What do you want to do when you grow up -- way, way up? Once you have finished your education, your childrearing and your career, what do you want to do for a living? For more and more people, abandoning the nine-to-five, holidays-and-two-weeks'-vacation lifestyle only means a change in career, rather than retirement in the traditional sense.
The next generation of retirees, the baby boomers, is the first American generation to look for fulfillment as much as security in a career. People are living longer, healthier lives and Social Security and 401k plans mean that they don't have to work until they drop. Many retired Americans find that they are still able to work and want to continue earning money, for either fun or necessity.
In a January 2002 Gallup/UBS Index of Investor Optimism poll*, respondents were asked if, upon reaching retirement age, they would like to "pursue a hobby of yours as a way to make money, but not necessarily start a full-fledged business." Forty-six percent (46%) reported that they would like to do so.
Salary, Savings and Education Influence Retirement Plans
Naturally, the less money one has for retirement, the more likely one is to want to make a hobby pay. Fifty-four percent (54%) of those who make $40,000 a year or less would like to make money from a hobby upon retirement, compared to 47% who make $40,000 to $60,000 a year. Likewise, the fewer dollars one has in savings, the more likely one is to pursue a hobby to make money. Fifty-one percent (51%) of individuals with $100,000 or less in savings are interested in fun for a profit, as are 44% of people with $100,000 to $200,000 saved. In contrast, only 36% of those with $200,000 or more socked away are interested in profiting from their retirement hobbies.
Education influences income, which in turn influences retirement. People with a high school education or less are more likely to pursue a hobby to make money (52%) than are those with some college (44%), college graduates (47%), or post-graduates (45%).
Marital Status, Gender and Age
Married couples tend to have higher incomes than singles. Perhaps this is why unmarried people are slightly more likely to pursue a hobby to make money (49%) than are married people (45%). There is also a dichotomy between the plans of men and women. Fifty-two percent (52%) of men intend to putter for pay, as do only 42% of women.
Responses to the question of whether to take up a profitable retirement hobby differed significantly by age. The age group in the thick of retirement planning -- 35- to 49-year-olds -- is the one most likely to look for lucre in leisure (53%). Interestingly, 18- to 34-year-olds are the next most likely to want to pursue a profitable retirement hobby, perhaps because they feel that retirement will be their first opportunity to really do what they want, or because they fear Social Security won't be a sufficient income source.
The people who are least interested in making a hobby pay are the people closest to retirement -- those who are 50 or older (37%). This is, perhaps, cause for optimism. The people closest to retirement are the least likely to be searching for alternate sources of earnings, which may mean that they don't feel they need it.
*These results are based on telephone interviews with a randomly selected national sample of 1,001 U.S. investors not retired, aged 18 and older, conducted Jan. 4-13, 2002. For results based on this sample, one can say with 95% confidence that the maximum error attributable to sampling and other random effects is ±3%.
