31% of adults in the US don't understand life expectancy after 65
US adults were found to have a low percentage of longevity literacy, a report by the Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association of America (TIAA) Institute said.
Defined as how one understands how long people tend to live in retirement, longevity literacy was coined by the TIAA Institute and the Global Financial Literacy Excellence Center (GFLEC).
The report said that those whose longevity literacy was strong are much more likely to plan and save for retirement while they are working. They are also much more likely to have better financial outcomes when their retirement begins.
The report found that 31% of US adults had weak longevity literacy. Only 12% displayed strong longevity literacy. Employees who displayed a strong longevity literacy had a tendency to be much more prepared for their retirement, in contrast to those that had poor longevity literacy.
Among those that had strong longevity literacy, 50% of them could determine how much money they needed to save for their retirement, in contrast to those with weak longevity literacy which only had 32%.
72% of those with strong longevity literacy said that they saved money for retirement regularly while only 58% of those with weak longevity literacy said the same thing. As for confidence when it comes to having an adequate amount of savings by retirement, 76% of those with strong longevity literacy said that they are confident, which is 10% more than those with weak longevity literacy.
When it comes to the lifestyle of retirees, 77% of those with strong longevity literacy said that they had had met or exceeded the expectations they set prior to their retirement, while only 62% of those with weak longevity literacy said the same thing.
The report also found that within those with weak longevity literacy, 81% did not have a practical understanding of what the term “life expectancy” actually meant.
25% said that most people will not live past the determined life expectancy age, 47% said that they do not know what the term actually means, and 9% said that they believed only one half of people will die within one or two years of the determined life expectancy.
The usage of terms was found to be a big obstacle when it comes to the improvement of the longevity literacy of individuals as there is a need to explain the words used in order for them to be properly interpreted.
The report was based on the data gathered from the online survey that involved 3,505 US adults. There were at least 500 respondents each for Asian, Black, and Hispanic Americans.
