Twenty-three percent of workers who are employed or recently unemployed say their confidence in their ability to retire comfortably has declined in light of the coronavirus pandemic, according to Retirement Security Amid COVID-19: The Outlook of Three Generations, a new study released by Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies® (TCRS).
As part of TCRS’ 20th Annual Retirement Survey of Workers, one of the largest and longest running surveys of its kind, the study examines the retirement outlook of Millennials, Generation X and Baby Boomers. It is based on a survey conducted in late 2019 and offers comparisons with a supplemental survey conducted in April 2020, after several states issued stay-at-home orders and large segments of the U.S. economy had temporarily closed due to the pandemic.As of April 2020, the survey finds:
- Almost six in 10 workers (58 percent) have experienced one or more impacts to their employment situation as a result of the pandemic, including reduced work hours (29 percent), reduced salaries (17 percent), layoffs (16 percent), furloughs (11 percent) and early retirement (5 percent);
- When asked what they have used or would rely on if the pandemic negatively impacts their finances, workers’ most frequently cited source was savings (56 percent) followed by credit cards (29 percent), unemployment benefits (26 percent) and CARES Act stimulus money (24 percent). One in six workers cite a reliance on a significant other’s or spouse’s income (16 percent), withdrawal from a retirement account (14 percent) and/or a loan from a friend or family member (10 percent); and
- A concerning one in three Millennial workers (33 percent) have and/or plan to dip into their retirement accounts, including 22 percent who have already taken a loan and/or early withdrawal and 20 percent who plan to do so. By comparison, only 15 percent of Generation X and 10 percent of Baby Boomer workers have already done so and/or plan to do so.