Certain words and ideas root into our cultural landscape so completely that we think they’ve always been there. The word retirement is such a thing. Like kudzu in the south, it’s everywhere and hard to imagine life without it, but it is still new to the soil it claims.
Obviously, retirement relates primarily to amassing earthly goods. It is hard to look seriously at the idea of retirement without thinking of our Lord’s words: “Do not lay up treasure for yourselves on earth… lay up treasure for yourself in heaven” (Matt. 6:19, Knox).
But, if “retirement” is a new idea that could potentially grate against these simple words in the Gospel, does that mean we should not plan for the future at all? No, but to be wise and not fall into spiritual danger or inhumane living we need to know the foundations of modern retirement ideals — and build from new ones.
Survival, Security, and Beyond
Retirement is billed as a time you can finally kick back and live “the good life.” However, when we, as Catholics, say “the good life,” we mean the life of virtue, so any talk of retiring must be exposed to that light.
Wise preparation for a later time belongs to the virtue of prudence: “The prudent man considers things afar off [i.e. in the future],” says St. Thomas Aquinas, “in so far as they tend to be a help or a hindrance to that which has to be done at the present time.” Virtue discerns the good life, orders our life toward that good, and prepares for potential threats and dangers to that good. Prudence seeks security, the safeguarding of present and future goods. A lack of preparation for the future, including the realities of old age, would be imprudent.
But, Aquinas says, prudence can never be considered for the individual alone, because “the individual good is impossible without the common good of the family, state, or kingdom.” [1] Therefore, the prudent father considers all plans in relation to his household and even extended family. If our work and plans are good for us but not our family, it is imprudence. High incomes, for example, that create low morale (or low morals) at home cost too much. Regarding the future, the mutual benefit shared with a father and his family is also manifest, because when a father is old, his children can both continue his work and also care for him if he cannot care for himself. The Mosaic law had clear directives to help a widow have children, because to enter old age without children is dangerous. This is of course enshrined in the fourth commandment also. Or, more poignantly, in natural and Mosaic law, and in the ancient world generally, children are the most secure “investment.”
But, children grow a household, and a household needs a place to work out its own ends. When we seek to provide and plan for those in our care, we don’t merely look for the next meal but toward ongoing security, which the Church’s social teaching says means gaining ownership over income and supply. It is good to know where your next meal comes from. It is better to know where your meals will always come from. This principle has most often been oriented toward the ownership of productive property, because, as Aquinas says, “a more peaceful state is ensured to man if each one is contented with his own,” [2] and it is from the soil or sustainable work that man’s security comes. As Hilaire Belloc said, “Truth confirms truth and the general truths of the Faith promote…that the complete citizen is a free man working upon the land.” Although this was most often agricultural, it could be another trade or craft. Ownership in tangible and productive property brings security. God promised two things to the Israelites in the desert: His care and fertile land.
Therefore, considering retirement in light of virtue, we can see that classically and naturally man prepares for old age by prudently securing three things: family, work, and productive property. This is confirmed in Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical Rerum Novarum, which teaches that man extends his “personality” through these things: families with children, Leo says “continue [the father’s] personality”; work too is “bound up with his personality.” And he says a man leaves an “impress of his personality” on the land and place he cultivates in order to provide for his household. [3] He goes so far as to say “the impelling reason and motive of his work is to obtain property,” claiming this to be the very thing for which savings is directed. [4]
And these are not just ideals of distant places and times. Although Americans are now known for being obsessively profit-driven, these more natural means were the fabric of things in older generations, associated especially with the agrarian ideals of Thomas Jefferson and other southerners, and reflect again the natural concerns of fatherhood, as Allan C. Carlson points out when speaking of a younger America:
Economic gain … was not the most overriding concern [for Americans]: it was subordinated to the long-run security, through land, of the family unit. Toward this end, the central goal of fathers was to provide for their children farms that were viable economic units… Property, in effect, was “communal” within the family, the aim being preservation of the land for posterity. [5]
This spirit of fatherly prudence is different from, say, a billionaire paying to have his head cryogenically frozen for a future time in which he can be reconstituted with a technology yet developed (yes, this is a thing). A father leaving a stamp of personality, in the spirit described by Leo XIII, is one that loses his life by investing in a future he will not see, not investing in himself to make sure he’s in the future. Interestingly, it is a significant debate as to whether the desire for legacy is a form of self-gift or an expression of narcissism. [6] It likely depends on whether the man is a loving father or a psychopath, which many of our modern overlords are. [7]
In summary, natural prudence enacted in classical economic systems valued the relational and tangible above all things, not only because they valued things like family local culture and belonging, which they did, but also because these things brought long-term security.
