[00:00:01] Speaker A: Well, the sandwich generation experience is a profound illustration of how longevity creates cascading care obligations. So when you are simultaneously raising children, teenagers, and supporting aging parents, the physical, emotional and financial resources available to each of these sets of obligations are inevitably compressed.
So we're not just talking about time, we're talking about a diminished capacity to be you, to be fully present for anyone, including yourself.
[00:00:46] Speaker B: Welcome to the Age of Aging, a show about living well with an aging brain, produced by the Penn Memory center and the Michael Nadoff Communications Hub. Hi, I'm Jake Johnson.
In a world that's getting older and more expensive, what steps can we take now so our money supports us and the people we love as we age?
It's a big question with a lot of different answers. So today's episode features a diverse panel of experts.
My co host Terence Casey moderates a conversation with Surya Kolloury, Head of TIA Institute, and Mary Naylor, director of the new Cortland center for Transitions and Health and professor at Penn School of Nursing.
Together they break down the financial cost of caregiving, how to prepare for a long life after 65, and what needs to change in our current system to support an aging population.
Then we hear from financial professionals Bodie Hennigan and Christine Moriarty, who share practical advice on avoiding common pitfalls and building long term financial security.
Terrence will take it away in just a moment, but first, a word from our sponsors.
[00:01:53] Speaker C: Caring for an aging loved one isn't easy, but you don't have to do it alone. At Rothkof Law Group, we guide families throughout New Jersey and Pennsylvania along every
[00:02:02] Speaker D: stage of your aging journey.
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Rothkof Law Group, your partner in elder care advocacy and senior care planning every step of the way. Visit rothkofflaw.com for more information.
That's R O T H K O
[00:02:26] Speaker B: F F L A W.com hi everyone, Jake here. Before we jump into the episode, we have an exciting opportunity to share. The Age of Aging is looking for a summer intern to join our team. If you're an undergrad who loves storytelling, is curious about aging and longevity, and wants real hands on experience in podcast production, from recording and editing to publishing and promotion, we want to hear from you. No prior experience required, just a willingness to learn. The position is based on the UPenn campus in Philadelphia with some hybrid flexibility. Find the full job description and application
[email protected] or reach out to us directly. We'd love to work with you. All right, back to the episode.
[00:03:16] Speaker D: Well, welcome, Surya. Mary, thanks for joining us today.
[00:03:18] Speaker C: Thank you.
[00:03:19] Speaker A: Delighted to be here.
[00:03:20] Speaker D: I'd like to start with you, Surya. Since 1935, when the Social Security act was signed, we have seen average life expectancy go up in the United States by 17 years.
Could you tell me a little bit more about what that means for Americans and how they should be thinking about their financial lives?
[00:03:37] Speaker C: Terence, thank you for having me join this conversation. I'm really looking forward to it. It's going to be a great company. This question about Social Security and what has happened since then is arguably one of the most consequential and maybe even underappreciated shifts in our modern life.
When Social Security was passed with 65 as the age of full benefits, the average American was not expected to live much beyond that. But today we are routinely planning for retirements that could last 20 years, 25 years, maybe even 30 years.
I'm talking about today's generation. So if you think about the generations of babies being born now, even longer.
So it is a fundamentally different life structure. We can't just think of this as extending life. We need to be thinking of this as changing the structure of life. At the Institute, we talk about three dimensions of what this means lifespan, which is how long we're going to live. And then, of course, I would say this coming from a financial services firm, wealth span, meaning will your money last that long?
And then I'm sure we're going to lean a lot on Mary's expertise on this health span as well.
So extending this lifespan that we have done without the wealth or the health is going to become a burden. And the last point I'll make in answer to this question is, you know, it is striking to me how this, let's call this the longevity bonus that we have given ourselves. It compounds the challenge of caregiving. That brings us to the topic at hand today. The longer we live, the longer this period during which we might need care or we might need to give care, and these two things are deeply linked. And in the work that we have done, the need for planning and the need for financial planning becomes paramount.
[00:05:31] Speaker D: Yeah, Mary, I'd like to turn that to you next because at the Penn Memory center, we talk often about is increasing the length of life a good goal? And the answer is in a vacuum, increased lifespan is great, but nothing happens in a vacuum. Living longer can often mean more complications, particularly when it comes to health.
