Baby Boomer Spending Slows and Savings Increases

Paul Hodges has some interesting thoughts re boomers and their changing spending habits over at his blog.

The extract below is part of his comment;’

‘But they are getting closer to retirement, with a median age of 54 years. And so their need for ‘new things’ is reducing, as is their ability to afford them. Equally, as the above chart from thechartstore.com shows, their savings rate is starting to shoot up. They were let down by the stock market after the dot-com boom; then the housing market disappointed.
So now we seem to be seeing the start of a generational switch from spending to saving in the world’s most important market. From close to zero, the savings rate has already jumped to 6%, as baby-boomers worry about how to afford their retirement, especially as they can expect to live longer than any generation in history’.

Harry Dent argues that the economic cycle is dependent on the generation spending wave. And that indicates that things are not going to improve for quite a while yet. I hope he’s wrong, but in the mean time I am one of those boomers who is cutting spending and trying to save more!.

To read more go to Boomers cutting spending and start saving.