Where Did Retirement Come From?
The use of the word retire to describe ending paid work in old age is inseparable from the rise of the modern economy, and it has grown out of the same soil where former dependencies on family and place died.
Military pensions are the oldest form of guaranteed income for the period of life when work ceases. The practice of government care for aged soldiers stretches back to ancient Rome.
But in the late 1800s, German Chancellor Otto Van Bismarck extended military pensions outward to other public officials who were unable to work. The connection to military pensions partly explains why we even use the word “retire” today — it was formerly a military word synonymous with retreat. Since Bismarck’s act was a first major step toward broader ideas of retiring, Bismarck is often titled “the father of retirement,” even introducing the age of 65 as the standard age to exit the workforce.
The reason for pensions, however, is revealing. They were extended in Germany, at least in part, to placate growing calls from the working class for socialism, a reaction against the slummy suffering related to industrialization. The Industrial Revolution was not merely a new and efficient way to make a lot of things, but a complete reordering of society. As work consolidated away from agrarian holdings to larger corporations, and the pursuit of land gave way to the pursuit of wages, traditional family stability and property no longer provided a “safety net,” and the resulting insecurity was manifest. In some ways, the systems of retirement via pension can be seen as growing in response to lost security in natural, non-monetary, and tangible means like family and land.
Larger companies in the United States later adopted the pension idea to entice long-term labor to leave farms for a stable wage. However, this was not widespread; at the turn of the 20th century only 12 companies offered pensions. The only U.S. government pensions offered then were paid mostly to Union soldiers and very few Confederate soldiers. It was only after the Great Depression, when the fragile constructs of industrial and bank-based economies tumbled like a house of cards, that the Federal Government passed what we now call Social Security, attempting to bring a safety net to the masses, realizing that abundance (i.e. economic growth) does not always equal security.
Work On
We should note that early “safety nets” were not originally intended for people of a particular age who “stop working to enjoy life,” but for those who could no longer work. In fact, to this day what we call “Social Security” is legally known by its original name that harkens to this fact: Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance. Even pensioned soldiers in the US would be denied benefits if they were found to be “unusually vigorous.” But the culture of that age made them agreeable to that reality — who would stop working to live off the dole?
However, the incompatibility of industrialism and old age helped to create a more widespread embrace of retiring employees, because the functions in factory systems don’t change, but the functionaries do. Or, a lever needs to be pulled even if the puller can no longer pull it. Thus “older workers were forced out of the labor force because modern industry had no use for them.” [8] In fact, it seems this is where the use of the word “retire” gained momentum — companies started “retiring” their employees before employees started choosing to retire.
The Growth of Nuclear Family Units
Naturally, if your industrial job and work are your long-term security, we also see in this time an acceleration of the breakdown of multi-generational holdings into individual family units — the “nuclear family” living in its own wholly independent household. Many towns were literally built with neighborhoods of families surrounding the factory as the economic center and primary source of security. Prior to this shift, sprawling suburbs of newly transplanted families would not have been easily adopted, because to leave one’s home and kin would have posed threats to long-term security. The growth of suburbia is not without some sense of community, but the surrounding communities were people like you: working dad, stay-at-home mom, and kids in public school. Unlike something like a neighborhood of family members, which was not uncommon in previous centuries, a modern neighborhood is a place of embraced association but not dependency.