So from your perspective, what does living longer actually look like for Americans?
[00:05:57] Speaker A: Well, I also am delighted to join this important conversation. And you know, what you're talking about is longevity gains that are real. They are remarkable. But the picture for many is nuanced. Many Americans are indeed living longer, but they're living longer with multiple health and social challenges. They might have heart disease, diabetes, dementia, depression.
And these challenges require sustained care over years or even decades. At Penn Nursing's new Cortland center, our mission is rooted in understanding these health transitions, that critical period when someone moves from being relatively independent to needing significant support.
Whether these declines in health progress slowly or happen suddenly, we've learned that these transitions share in common that they are poorly anticipated and inadequately supported, both by the health and social care systems and by family members who have generally not been well equipped to know what to do to help loved ones. So the upshot is that longevity creates not just a financial planning challenge, but a care planning challenge. About seven in 10 older adults will require some form of long term care in their lifetimes. That's an enormous number. And in the vast majority of cases, the default care providers are family members, most often women.
[00:07:25] Speaker D: Yeah, I want to come back to that disproportionate burden on women, but first I think we need to level set in terms of the financial management for an American household.
Mary, you're talking about some of the issues of long term care and how much that'll impact adults.
Surya, among these older adults, and particularly caregivers, who are they and what's their financial reality?
[00:07:51] Speaker C: Yeah. For this, Terence, let me just tell a quick story and also thank Mary.
I don't even remember how many years ago. A few years ago I had visited Mary at the Boatner center and we were talking about caregiving and we said we should shine a light on the financial dimensions of caregiving. And that was the first report that we had jointly published, which we call the Long Game.
And in it we identified that caregiving is not only transportation, it's not only companionship, it's not only medicinal, it's not only socialization, but it's also financial. So I'm drawing from that to make some of these points, that first of all, the financial toll is steep.
You know, family caregivers spend an average of $7,200 a year in out of pocket costs, but that direct out of pocket spending is only part of the story. There are indirect costs. As an economist at the Institute, we were like, okay, just don't follow the money. That's being spent. What is the money that's not being acquired as a result of this? Right. What are the indirect costs? Wages not earned, retirement contributions not made, promotions not pursued.
Maybe if somebody took time off and came back losing the career path track and acceleration, these are all like things that compound on each other. You can actually do modeling on this, right? The financial modeling. So what is amazing to me is if you poll caregivers and ask how many of them are financial caregivers?
Nine out of ten are financial caregivers. So this is a super majority of caregivers are also financial caregivers. And let me make it clear, what do I mean when I say financial caregivers? If you're paying bills, if you're filing taxes, if you're filing claims in addition to spending money, you are automatically a financial caregiver. You're either a financial contributor or a financial coordinator. Either way, nine out of 10. So these are not small numbers.
[00:10:01] Speaker D: Yeah. And you know, this is something we've talked about a lot in previous episodes.
We've also done work with Norma Ko, also at the University of Pennsylvania, about the financial burden of caregiving.
And Mary, I'd like to turn back to you because you mentioned that the caregiving responsibilities often fall to women. And we talk about that in our clinic all the time. When we review patient cases, one of the recurring lines we hear is it's not exclusively women, but it's almost exclusively women who are helping care for the older adults who come through our clinic. Could you tell us a little bit about why that is still the case in 2026? Why haven't we outgrown issues like that?
[00:10:40] Speaker A: Well, it's not accidental. I mean, this disproportionate burden of caregiving on women is deeply embedded. It's embedded in societal and cultural norms. And this will take a long time to change. But those norms right now are about who is expected to provide care. And when we look at the numbers, about 6 in 10 of family caregivers in the US are women. And even when multiple family members are involved, but those who are doing most of the work, the so called primary caregivers are women. Women don't often identify themselves as caregivers because the care they're providing is simply assumed by by them to be part of roles, their roles as mothers, as daughters or wives.
So this invisibility is a big challenge. It makes it harder to measure, harder to support, and harder to address through policy.
