Boomers

There are 72 million baby boomers, people born between 1946 and 1964 and the first of this group reached age 65 in 2011 which means that over the next 18 years about 4 million people per year will reach the retirement age of 65. The current unemployment rate of 8.6% represents 13.3 million people without a job. If those 4 million boomers had not retired the unemployment rate would be 11.2%. With this many people retiring you might assume that productivity would be on the decline, but just the opposite is happening. Companies are producing more with fewer people and this increase in productivity is primarily caused by the computer and its effect on automation.