a 6-by-12-foot kiln that "cooks" 50 grapevines at a time to kill any insects or fungus lingering in the leggy vines, some of them 8 feet wide. Bulan trained on the torches and saws he needed to cut through steel, and even took a job in marketing for a time to learn how to compose a compelling media release.
Both men have enjoyed success — and readily acknowledge that more change is inevitable. But they are ready. "A lot of people like to talk about what others should do with their lives, but when it boils down to it, it's just a matter of knowing what you want to do and making it happen," Bulan says. "That's a little scary, but there is always a payoff."
'I Turned Trash into Money'
The biggest payoff for Block, he says, is yet to come. "Basically, wine barrel furniture did not exist before me, and after I die and my furniture lives on, the true value of my handmade wares will become apparent," he says. "Price times longevity equals value, and many of my pieces will last 100 years. Plus, my art work had a global impact on the wine industry, because I turned trash into money."
Block embraced finding appropriate reuses for discarded items long ago. As a fine arts student majoring in sculpture at Boston University, he was hesitant to buy new materials. "Making art is not supposed to be stressful, and using stuff I found in landfills or collected from the garbage was fun," he says.
Later, Block attended culinary school in Boston and then enrolled at Parsons School of Design in New York, where he studied environmental design.
A Profound Impact
"When making a table at Parsons, I used cardboard and other trash as part of the process," Block says. "That mentality was strengthened there because the film 'An Inconvenient Truth' had a profound impact on all of us in the art world."
In 1996, Block moved to California to work as a chef. Some 16 months later, he built his first piece of furniture from a used wine barrel. In 2010, a winegrower invited Block to set up a furniture workshop in a barn on a four-acre parcel of land just outside Calistoga, on the northern edge of the Napa Valley.
Rick Bulan"He had intended to open a winery with barrel storage, a tasting room and offices, but he didn't have enough land," Block says. "I turned part of the property into an agricultural dump site for barrels and grapevines, and after I put up a sign on the highway, wineries brought me their garbage, because I was saving them thousands of dollars in dumping fees."
That won him recognition from the California Department of Agriculture as the only grapevine recycling business in the state. Block also established a community woodbin to collect dried grapevines for people to use for winter fuel.
"I was saving them thousands of dollars in dumping fees."
Early in 2020, the wine grower decided to sell the property in Calistoga. Block moved into a shop in town, then into a shared space in Sonoma County and later to a shop in Solano County.
"Now I'm looking to operate a waste management program, open to the public, at a winery," Block says. "All vines, barrels, bottles, wooden wine boxes, pallets and corks will feed through me, and I'll spin them into money. I've been doing that since I sold my first piece of furniture, and one thing leads to another with art."
'Blood, Sweat and Burns'
Bulan's metal art has led to almost 30 years of creative satisfaction as he has designed products and cut steel — and invested "blood, sweat and burns." He explains: "Sometimes when I use a dry metal saw, the blade flings hot little pieces of steel in every direction, so I've been burned a few times." Still, the Bay Area native notes that his early learning process was even more challenging.
"After I hired a truck to bring home that first big section and got it into my side yard, I spent a month trying to figure out how to cut it," Bulan says. A hardware store provided advice about blades for a circular saw and his neighbor taught him to use an oxygen-acetylene torch to cut the steel. Bulan used the torch to craft a 115-pound bed headboard instead of one that weighed 350 pounds.
'Golden Gate Bridge Handrail Queen Headboard,' made by Rick BulanWhen a friend asked Bulan to make him a headboard, Bulan put aside his diploma in finance and left a warehouse job so he could concentrate on a career that seemed to have chosen him.
"I never thought about where this would go," he says. "I just knew it was what I wanted to do and I pursued it." Over the years, Bulan has mastered tungsten inert gas (TIG) welding and a plasma cutter and learned the art of placing magazine ads.
Currently, Bulan fills custom orders and designs new products, "playing with different arrangements and shapes" that suit steel from the bridge. The pedestrian handrails he first bought were removed from the west side of the bridge, which takes the brunt of fierce wind and salty air from the Pacific Ocean.
A grapevine candelabra made by Paul Block"The sections weren't in terrible shape," he notes. That's because the base coat for the bridge, which opened in May 1937 after more than four years of construction, is a zinc primer and the top coat is an acrylic enamel moisture-cured battleship paint in a rowdy color known as International Orange.
Because bridge sections replaced in more recent years have not been made available to Bulan or other interested buyers, he does see an end in sight. What happens when he runs out of steel? Bulan laughs at the perfect set up and quips, "I'll cross that bridge when I come to it."


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