[00:11:35] Speaker D: I think a lot of these caregivers are maybe in their 40s and 50s at this point. And for many of them, they just got over the challenges of being the primary caregiver for their own children and now they're turning around and doing the same work for their parents here. They're part of that sandwich generation. And I'd like to come back to that. But Surya, what about from your perspective, this disproportionate caregiver burden on women? What are the financial realities for them?
[00:12:01] Speaker C: So I'll address the financial burden in a quick second. But I did want to point out that when we look at our data, Terence, in the generations coming up, there are younger caregivers. And in that younger caregiver population, the balance is becoming a little more even. So I think if you click down a few decades and that information comes up to the point where we're talking about this could balance out a little bit. But let's talk about today. Our research shows that donors providing care see a median loss in wages of about $24,500 over just a two year period. So I'm talking about real numbers here.
Looking further out, caregiving retirement savings can show deficits of between 40 and 90% by age 65. This kind of hurts me deeply because I'm in the retirement business and I spent all my time trying to encourage people to save as much as they can for their retirement. To see this being depleted is kind of alarming. And in some scenarios, individuals would need between 8 to 24 additional years of work just to recover their contributions that they missed, let alone add a safety cushion on top of that. So these are staggering figures. And it falls disproportionately, as Mary said, on women and particularly women of color who are maybe already starting from a position of greater financial vulnerability.
[00:13:26] Speaker D: Now, you mentioned some of your research that you had done together, and part of that is based on the financial realities.
But you also get into some of the efforts about caregiving expectations and what's involved in the experience of being a caregiver. I'm sure people are open and accepting that they may have some financial loss included in caregiving. But you say up to 90% financial loss. I mean, these are staggering losses that we're talking about here in the long term.
But also what about the general expectations of caregiving? What is it that people are getting wrong? Why does it matter?
[00:14:01] Speaker C: So we surveyed about 1200Americans between ages of 40 to 65 who were at least one living parent, and we compared them with the current caregivers to see what the expectation gaps were. As you asked and what we found was there's an optimism gap. And this optimism gap is significant.
So future caregivers. So those who expect to be giving care overestimate how much help they'll get from their siblings.
About 44% of current caregivers report that other family members were simply unable to help for a variety of reasons, understandable reasons, and another 43% say family members were unwilling. So that's one will I get help from my siblings?
The second one is future caregivers also overestimate how much they're prepared their parents are.
So there's in the mind, there's like, I think my parents are ready. And the answer is the parents are not ready. So what we find is that nearly 70% of future caregivers believe their parents are well prepared to plan for their own care. But when we look at the current caregivers who actually found that when caregiving began, only half the parents were prepared. So there's a 20 percentage point gap there. And then the last point I'll make is a sobering one around paid care, because up to this point, I've been talking about informal care, unpaid care. So the paired care side, 42% of future caregivers expected to supplement their unpaid time with paid care services. But in the current generation who are giving care, fewer than 21% are doing so. Again, another 20% gap. So these are not small gaps. So part of the responsibility that we have is to educate the caregivers who are coming up to say, you know, you need to adjust your expectations of what's really going to happen when your hair catches fire and mom or dad have fallen in the kitchen or the bathroom.
[00:15:53] Speaker D: I think this gets to the concept you brought up of longevity literacy.
How does that differentiate from basic financial literacy?
[00:16:02] Speaker C: Yeah, this is an important question. So we kind of stumbled upon this thought about four or five years ago, where when we asked people, if you get to age 65, how long do you expect to live? If you get to age 65, what your life expectancy is?
And it's 87 for female, 85 for male. And people vastly underestimate that number, men more than women. And if you underestimate how long you're expecting to live, your planning is off, right? Your preparation is off. And so we are very keen on promoting this idea of, let us give people education, information on how long they really should be planning for their lives.
[00:16:44] Speaker D: Mary, I'd like to turn that over to you. When we talk about longevity literacy, how does that engage with your work at the New Cortland Center.
[00:16:53] Speaker A: It's actually core. The connection between longevity, literacy and health transitions is so foundational to everything that we do. One of the things we've learned from decades of research is this common ground around what happens when there's poor planning. We found that when people have these conversations early, way before a crisis, both their care outcomes, their health, their quality of life, and financial outcomes at an individual level and societal level are significantly better.