Move to the Market
Even though many companies did increase the use of pensions to care for retired employees (usually due to unions), that type of security gradually ended. For decades now, pensions (known technically as Defined-Benefit Plans) have been off-loaded into personal investment accounts (Defined-Contribution Plans), like 401k plans. Companies don’t save money for you now but help you get money into the stock-market as investment for the future. Or, they don’t invest in and for you; they help you invest for you. This switch essentially became a transfer of risk from employer to employee. The employee is offered assistance but ultimately no guarantee of security, because future security depended on the success of investments and the state of the stock market, not the direct commitment of support from the company. This shift from pension to markets also explains why there has been a steady rise in the financial service industry. It is no longer a matter of paying into an account that pays you later but is a complex industry in itself that requires professionals.
Savings as Security
We can now see how the natural security (the ends of family, work, and property) was slowly absorbed and replaced into a system we now call retirement. A new ideal was established: exiting the workforce with enough “assets to maintain consumption,” [9] to keep spending money after you stop making it, and live “independently,” hopefully near other retired people. In short, the sense and means of security shifted from the relational and tangible (family and property) to the monetary (long-term savings or passive income).
Industrialism also rises in the philosophical era of modernism, which is best described as the exaltation of the individual as an autonomous and self-determining being. We subtly accept the idealization of radical independence, and have a hard time imagining that generations should be dependent on each other in ways that might limit a person’s potential to succeed as an individual. Therefore, the transfer of value from people and things to money, with the decline in direct production of goods, relates to another chilling societal shift too rarely considered: kids as burdens.
In prior ages children brought security by being able to both work within the household economy and care for us as we age, but in our present situation most of us are implicitly or explicitly taught that children are primarily an expense. This is so if the sole means of supporting them is wages earned by parents alone, and the fact that they have little tangible “return” in the form of security. We pay for kids until they “fly the coop” and pay for themselves. From such a perspective, new life does not extend an estate and the “personality” of the man, as Pope Leo described, but strains it. Children are not another hand to the plow. They are another mouth to feed. Yes, I am well aware of the danger of romanticizing former days of small family farms, because life was indeed very hard. Yet, we cannot dismiss how shifts in thinking shape our views of life itself.
Even in academic studies, retirement is idealized precisely because you are not “dependent on family and friends… [and is] a time of discovery, personal fulfillment, and relative independence.” [10] This is an overarching philosophy that is instilled at the youngest of ages as a goal. I plugged the exact words describing retirement (“discovery, personal fulfillment, and independence”) into a search engine and the first result was from Princeton. Success is leaving the boundaries of home and place to chase the endless horizon of independence and self-actualization. In my research, one motivational self-help author defined retirement in the exact way that a teen might define leaving home: “Retirement, a time to do what you want to do, when you want to do it, where you want to do it and how you want to do it.” [11]
Feeling the Pain
This does not mean that all of those working toward and entering retirement do not value relational and tangible “assets’’ and only want to be rich. But the economic and philosophical practices of retirement — as a simple fact — come from a consumerist, modern, and secular foundation. They do not come from an organic development of natural economy tempered by Christian virtue, and we would not call retirement a “tradition” of man, something distilled by the wise of a culture and handed down. This leaves us recognizing something awry in our particular society, but not sure what to do about it, as author Madeleine L’Engle put it:
Something very wrong that our generation, as a whole, has done is to set one example for our children that may be more telling that we realize: we respect old age even less than they do. Our parents, as they grow old, are frequently shuffled off into homes or institutions. We persuade ourselves that they’ll be happier there…with their “own kind”…but actually the real problem is that we have neither the time nor the space for them in this urban, technological world. I don’t speak out of any righteous isolation and I know of no easy solution.
Yet, recognizing that something has gone wrong collides with hard facts, like not wanting to be imprudent and become a “burden” to others. We feel disconnected from older generations, yes, but fear what it would mean to re-connect with the next in a shared life. What we are willing to do in love, and unwilling to do, is a bit of a paradox when we speak of old age. L’Engle again:
…I come to a dichotomy of my thinking as far as my own children are concerned. I cannot bear the thought of being a burden to them, of becoming senile and silly and an exacerbation. I would be willing — I hope — to accept such a burden myself, but I never want to be one. There is something more than pride involved here. We’ve taken a wrong turning somewhere, so long ago, that we no longer know what is the right way.
