Whenever someone mentions the word ageism, my mind immediately associates it with judgement about how old someone looks. It’s understandable given how much of a premium society places on the superficial – Botox use increased by 124 per cent in 2022 according to the British Association for Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (BAAPS), while the cosmetic tweakments industry which is currently worth around £3bn, is estimated to increase to more than £11bn by 2026 according to a recent UCL study.
But I recently realised that ageism has a far more serious impact: it affects how we view getting older. Getting older is stereotypically portrayed as becoming more fragile, less relevant and cognitively challenged. No wonder some of us put off thinking about our future and preparing for it.
My fear of ageing meant that I hadn’t properly thought about finance in my sixties and seventies. If I try and think about money in my older age, my mind slides off the subject. It feels uncomfortable, confronting even. Part of it is maybe that I don’t envision a future where I’m actually able to retire. That’s not just for financial reasons – being a writer is who I am, not just what I do.
Another reason for my avoidance is tapping into bigger fears. I’m single, and I don’t have children (these are both active choices I made, and I currently love my life). While children aren’t a retirement plan and there are plenty of grown children who don’t look after their parents, what will happen if I need looking after? Will I have a partner when I am older? It has been easier to think of it as some vague blob of events that will all eventually turn out alright. And maybe it will turn out alright, but one thing that could definitely help is money.
But building a decent retirement fund is easier said than done. Particularly if you are a woman and have grown up with the social conditioning that sorting out the finances is a man’s responsibility. You will also be feeling the impact of a lifetime earning less than your male counterparts. According to a 2022 report by the UN, women globally are likely to be poorer than men, predominantly due to the gender pay gap, but also because we live longer and are more likely in older age, to live alone compared to older men.
I am highly avoidant when it comes to money – I’ve spoken before about how it makes me fearful and worried.
Recently, however, I was listening to a podcast which featured Ramit Sethi, the money expert and star of Netflix show How to Get Rich. Normally I don’t engage with money gurus, but I like Sethi’s idea that it isn’t about making loads of money but about designing what your rich life looks like, that is specific to you. In other words, the quality of life versus sitting on a pile of gold like Smaug.
Sethi was asked about commonalities he had noticed among people who were older and badly off financially, and he replied that they were afraid and avoidant about money. Reader, I felt attacked. But the words hit home.
I have a pension that was set up automatically at my last permanent place of work, but had it been left to me, I may never have done it myself. I’m constantly aware that I’m not paying enough, but with the cost-of-living crisis it hasn’t been possible to increase the amount. I also want enough to live on to actually enjoy my life in the present.
In recent times, friends and social media have overwhelmed me with conflicting information about investing, to the point that it made me even more avoidant.
But the most useful thing Sethi said was that you don’t have to be rich to start investing – something I’d believed until about a month ago. He talked specifically about retirement and investment funds, which can be set up at any time. You can determine the amount you want to pay in every month. When he discussed how much money could have been amassed if I had started saving in my 20s or 30s, the numbers were so much more than the usual route people take to make money: buying property.
The biggest learning curve for me has been dismantling the idea that only people who were already wealthy could set up funds. Within a day of listening to the podcast, I found an investment company who picked the stocks for me and offered different types of retirement funds.
It took 24 hours to set up, and while I was relieved a seed had been planted that might mean I would be better off financially in my older years, I also feel incredibly sad that I didn’t do it sooner.
Knowing that I’ve started planning for the future has eased my anxiety, and I’m now more confident about looking at other ways to invest money (one friend suggested whisky casks but I may need to start with something more conservative).