[00:17:25] Speaker D: And what is early? So just to put this in perspective, I'm almost 40 years old, my parents are in their mid-70s.
I'm starting to think that we probably should have been talking about this already.
What is early to you?
[00:17:39] Speaker A: I think you can start today.
So it's never too early to start. I have three daughters, and I recall vividly taking them out to lunch about 20 years ago and beginning a conversation with them. They're now in their 30s and 40s, and of course, they immediately wanted to know what's wrong. And I'm telling them, no, this is a conversation we need to have now while I am in great health.
So it's never too early, but it's also never too late. So I would gather everyone around your dinner table tonight and start the conversation.
[00:18:17] Speaker D: That's good, practical advice. I appreciate that. I'd like to talk briefly too, about the sandwich generation. We talked about this earlier. We didn't really use the term, but a lot of people think of being sandwiched as caregiver to both young children and older adult parents. How does that change the financial and emotional equation?
[00:18:36] Speaker A: Well, the sandwich generation experience is a profound illustration of how longevity creates cascading care obligations. So when you are simultaneously raising children, teenagers, and supporting aging parents, the physical, emotional and financial resources available to each of these sets of obligations are inevitably compressed. So we're not just talking about time, we're talking about a diminished capacity to be you, to be fully present for anyone, including yourself.
Nearly a quarter of caregivers are now in this sandwich generation. And as people are having children later in life and as their parents are living longer, the overlap between these two phases of caregiving is growing. So we need health systems, we need workplaces, we need social policies that recognize this reality and provide meaningful support.
[00:19:34] Speaker D: Mary, I'd like to talk about long term care for a second. I think a lot of people don't know how much it has changed over the last few decades and what they should be doing to be preparing themselves emotionally and financially when it comes to long term care.
First of all, how practical is long term care? In 2026 and beyond.
[00:19:55] Speaker A: So let's talk about just financing long term care. Long term care is primarily financed by a mixture of things. Out of pocket savings, specialized insurance. Those that meet strict low income and asset requirements have access to Medicaid. The VA provides long term care benefits to eligible veterans.
Some listeners, many might be surprised to learn that Medicare does not cover long term care personal care needs.
So key issues to consider right now are that high out of pocket costs are typically paid for by individuals and family savings and or income, that some will need to spend down assets to qualify for public financing via Medicaid and that private long term care insurance policies to cover care in the home or assisted living. This is very expensive. In recent years, hybrid insurance policies that combine life insurance or annuities with long term benefits have become available. So we're going to really begin to look at what's the impact of that in terms of financing.
But the first step in all of this is to know your options. The majority of us will be paying out of pocket for long term care.
So along with thinking about student debt and all of the other challenges you described, you need to think early about setting aside a portion of your income or savings for this purpose. I think you need to think about that now.
[00:21:28] Speaker D: And Surya, your research has consistently identified the workplace as a critical lever for supporting caregivers. What should employers be doing to support their employees as they're approaching the caregiving age or retirement age? What's the business case for that as well?
[00:21:45] Speaker C: Terence, I think the conversation is finally turning to a point where we can shine a positive light to say where can folks get help and who can provide that help? And I'm so glad in this conversation we're talking about the role of the employer.
So let me spend a little bit of time on this. The business case, first of all, I think is very compelling. But somehow this benefit, as it were, that an employee might offer around caregiving is underutilized.
So what we find in our studies, and we estimate that productivity losses from employee caregiving responsibilities amount to as much as $5,600 per employee per year. And yet most employers don't measure the extent of the caregiving in their workforce.
So what we find is a good news is that the most valued interventions are not necessarily the most expensive from an employer perspective. So when we look at what caregiving employees say they want, the top items are flexible scheduling, access to paid family medical leave, remote work options, mental health coverage.
So many of these are already available in many of the workplaces but it's not been packaged as such.
