I recently commented to a friend that, having reach the milestone age of 65, and without asking, I find myself knee deep in medical tests and checks. I am happy to comply but, having kept my distance from the doctor’s surgery for the last three decades, I now feel that I should qualify for a […]
The day after one client ‘retired’ he took all his business suits to the charity shop. For him they were a uniform and this marked a clear ‘transition’ – the end of his ‘first career’ and a first step forward to what comes next. Another took over a decade to discard the last business suit […]
Traditionally, once you stop working, you enter ‘old age’ – and from there, there is no return! All that is changing and these days ‘old age’ subdividing into ‘old age’ (the point your first career stops) and ‘frail old age’ (when ‘whatever is going to get you’ starts to emerge). Old age is the world’s […]
When Bismark created the world’s first state pension scheme in the 1880s he never expected to pay out – it was simply a creative (and seemingly popular) tax raising exercise. Life expectancy in Germany at the time was 48, so 65 was selected for benefit payments to start, thus ensuring there were few, if any, […]
When the chancellor found a hole in his balance sheet he took the easy option and turned to taxing the dead. Inheritance tax thresholds have already been frozen for over a decade – progressively dragging more people into the net and increasing the tax raised. However Covid needed a faster solution so the chancellor looked […]
That ‘a-ha’ moment… Recently a client captured the essence of what we do: ‘Now get it… at some point I will no longer be here. What EML is asking me to focus on everything I can control between now and then. While our discussions are structured around your six core areas, my success comes from […]
I’ve been watching Dan Buettner’s series on how to live to 100 (the secrets of the Blue Zone). He focus is on the importance of creating the right environment and he shows how originally this happened by chance, but through careful nurturing similar results can be achieved anywhere. He also shows how easy it to […]
When it comes to life planning, deciding when and how to retire is likely to be the most important decision you ever make. For earlier generations it was easy – you worked through to your 65th birthday, probably in the same industry and maybe even the same employer. It was then time to collect your […]
Not everyone referred to EML is ready to face the reality of their changing prospects for later life. While fees are sometimes cited as being the issue, they are nothing more than a convenient excuse along with, ‘I’m too young’, ‘I’m too busy’ etc etc. The real message is ‘I don’t want to acknowledge my […]
After an enforced break of over three years due to Covid, I find myself, once again, gearing up to deliver talks on EML’s research into living longer. The starting point is my earlier presentation, which is in need of updating as the data I have been using has moved on. Much of what was projected […]