Retirement alternative

[Rogar]

I really enjoyed this NPR article about a family who took a year long sabbatical and moved to a small island in the Norwegian Sea north of the arctic circle. There is a neat photo series of their adventure. Also, there is a link to the TED talk that inspired their adventure. The fellow in the TED talk describes his alternative to retirement where he takes a year off every seven years to explore his creativity and discover new ideals. I thought the TED talk was good, too. http://www.npr.org/2013/05/20/183910777/seeing-the-northern-light-a-temporary-arctic-retirement

[puglogic]

Very cool!

[KayLR]

Wow, I am totally jealous.

[ApatheticNoMore]

Or you could just wait to lose your job to do the same thing, it will probably happen at least every 7 years if not more frequently. I think I often do wait for that frankly. I certainly only fear it so much, because hey unemployment does have it's benefits.

Of course I don't see the working longer to take time off now to actually be a very realistic plan. It's just taking time off without out necessarily any capacity to work longer later. If you are young they want to hire you, when you are old they won't. Why? Because you are old.

[Gardenarian]

I just read that article! Very interesting - I sure am ready for a sabbatical!
It was neat that in his time off, just fiddling around, he made an app that creates a second income. Made me wonder what creative things I would do if I had more time.

[fidgiegirl]

The comments are as interesting as the article, and reminded me of our little community here. "Who could become financially independent? Impossible. For elites." But books like YMOYL and Getting a Life (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/601418.Getting_a_Life?auto_login_attempted=true)he lp illustrate otherwise.

[Rogar]

In the TED talk the guy talks about cutting five years off the retirement phase of life, so retiring at say 70, and then interspersing those five years among the working phase of life for "sabbaticals". An interesting concept, though I think I like living simply and retiring early a little better. The life experience of living on that island sounds wonderful.

[ApatheticNoMore]

In the TED talk the guy talks about cutting five years off the retirement phase of life, so retiring at say 70, and then interspersing those five years among the working phase of life for "sabbaticals".

But of course you are not equally desirable to companies at 67 as at 37.

[herbgeek]

I unintentionally took my sabbatical for a few years. It was a good experience, but not one I'd like to repeat soon. I did get to try out a business and found that I was no entrepreneur. I thought I would have all the time in the world to do all those unfinished projects, but you know, I really didn't get many of them done. And I didn't spend hours and hours preparing fabulous meals like I once thought I'd do if I had the time. The best part about the time off was discovering who I really was instead of who I was in my aspirational dreams.

The downside to the "sabbatical" was the ambiguity of it ending- would I ever find a job? I didn't want to commit to daytime activities with groups, and keep the time free for interviews and the like, so it was kind of lonely. I suppose it would have been somewhat different if it had been my choice, and if I had defined the time ahead of time, and had something to go back to.

[Spoony]

In today's employment environment, any stint of unemployment for those over 40 years of age is very damaging to the ability to find other employment. I have friends in their 50s who are essentially "retired," because they cannot find work.

[Rogar]

It seems to me like both the guy in the article and in the TED talk were either self-employed or had some agreements that their job would be preserved in their absence. I know of people in more employable or flexible fields, like nursing, massage therapy, or consulting that have taken some sort of sebatical. But I do suppose it's not something everyone could do.

Regardless of practicality, it does seem like a VERY fun thing to do and sometimes things have a way of working out fine. Since I retired early, I'm sort of past any point of decision on it, but it did give me some ideas. I noticed how detailed the man planned his time during sabbatical. He made a very neat chart for time management. Even though he was sort of on a vacation he was still strict in scheduling so he could be both productive and have time for hobbies and exercise. I also thought his choice of destination was extremely imaginative and would maximize the life experience.

[oldhat]

In today's employment environment, any stint of unemployment for those over 40 years of age is very damaging to the ability to find other employment.

This is what concerns me. I'd like to take a sabbatical and I can afford to do so. But I'm pretty sure I'd like to return to work for a time before I permanently retire, and at 58 I worry that my age would be held against me.

