Annuities Got It Goin’ On: Blog
August 20, 2014 by Steve Morelli
Will you need me? Will you still feed me?
When I’m 64?”
Short answer: no.
When The Beatles sang this, today’s 64-year-olds were 17. Like most teenagers, they probably never imagined 64 would happen to them. Heck, they wouldn’t have trusted someone over 30. The age of 64 may as well have been 104. Just ridiculously old.
They probably imagined cardigans, canes and false teeth. They couldn’t have envisioned the vibrant, active people that 64-year-olds are today. They also probably couldn’t have fathomed a rock star rehabilitating the cardigan as cool wear, but, then again, Kurt Cobain was a little unusual anyway.
Now you might be uncool if you called a 64-year-old a senior. Boomers always took themselves darn seriously and thought they invented anything they encountered. Well, they’re doing it again with retirement.
The second quarter annuity sales numbers have come out and it’s a banner time for fixed annuities, especially of the fixed index variety. Linda Koco has done an extensive article delving into the data, but a key point popped out. According to Wink, Inc., the average age of a fixed index annuity client is 64.
So, will you still feed me? People are understanding that they have to feed themselves. A lot has happened between 1967 and now. One of them is the demise of dependable retirement income. A pension is about as rare as polyester bell bottoms these days. And if the past is any indication, no one knows what kind of really bad trips the future has in store in the economy or financial markets.
LIMRA also finished a study recently that showed consumers want security and lifetime income but don’t necessarily want to give up control of their money. Well, boomers were all about deconstructing control issues, so maybe these past good quarters in annuity sales are the beginning of a turn in this attitude.
Could it be that tuning in, turning on and dropping out is a whole lot easier when you have an annuity?
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