One is here, one is there, one is there. Often when I speak to associates about our caregiving benefits at my own company, the first reaction that I get from them is, I did not know we had that. So connecting the dots between packaging these benefits in a proper way, labeling them properly, and providing it to associates at the point in time when they need it becomes very important. And the first step I would ask employers to take, in addition to packaging and sharing these benefits, is to find out how many caregivers there are in the workplace. Because if you do, you're going to be surprised by the number.
[00:23:43] Speaker A: Well, Surya talked about what's going on in terms of employers. But at the policy level, at a fundamental level, we need paid family and medical leave for all. And we right now, the absence of such leave policies at the federal level really makes the US an outlier among developed nations. And this absence of a policy affects all of us. But it's most devastating among low wage workers, hourly employees, and women.
Fortunately, states are moving to fill this gap. About 15 states now offer paid family leave.
But I want to take on another dimension of this. It's one thing to have the benefit, it's another to have the workforce to deliver on that benefit. So equally important is the need for meaningful investment in the paid caregiving workforce. And here I'm especially focused on home health and personal care aides. Currently, the US Is facing a severe shortage of paid caregivers. And this is leading to long waiting lists resulting in weeks, months, and in some states, up to a year for people to get the help that they need with their most basic needs. And this has resulted in family members reducing their work commitments or leaving the workforce prematurely because they cannot access essential care for their loved ones.
At the same time, and we've been talking about this throughout this conversation, the demand for paid caregivers in the next few decades will grow dramatically. And this is again primarily due to increased longevity of older adults. So if unaddressed, the current shortage coupled with the increased demand will result in a crisis in care.
So we need to think very carefully about how will we support family caregivers now directly, through tax credits, through Social Security credits for caregiving time, for protecting them against workforce discrimination.
But we also need to act very quickly to build and sustain the paid caregiver workforce through better pay, better working conditions, expanded training programs, and importantly, demonstrating this respect that this workforce is due for their contributions.
[00:26:03] Speaker D: Excellent. We covered a lot of ground on a personal level on a workforce level, on a policy level, and a lot of information came at once.
So one thing we like to do when we have a complex topic on this show is boil it down at the end to some practical, concrete next steps for our listeners. So, Mary, I'd like to start with you and maybe use myself as an example. Somebody in their about their 40s, a sandwich caregiver, maybe up to the age of 50, maybe hasn't yet become fully involved or thinking of themselves as a caregiver. What practical steps would you recommend besides starting those conversations with your siblings and parents?
[00:26:43] Speaker A: Well, actually, that is my practical step.
I really think, you know, you in your 40s and your parents in your 70s, you need to begin that conversation because honestly, it may be the single most powerful thing you can do. You know, in our society, we have this reluctance to, to talk about aging, a reluctance to talk about needing care, certainly a reluctance to and you know, it's an emotional reluctance to talk about end of life. But that leaves everyone profoundly unprepared when those conversations can no longer be avoided. So that is still my recommendation.
[00:27:23] Speaker C: Clarence, I have four practical tips. They're genuinely practical. But if anyone, including you, including me, say I've checked the box, all four, I'm going to be very impressed. So there's some homework for all of us. Right? First, the first one is please maximize the common contributions before caregiving begins. Why am I saying this? Because nearly a third of us who become caregivers stop saving entirely. So let's build up that muscle now. So maximize the turbine contributions Checkbox, item two.
And this is even more important, please establish legal documents like power of attorney before the crisis. Because what we find is many people enter this financial caregiving roles and assume these duties without authorization.
There lies trouble. So let's get the paperwork done. And talking about benefits of employers providing. Many employers provide this paperwork help. So let's take advantage of it. The third one is what we've talked about. Let's adjust our mindset to what the life expectancy really is.
You know, so let's build up our longevity literacy muscle. There's a third one. And the fourth, let's get familiar with what potential caregiving costs could be into retirement planning. Let that not be a surprise. And we have shared those numbers in this conversation already.
So if we did those four things, practical things, I think we have begun the journey to be prepared.
[00:28:55] Speaker D: Well, I want to thank both of you for your insights and your time today. Again, this was a conversation with Mary Naylor from the New Cortland center for Transitions in Health and Surya Kolluri from the TIA Institute. Thank you both.
[00:29:08] Speaker C: Thank you.
