Three-quarters of workers over 50 surveyed are delaying retirement and nearly two-thirds are using their savings early, advisers say, leaving room for improvement fast narrowing.
A sizable portion of older workers in the U.S. are feeling financial pressure as inflation and tariff concerns are forcing a fundamental rethink of retirement, according to new survey findings.
LiveCareer’s Retirement Reality Check report, based on responses from 878 U.S. workers age 50 and older, found that 91% say inflation or tariffs have affected their retirement plans.
Three-quarters of respondents said they are delaying retirement due to recent market volatility – a figure that underscores how deeply economic uncertainty has taken root in older Americans’ long-term financial planning.
This data comes against the backdrop of falling consumer confidence. The latest reading of the University of Michigan’s Headline Sentiment Index It fell to a record low of 47.6 in April – a 10.7% decline from March – as one-year inflation expectations climbed to 4.8%. The decline was mainly driven by concerns over the Iran conflict, which sent energy prices rising and the consumer price index hitting a 3.3% annual rate in March.
That pressure is visible in the salary also. Taking inflation into account, average weekly earnings fell 0.9% in March — the sharpest monthly decline since mid-2022, according to an analysis of federal data. As reported wall street journal.
For those already approaching retirement age, the pressure is having real consequences. The LiveCareer survey found that 61% of respondents are regularly withdrawing from retirement accounts to cover current expenses, while 30% do so occasionally for specific needs. Only 8% said they were holding the money back for later.
In a recent preview of its “How America Saves 2026” reportVanguard said it plans for 6% of workers to barely return in 2025, compared with 4.8% in 2024 and about 2% before the pandemic.
Only 9% of older workers in the LiveCareer survey said inflation and tariff concerns had little or no impact on their retirement outlook. Among the rest, 45% said they are rethinking their entire retirement plan, while 46% have made small adjustments.
Health care costs top the list of retirement fears, with 55% of survey respondents citing it as their biggest concern. Forty-nine percent said they feared running out of their savings, while 30% cited stock market volatility as a major concern. Only 2% of respondents said they had no financial concerns about their future.
41 percent said they have already changed their investment strategy in response to market volatility, while only 8% said they are sticking with it without any changes.
consultants are considering
Scott Bishop, a wealth advisor at Presidio Wealth Partners in Houston, said the results are in line with what many advisors are seeing directly.
“Inflation has quietly made retirement savings a byproduct of everyday living,” he said. “When six in ten workers over the age of 50 are already using retirement accounts, the issue is not just high prices — it’s that long-term assets are being used for short-term survival, fundamentally changing the dynamics of retirement risk.”
Bishop pointed to sequence-of-returns risk — the danger that forced withdrawals during market declines can permanently damage a portfolio, even if long-term average returns appear good — as a growing planning concern. He argued that retirement portfolios should be stress-tested against scenarios that include high inflationInitial bearish markets, and continued withdrawals have become a necessity rather than a precaution.
Scott Van den Bergh of Century Management in Austin, Texas, said he is seeing the same thing “in real time.” In addition to raising prices, he says inflation is changing behavior among customers in their 50s and 60s, some of whom are using retirement accounts earlier than expected to keep pace with day-to-day expenses.
“The bigger issue is this: Retirement is going to last longer, and the old 60/40 stock-bond mix may not hold up in the same way in a world of sticky inflation and higher rates,” Van den Bergh said. “Bonds are not providing the same stability or security that they used to, especially with long-term risk.”
At Century, he said it is spending more time helping clients protect purchasing power by tilting some of their portfolios toward real assets such as energy, materials and select industries, as well as focusing more on sustainable, dividend-paying companies.
“It’s less about chasing returns and more about making sure their money can still do its job 10 to 20 years from now,” Van den Bergh said.
Not all advisors are seeing that promptness in the behavior of clients. Jeffrey Judge, a financial planner at Chesapeake Financial Planners in Forest Hill, Maryland, said he hasn’t seen clients make adjustments to retirement accounts, and his team isn’t asking them to make changes based on recent inflation or tariff pressures.
“Clients have become more concerned about retirement, but no one is changing their approach or strategy,” he said.