Women enjoy 7 years longer retirement

The retirement gap has widened with women in the UK now looking forward to seven years longer in retirement according to new data from the Office of National Statistics.

The average man gets 13 lucky years after work to make the most of his retirement, while women on average can look forward to two workfree decades at the end of their lives.

The average age at which men stopped working and retired rose from 63.8 years in 2004 to 64.5 in 2009, while life expectancy for a boy born the same year is 77.7 years.

The average age for women retiring also rose from 61.2 to 62 years while life expectancy for girls born in 2009 is 81.9 years.

Inequality in late life is one of the issues highlighted in our post THIRTEEN REASONS ITS UNLUCKY TO BE A MAN.

Until recently in the UK men and women’s retirement age was not equal – with women retiring 5 years younger than men despite living longer – cause championed by the UK charity for equal rights for men – Parity

While the retirement age has been equalised, men are still twice as likely to be working over 60 and have a shorter life expectancy. When you look at all the people over 65 in the UK today, twice as many of the women will still be alive at 100.

According to research by Age Concern – now Age UK – there is an increasing body of research evidence pointing out that the specific needs of older men are largely ignored in current services for older people,

The research shows that older men are more likely than older women to be excluded from wider social relationships, especially men who are divorced or never married.

Divorced and never married men are particularly susceptible to social isolation, poor health, risk behaviours (e.g. smoking and drinking) and material disadvantage than married older men.