[ApatheticNoMore]

Basically I think there's two potential risks:
1) possibility of being considered long-term unemployed (no it doesn't matter if you collected unemployment or not and you wouldn't from a voluntary quit to take a vacation, no it doesn't matter that it was entirely planned and by choice - to employers you are still the long-term unemployed!). And we have all heard of employers refusing to consider even interviewing the long term unemployed! So you may put yourself in a situation in which employers don't even want to interview you. Uh oh
2) age discrimination. At 40? Possibly, sometimes discrimination does hit that young, but not necessarily as that's still fairly young even for a job market that doesn't like age. But more age discrimination when you plan to work the extra 5 years between 65-70, see that really is ancient to the job market. So he is making actual *plans* based on being able to get jobs at ages when the experience of lots of people is that they are unable to get jobs even if they are able to do them. So what is his plan to be employable at 65-70 despite age discrimination?

I suppose there might be a 3rd risk of the economy being even worse when you get back, but I wouldn't classify it with those two risks as it's highly speculative and isn't at all a risk you brought about by your choices, it's way bigger than you - the other two are, you made yourself "long-term unemployed" and you are making a plan to have to seek work at 68 and so on.

I agree we don't necessarily know much about this guy from the article, he may have an agreement to get his old job back, he would do fine in the open job market even if he didn't because of the sucessful development work he did while unemployed - but that's the last thing in the world most people are going to do or should count on. And he wasn't without income for a year anyway, his wife worked while he was unemployed (so one income instead of two - big deal - I've gone periods with no income of any sort where I couldn't even get unemployment - turned out ok because I've got some money, but it's scary).


But I do suppose it's not something everyone could do.

Someone who never makes enough to save a dime obviously can't do it. Those it tortures with ambiguity is the sort of middle class that could do it, that would manage the thing itself monetarily, but whose future afterward would be one big question mark. Things like: ok so would I then be long term unemployed and would I be able to get a job when I got back? How do I know they'll hire me when I'm old when I hear so much about age discrimination? etc.. Because for them it's a true and tempting like a siren risk, but it is a risk utterly without a net. Will I be able to step back in the same river I stepped out of or will I even if I get a job end up taking one at a much lower level afterward etc.? Should I just do it, without the optimists pretense in any certainty that it will all work out, without anyone that's got my back, in a world that doesn't give a flying @#$# what happens to me, just as *pure* UNMITIGATED and UNMITIGATABLE risk.

[Spartana]

My sister has taken many long sabbaticals in her life - a year in New Zealand, 3 summers in Alaska, a year road trip around the USA, a year travelling over seas, etc... and I have also taken a long break (2 years to travel) as well as some shorter ones of a couple of months. I think it's a great way to live and in our cases we were young and childless (sis was single but I was married) with no debts or financial obligation so it made it much easier. However there are those job ramifications to deal with upon return. May be hard to find a 'good" job - especially if older and/or having a family to support so need a higher income. Sis, besides being single, childless and youngish (20's and 30's), worked low income wage slave jobs between travels (and also worked while travelling) to support herself and live that life. I travelled between natural job breaks like when getting out of the coast guard or college or changing jobs.

After living that lifestyle for 17 years, sis eventually "settled down" and got a good job and has worked full time for 18 years now and has a house, money in savings and retirement and no debt. But she worked many crappy low paying jobs, and always rented rooms rather than got her own place in order to live that lifestyle from age 18 to 35. She might be much further behind financially then she would be if she didn't live that lifestyle all those years, but she doesn't regret it at all.

Of course for someone starting at an older age, with family obligations, debt, mortgage, etc.. would be much more difficult but I know many people who find a way to combine year long sabatticals between periods of full time work. Generally they have jobs or proffessions that allow for that (teacher) and live frugally to save the money to be able to afford a year off work.

[bae]

2) age discrimination. At 40? Possibly, sometimes discrimination does hit that young,

One of the reasons I "retired" in my mid-30s was that when I looked around in my industry, I saw *very* few people over the age of 40, and those were mostly in upper-upper management positions, a direction I didn't particularly enjoy going in.

We were hiring massively in that period too, and it was clear there was some unconscious age discrimination going on, it was rare anyone over 40 would make it through the first round of interviews.

[Spartana]

I wonder if the main reason these kinds of long sabbaticals are more common in other countries is because their healthcare isn't tie to their job. If a person or family in the US takes a year off work, we have to pay the for it ourselves. That can be impractical and very expensive for a family. Especially if you are living off savings for a year. Probably why you see young single childless people doing it more than married couples with kids. Although there are lots of families who do that - the Man vs. debt guy being one of them.