Learn From Mistakes of Two Political Leaders When Preparing for Retirement

Learning from the mistakes of two political leaders can make us understand how important it is to plan for retirement, writes Peter Watson.

Beware when planning for retirement. Life does not always evolve as you might have hoped.

Key assumptions are made about when you will retire, and the cash flow needed to maintain your desired standard of living. My suggestion is to look at several different retirement scenarios in case life evolves differently than the assumptions made.

This column idea was inspired by politics in Canada and United States. Many assumed President Joe Biden would not run for a second term. There could be an orderly transition to whoever the Democrats elected to run against the Republicans in the 2024 presidential election.

Biden surprised many by continuing to be his party’s nominee for President. Unfortunately, the aging process caught up with him and in the first minutes of the first presidential debate against Donald Trump it became evident that Biden did not have the mental acumen to continue as President.

Almost a decade after becoming Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau pondered his political future. Despite extremely low support from Canadians and members of his own Liberal Party, he delayed the inevitable decision to resign.

Finally, as Donald Trump was getting ready to retake the White House and was thinking about imposing costly tariffs on Canada, Trudeau decided to resign.

In both countries the late actions of the two political heads of state proved to be a disastrous way to retire. Ideally politicians want a smooth transition of power the same way we all would like a smooth transition into retirement.

We can learn from this. Regardless of how confident you are with your own retirement future, consider other scenarios on how retirement might actually occur.

Planning ahead is strongly recommended. Getting retirement wrong was done by Biden and Trudeau.

Hopefully you will not make mistakes with your own retirement.

Peter Watson, of Watson Investments MBA, CFP®, R.F.P., CIM®, FCSI offers a weekly financial planning column, Dollars & Sense. He can be contacted through www.watsoninvestments.com