Men want to lift the burdens of others, not lay them on their backs, like Jesus said the Pharisees did. Of course we don’t want to be a “burden.” Yet, Jesus also rebukes the Pharisees for disrupting the duties of children toward their parents, when they claimed their money is all given to God and, therefore, they feign they have nothing to offer their parents (Matt. 15:5-6). In Scripture it is presumed and commanded that we accept that children should take part in the care of their parents. St. Jerome, commenting on Matthew 15, interprets it forcefully, saying here Jesus confirmed and “commanded that sons should honor their parents in providing them with necessaries of life.” In other words, “honor thy father and mother” means more than a quarterly phone call home. All love is a burden, and we are clearly told to “bear one another’s burdens” which begins “in our household” (Gal. 6:2, 1 Tim. 5:8) — and in the Bible, “household” is not the nuclear family alone, but generations together.
Rethinking Foundations, Building New Ones
It is hard to go against ideals of autonomous success and independence, but if we are to build on different foundations than the ones offered by the secular world, the most simple place to start is relationships within the family. This begins with basic communication, which must be initiated and led by the father, especially if he is the primary financial support of the home.
Our first foundation is to reclaim the family as the focus of all economic considerations, not wealth, success, or independence. As Aquinas showed us, a father’s purpose is not solely to make enough money to pay for college and retire in independence so that his children can do the same. Prudence for a father is seeking the good of the family, and it is good for the family to be the center and goal of economic life as opposed to a house where successful individuals live or start from. Yes, preparation and education are good things, but we must speak to each other and set goals based on God’s design, which is the mutual dependence of a household. Because most cultural norms and patterns for this connectivity are eroded or gone, this is a significant challenge, but following the truth cannot be avoided simply because it’s hard.
It is commanded by God that children be involved with the care of their parents.
Like L’Engle, I have no “easy solution” to propose, but simply know it is a challenge that must be met. We must no longer speak of each other, even ourselves, as burdens. God does not saddle us with the debt and burden of life. He blesses us with it and yokes us together in these bonds, which are also the means of salvation through vocation. As the Church’s teaching on life is often put, we love life “from birth to natural death,” which means we welcome the work that comes with life in all its stages.
Next, to build toward old age on different foundations, we have to rethink work in two ways.
First, if at all possible we should find ways to make the home a place of shared work. The most natural and universal bond of families is work, and it is hard to manufacture a sense of mutual dependence when you have no practical need for each other. “For thousands of years it was the family economy that provided the context in which family members spent time together,” says Rory Groves, “[by work they] achieved goals together, cared and provided for one another’s needs, gave and received mentorship, and transmitted faith, culture, and values to the next generation.” [12] The act of passing work on was a gift of the ordinary and the very place of relationship. For many of us, this could appear insurmountable due to the demand and practical realities of work and home, but in the end it is the easier way because it is built into the very nature of man.
Second, a life without work is not human. God commands us to work, and as scripture says, those who can work should work (2 Thes. 3:10). In discussing the last years of men’s lives, I am astounded by how many of them begin with something like, “Grandpa began to decline when he retired.” “When he stopped work,” says L’Engle of her grandfather, “the rest of him began stopping, too.” I’ve heard it put bluntly: when you retire you expire. My grandfather was a scientist, homebuilder, vigorous gardener, and amateur archaeologist. Once he was forcibly retired, however, his decline was rapid. Although the types and rigor of work may change, we do not have a compelling reason to think that life should be free of work at all, and for many men, ceasing meaningful work seems to be some sort of self-destructive act. If we were considering practical means for the previous consideration — keeping connected to family — perhaps there should be greater focus on shared work when the elderly can focus more on mentoring and guidance.
Work, however, does not necessitate wages. If that were so, the work of a stay-at-home mother would not be work, and any witness to a mother’s life at home knows that is absurd. Work also provides purpose, and if men find themselves secure financially, then they can dedicate themselves to good work without concern for pay. Fraternus, for example, runs with the volunteer help of “retired” and dedicated men.