[00:29:08] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:29:14] Speaker C: Foreign
[00:29:17] Speaker B: let's transition now to Bodhi Hennigan, the founder and president of Life Managers and Associates, a firm that helps support older adults live independently through administrative assistance. Hennigan will break down her top five financial pitfalls that she sees older adults get stuck in.
[00:29:33] Speaker E: So hi, I'm Bodie Hennigan and I'm the owner of Life Managers and Associates. The number one thing is not getting help soon enough.
What I talk about with help is not someone taking over, but someone that is just keeping an eye on what is going on.
Because as a person declines physically and or cognitively, it's difficult to do all of the things that you might have done in the past.
There may be family members that can fill these roles. It could be an outside organization like my organization or a care management team, or it could be the person who you've named as your power of attorney could fill some of these roles so that there's another set of eyes on what's going on.
My second pitfall was assuming that you've done your legal documents and so you've done your planning.
And the truth of it is that the legal documents are just the start of the planning because the legal documents are all around incapacity and death.
So you might have named someone as your power of attorney, but that's the person who's going to take over when you're incapacitated. In order for a person to successfully be independent, they have to have a home that will accommodate an aging individual. They need to have someone who can assist them in managing their care.
And that includes the care management component as well as the hands on care that a home care agency would provide.
And then the third component is who's going to manage their administrative affairs. Because you still have expenses. Whether you're living independently in your home or whether you've moved to a community, you still have expenses. And the more complicated your financial life is, the more at risk you are because there's so many moving pieces.
Number three is overconfidence.
And we see that a lot. And I've got three parts to this overconfidence. One is that people may not realize that math becomes one of the first things that becomes difficult with cognitive impairment. And managing your finances requires math. And so this overconfidence that it's not going to happen to you, it's really important to know that math is a huge component here. The second piece is the lack of awareness of your own cognitive impairment.
And we have seen people over and over again that are not conscious of their own cognitive decline, which makes them more confident that they're able to make decisions. And then the third piece of this is someone who knows that they might have made a mistake, but now they're going to cover it up because they're confident that it's not going to happen Again, just going into this with some self awareness or having people around you that can in a non judgmental way, just state the facts of what the situation is. And the person needs to be open to receiving that information that they're starting to be forgetful.
Number four is just assuming that your family's going to figure it out for you. And I am not saying that family shouldn't be involved, family should absolutely be involved. But there needs to be communication about who's doing what and when and making sure that the people who you want to help you are available to do that. Because adult children may have their own careers, they may have their own families and their own obligations and, and they're willing to help, but they may not have the time commitment to do it the way that you as the older adult want it done.
And so we see a lot of families clashing because of that time commitment.
Also there may be just disagreements among family. And so the earlier you can start to have these conversations and to really be clear about what the roles are, the more successful. We have seen families navigate these issues.
The last one is trusting the wrong people.
And this we often see happen because when the person starts planning, they're already vulnerable, so they've already started to decline.
And so they turn to the people that are closest to them that may not be the appropriate person to do whatever the job is. So, you know, asking the housekeeper to write a check for you.
And I don't want to say that everybody is, is not trustworthy, but there's a skill level necessary in order to be able to manage finances. And that person may not have that skill level or that sophistication in order to be able to navigate what the issues are. But I've also seen plenty of bad actors. And so, you know, it loops back to my first point, that you need to plan early.
[00:35:11] Speaker B: Thanks so much to Bodie Hennigan for sharing her insights and expertise.
For our final segment, we will hear from Christine Moriarty, a financial educator and founder of Money Piece, who will share her five tips for financial planning as you age.
[00:35:24] Speaker F: I'm Christine Moriarty. I'm the owner of Money Piece. Well, it's really easy because it's five things. You gotta know yourself, manage your money, understand the details, have a backup plan, and enjoy life.
So a number one priority is know yourself, know what your values are, know what your dreams are, and know what your behaviors are and who you are. Because if you don't actually create a deeper knowledge of yourself, your money is not going to make you happy. It's just going to be a source of frustration.
My second tip is manage your money before it manages you. Too many people think, I got to buy this, I got to do this, I got to. They like spend it before they get it and they don't understand that. The first thing is get it into your account, have it there and then make a plan for it. Be proactive of planning it, not reactive.
