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When a longer working life is good for us all

By Lucy Kellaway

Published: November 1 2009 22:02 | Last updated: November 1 2009 22:02

When I was 20, I thought I’d retire at 60. By the time I was 35, I expected to retire rather earlier, at about 50 or so. Back then, it was fashionable for professionals to take early retirement – either because they found they could, or because their employers had tired of them and pensioned them off. But now that I’m 50 myself, I find that the finishing line has been moved once again and it looks as though I’ll be slogging away until I’m 70 and beyond.

In the past couple of weeks, there have been various reports from economists saying that the only way of saving the economy from collapse is for everyone to work for much longer. The assumption is that while this makes sense for the public sector borrowing requirement, it’s going to be tough on us.

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