And, lastly, we must completely rethink notions of value if we are to build on true foundations. Some have no concept of limiting potential and income for the sake of living as a family economy. Others feel completely inadequate if their incomes and homes are not as large as another’s. We have to rethink the very ideal that wealth can be pursued by any means without danger to our homes and souls — whether we are achieving wealth or not. Aquinas echoes Aristotle in noting that economies like our own, where “wealth-getting” is the goal of work and is often detached from the bonds of people and communities, orients men toward “the unnatural and limitless end of amassing money, ever more money.” [13] Pope Pius XI observed that economies based solely on money and trade attract many to “buying and selling…for quick profit” and the attitudes of “get more” trickle down to workers, creating “obstacles to the family bond and normal family life.” [14]
In other words, we have to seek higher goods like family and God and be wary of having our attention diverted to things lower, and sometimes there are few things lower than a bottom line. But, as we see in Pius’s observation, the way to limit the desire for money is in understanding all of our life as an investment in the good of the household and the virtue of its members. “Since the need of any one household for natural wealth, such as food and clothing, is limited…[it tends] less to become inordinate.” [15] Keeping focused on true needs, limited by faith and prudence, we find the freedom from disordered desires.
In the End is the End
In the end, our life will end, but it continues, too. And the end of man is God — we are made for Him. In prudence we prepare for what we cannot yet see. But that is the natural virtue. Prudence must be enlightened and even corrected by the virtues of hope and faith, which also look forward to things unseen. Much of the industry and ideas of retirement are born from fear and monetary considerations alone, and not having connection to natural ends can cause inordinate fear. Today, people nearing and entering retirement consistently report fearing running out of money more than death itself. [16]
Jesus tells us plainly: “Do not lay up treasure for yourselves on earth…lay up treasure for yourselves in heaven…Where your treasure-house is, there your heart is too.” Jesus did not totally settle His estate until He was on the cross, hung there with all of his possessions, when He gave instruction for the care of Mary. No, He is not telling us to not prepare for the future at all. What we cannot be ruled by is avarice unrestrained or fear untempered by faith. In fact, Aquinas says that the passion of fear is something that threatens prudence, because like prudence which concerns the future, “fear regards a future evil.” If we look ahead without faith we can easily fall into sinful fear or untempered hoarding.
Especially for us fathers, we must take care of material needs, yes. But we must do so with trust that ultimately it is God Who cares for us and knows our needs. “See how the birds of the air never sow, or reap, or gather grain into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them; have you not an excellence beyond theirs?” (Matt. 25:26, Knox). To have our “treasure house” in order in the future, we have to have our hearts in the right place now.
This essay was originally published in Sword&Spade Magazine.
About the Author
Jason Craig is the co-founder of Fraternus, founding editor of Sword&Spade magazine, and author of Leaving Boyhood Behind. He writes, works, and hosts on-farm retreats from St. Joseph’s Farm, which boasts of NC’s smallest and likely least successful Grade A dairy. All adventures are alongside his high-school sweetheart Katie and their seven children (and counting). He is also known to defend his family’s claim to have invented bourbon.
[1] Summa, II-II, Q. 47, art. 10, emphasis added.
[2] Summa, II-II, Q. 66, art. 2.
[3] Pope Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum, from paragraphs 9, 14, 44.
[4] Ibid., 5.
[5] Allan C. Carlson, From Cottage to Workstation: The Family’s Search for Social Harmony in the Industrial Age. Ignatius Press. 1993, p. 12.
[6] Newton, N. J., Herr, J. M., Pollack, J. I., & McAdams, D. P. (2014). Selfless or Selfish?Generativity and Narcissism as Components of Legacy. Journal of Adult Development, 21(1), 59-68. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10804-013-9179-1
[7] https://nypost.com/2020/09/26/why-silicon-valley-ceos-are-such-raging-psychopaths/
[8] Dora L. Costa, The History of Retirement: 1890-1990, 14.
[9] Costa, 14. Emphasis added.
[10] Ibid., 1.
[11] Catherine Pulsifer, Wings for Goals.
[12] Rory Groves, Durable Trades: Family-Centered Economies That Have Stood the Test of Time. From the intro.
[13] George H Speltz, The Importance of the Rural Life According to Thomas Aquinas, 7.
[14] Pius XI, Quadrigessimo anno, 132, 135.
[15] Ibid., 6.
[16] https://tinyurl.com/y4cezmhh