We live in an impulse society. You can get anything quickly. However, a lot of people do and then they end up in credit card debt or don't realize what they've spent and but slowing down even to write down how much debt you have, what's your payments, what's the interest rate, really gives you an awareness that other processes won't. And it's been proven many times over in studies that if you write things down, it gets kinesthetically into your body and mind better than, yes, even the great apps that we have on our phone.
My third one is understand the details. This one can be complicated and long and whatever, but the real bottom line is people need to always be acquiring knowledge around personal finance. When someone says, oh, I don't need a financial planner or a financial person because I do it myself, I don't argue with them, I just think, oh, what piece are you missing?
Because part of the reason I went into this industry is I am learning something every day. The laws change, the rules change, the financial limits change on how much you can put in your 401k or 403 and I have to really stay on top of things. And that's a full time job for me. So I can't imagine how someone can do it without any help at all. So knowing the details and knowing the details, if you do have a financial person, because someone like me, I always charged hourly for my work.
However, a lot of people tell me, oh, my financial person's free. I'm like, well, how much are you paying them in fees? Whether management fees for your money or commissions. And most people don't know if they're paying someone in how much. That's a detail. Another detail is what about your retirement Plan at work, are you matched? How much do you get for a match?
And there's more than just retirement. There's the health care benefits, the short term disability, long term disability.
And knowing the details and learning them make you a better manager of your money or just making sure you're secure.
Creating a backup plan is really part of living in reality.
Reality is you might get injured. Reality is wildfires or floods that you don't expect.
So for those kind of things you want insurance, but you also need that safety account.
So having a cash backup, I like to call it a money piece account because it's really about peace of mind. Open a safety account, but designated that not a savings account. And I usually tell people open it as separate bank or credit union and then every paycheck deposit $20, $50, doesn't matter into that account and watch it grow slowly because too many people put their money in their checking account. And what's a checking account meant for spending?
So if it gets in there, it's going to be gone. But if it goes directly from your paycheck with most employers let you do, you'll have something saved and you'll create a good habit. And you know, part of the backup plan is having insurance, like apartment insurance. Think about having an estate plan, which is the power of attorney.
Medically, what if something happens to you? Medically, who's making decisions if you come or who's making decisions financially. And a will, I can't think of anyone who doesn't need a will because everyone owns something. So that's part of having the backup plan. You don't have to go do it all at once, but you do have to take steps to it.
My final tip is really, really important. But it has to be the fifth one, it cannot be the first one. And that is enjoy your life. If you do take care of knowing your money, what you need, where it's coming from, having the details, you put things in place, the sense of freedom and lightness is very different than if you're living in debt and you're living stressed out. I had a client years ago and she came dancing into my office one day and said, I'm ready to die.
I'm so happy, I'm ready to die. We have taken care of so many things in our work with you that I'm just so happy now. I'm not dying, I'm healthy, I'm well, but I'm so much more relaxed. And that's what I hope for people is relaxed organization where they spend money happily and enjoy it knowing that it matches who they are and their values.
[00:41:25] Speaker B: Welcome back. I'm here with Terrence Casey and I want to start here. There was a lot of statistics, especially in that first part with Surya Kolluri and Dr. Mary Naylor. Were there any specific stats that stood out to you that you wanted to share?
[00:41:41] Speaker D: Again, the one that really stood out to me was this idea of the retirement savings deficit. Surya talked about how by age 65, some caregivers have a deficit of up to 90%.
That's crazy. Think about, I don't know how far along you are into planning your retirement savings. I'm only just starting to think about that Future. But a 90% deficit is a crisis. It's wild. That's also easy to think about as a long term problem. And I think the shorter term problem that really stood out is the wage gap of caregiving children, usually daughters, almost always daughters who are losing up to $24,000 in wages over a two year period. That is a life changing amount of money there.
[00:42:30] Speaker B: Yeah. No, I mean, it truly is shocking. Another interesting idea that I took away from this was the optimism gap. The idea that we're a little too optimistic about our siblings or our kids or our parents kind of figuring it out. We have this idea that somebody's going to figure it out. I think that kind of hit close to me because I'm an only child.
