According to data published by Optum, published in the Economic Times in 2016, nearly half of India’s workforce suffered from some form of stress, which was related to the targets and deadlines they were dealing with at their workplace, along with the environment. This stress also invoked a sense of isolation, moodiness and irritability, which only harmed their relationships, both personal and social. People facing high levels of work stress have been found to suffer from indigestion, constipation or diarrhea, and hypertension, which increases the risk of coronary heart disease, stroke and heart failure.
The above mentioned social and physical issues are forcing more Indians to think of early retirement. But how many of us are thinking of the need for retirement planning to ensure that our post-retirement life is stress-free? This is despite the fact that estimating your needs in retired life has been made easier with the availability of retirement calculators. Retirement savings calculators, also known as pension calculators, are an online tool that can help you estimate the contributions you should be making towards your nest egg to achieve the target pension required to sustain your current lifestyle, even when you are no longer actively employed. Before discussing the pension calculator, let us take a look at the perks that come along with early retirement.
Benefits of Early Retirement
- Better Health: The study mentioned above also found that due to the sedentary lifestyle that the modern day workforce is following, the BMI (body mass index) of 43% of them had changed suddenly from its normal ranges, which has put 30% at risk of hypertension and 30% at risk of diabetes. When you stop working at an early age, you save yourself from this sedentary life, following a more active existence, doing things that you love doing. This means lower stress, better sleep and better digestion. Early retirement gives you sufficient time to get a grip on your health.
- Freedom to Do What Your Heart Always Longed For: Ask every working individual if they like what they are doing. Trust me, the number of unhappy employees will outnumber the happy ones. In our country, the traditional norms says that you can’t earn through your passion like dancing, music or painting, and we need to ensure a “proper” career path through traditional means. This is why many of us end up with a profession we are least interested in. However, if you work hard, save wisely using tools like retirement calculators, and plan ahead, you can choose early retirement and move on to doing things you are passionate about. You never know, you just might end up earning more through you passion.
- More Family Time: Although you are working hard for long hours to earn money to fulfill your family’s monetary needs, the stress will be ultimately reflected on your relationships with family members, who’ll end up missing your presence. Early retirement gives you the opportunity to indulge in traveling, simple recreational activities, volunteer work and adventure activities like mountain climbing, bungee jumping, snorkeling, etc., in which you can count in your family members and friends as well.
One thing you should know is that improved health is a major benefit of early retirement, which leads to longevity or longer retirement years. It, thus, becomes necessary to compute your retirement savings using and online calculator to live your retirement years happily with your head held high!
Infographic created by Mowery & Schoenfeld, providing individual tax services