So there's this, there's no one coming to save me. There's no one coming to save me. There's no siblings.
[00:43:00] Speaker D: I also reacted to the optimism gap, but approaching it from the opposite direction. I'm one of five kids. My wife is one of five kids too. It's very easy to assume that as we get older and as our parents get older that one of our siblings is going to be the person to step up and provide the care.
But one, that's not fair to nameless sibling and two, it's not guaranteed. It's very much possible that my wife or I will be responsible for some of these things that we haven't been talking about. During the interview with Mary, I asked her for some direct advice. And her immediate advice to me in this situation was to go home that night and have these conversations both with my parents and with my wife about our family. Full disclosure, I didn't, but they all listened to the show. So now it's out on record here that we need to have these conversations. So mom and dad, if you're listening, set the agenda.
[00:44:03] Speaker B: Transitioning a Little bit now to our two experts that we had, Boney Hennigan and Christine Moriarty. Let's start first with the the five pitfalls that Bode Hennigan shared. Were there any of them that were surprising to you?
[00:44:18] Speaker D: I don't know if you had the same stroke of panic that I had when they talked about how math skills are one of the first things to go in cognitive decline, because there's not a great baseline there for me to begin with. That's one thing I know I'm personally gonna have to be thinking about as we go. The other one is legal documents. It's a tough reality to face that you don't know when you're going to need them. And it could come at you as quickly as an accident or as slowly as cognitive decline.
[00:44:48] Speaker B: It seems like you have to humble yourself a little bit in knowing that if you experience cognitive decline, I think to myself, like, I think I'll be self aware enough to know that I'm not remembering things, but you really never know. And I think one of the points that Hennigan made was that when you aren't realizing that you're making more mistakes, it's harder to pick up on those mistakes.
[00:45:13] Speaker D: That seems to align more with what Christine Moriarty was saying about know yourself and make sure that your plans align with your values, but also your skill sets and your adult children's skill sets. For example, I don't think that my parents will want me to be their accountant in the future, for example.
And one of the things I thought about when Christine was talking about knowing yourself is also knowing your limitations. I really like that she framed one of her ways of saving money for later as not being a savings account. But I really liked her suggestion of setting things up ahead of time so that you don't have to manually move money, each paycheck into this backup account. That it just is out of sight, out of mind, until you need it.
[00:46:01] Speaker B: So let's wrap up the episode. It's been a lot of information, this one. If a listener has to take one thing away, what do you think it should be?
[00:46:11] Speaker D: It's having these conversations early, and if you haven't had them early, you have them now. And that's a little hard in some families where talking about finances and health can be sort of a taboo subject.
But if we can demystify retirement plans and personal health, then we can be better positioned to support one another.
[00:46:36] Speaker B: Is there anything that gives you optimism about where all this is heading?
[00:46:40] Speaker D: The thing that I think gives me the most hope is actually the increased flexibility in work. A lot of places are now allowing people to make caregiving part of their daily life, and I for one am very grateful that I've had a lot of, we'll say, work interruptions being a parent of young kids, and I will be grateful for that flexibility if it is ever needed to help my parents as well.
[00:47:08] Speaker B: All right, well, I think that wraps everything up for this episode.
Thanks so much, Terrence, for your moderating in that discussion with Suryr Kolluri and Dr. Mary Naylor. And thanks to to all of our guests.
[00:47:24] Speaker D: Thanks for listening to this episode of the Age of Aging. A special thanks to today's guests, Bodhi Hennigan, Surya Kolloury, Christine Moriarty and Mary Naylor. If this episode resonated with you, please subscribe, leave us a review, or share it with someone who would appreciate it. It makes a real difference in helping others find the show. And if you have a topic you'd like to hear, email
[email protected] the age of Aging is a Pen Memory center production made possible by the generous support of the Michael Nadoff Communications Hub Fund and our sponsors, Rothkoff Law Group and Opera Philadelphia. Our team includes Morgan Adams, Dalia El Said, Jason Karlewish, Emily Largent, and Allison Lynn. I'm your host, Terrence Casey today, joined by my co host Jake Johnson.
