16 ms·

Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

218 points by _of 10y ago

reasonattlm 10y ago
Studies of health and activity have started to use accelerometers over the past decade. This has shown that even very modest levels of activity - on the order of washing dishes and puttering around the garden - have a meaningful correlation with health. This is causing something of a rethinking of the lower end of the dose-response curve for exercise. So when looking at the correlations between retirement and health, I'm inclined to think that physical activity level has a lot to do with it.
jaggederest 10y ago
As they say in the article, I think many people approach retirement as a cessation. From what I've seen of my own parents, I hope that retirement for me will be more a change of what I'm working on, and how I work, rather than whether or not I work. I'm also trying to make those changes now - working on what I want to work on, at a reasonable pace, at the level and times I'm interested. I'd quite happily keep doing this forever. It's a little frustrating that we reserve "living well and enjoying the fruits of your labor" for aged people - I'd rather enjoy it while I'm still relatively young and healthy, and mix it into my life rather than setting it aside as a separate thing.
- pmiller2 10y ago
  +1 to this. I plan to retire, or at least semi-retire at some point. To me, that means I'll have more time to do things I want to do that don't necessarily generate income.
- brandon272 10y ago
  I view retirement mostly as financial freedom. I have every intention of working after retirement as I get personal enjoyment out of doing what I do. I just haven't decided what "work" will look like.
  - ergothus 10y ago
    This. I am baffled by friends and family that talk about how they couldn't retire because what would they do? My response is to list the many, many things I want to do that I can't because I 'have to work': read more, learn new languages (spoken & computer), take up the piano/guitar, try new games (board, tabletoprpg, computer), write, program, etc. The only reason I ever get bored is because I don't have the time, resources, and/or other people to do what I want. The thought of not having to rely on a work schedule to provide necessary resources sounds wonderful, not threatening.
    - maroonblazer 10y ago
      My problem is similar but different. The last couple of vacations I've taken have been staycations. Even though I have many hobbies and interests - several musical instruments, writing music, drawing, dabbling in code, reading - not having the structure of a job and expectations of others weighing on me to 'be productive' I procrastinated quite a lot. I frequently felt anxious and unfulfilled. I took this experience as a glimpse into what retirement might be like. In retirement I think I'll need to create a schedule for myself that includes having others depending on me to 'show up'. E.g. doing volunteer teaching, etc.
      - TeMPOraL 10y ago
        I've recently started scheduling stuff I'm doing in advance and trying to stick to it, and I found it incredibly empowering. I too ended up wasting a lot of free time despite having a growing bucket list of things to create - scheduling free time helps to overcome that and generally makes me happier. I hope to use the same technique if/when I retire.
      - elbows 10y ago
        I've found that when I've been stressed out or overly busy, it can take a while to adjust to a more relaxed rhythm. At first I just want to slack off completely. After a couple of days, this gets boring, but it takes longer than that for my motivation to come back. Last year I was unemployed for about a month, and it was really only near the end of that time that I started to get some momentum going with side projects and hobbies.
- Shivetya 10y ago
  Get a hobby, it will save your life and your marriage. Heck even having pets help. the idea is to not have idle time
- singold 10y ago
  You made me remember this "living life backwards" quote http://seniorplanet.org/living-life-backward/ http://seniorplanet.org/living-life-backward/
xirdstl 10y ago
This is a concern for me as I consider "early" retirement. I'm not sure what I would do with all that time. I took a bit of a sabbatical a few years ago and ran into some of the problems described in the article. After a few months, it did have some pretty negative effects on my mental health.
- bpchaps 10y ago
  Find a problem to solve in your local community and do what it takes to fix it, no matter how small. You'll learn, do good and get involved with your community more. I recently took six months off to try and solve some local problems. There hasn't been a dull moment. :)
  - xirdstl 10y ago
    What kind of problems were you working on?
    - bpchaps 10y ago
      Lots of the work is just me identifying problems that I see and trying to fix them. Most of it is just exploratory and can be stressful at times, but it's overall very rewarding. I just accepted an offer in the infosec field to get out of the stress and to, well, get out of a financial hole. -Heck of a lot of FOIA requests to get the Chicago mayor's office's phone records. -Went to a hackathon a couple months back and made a domestic violence shelter map which has since been taken over by a small team of volunteers. -Got some wrongful parking tickets and started a project to map out Chicago's parking tickets using FOIA data. -Started setting up a LAN party with some friends which we hope will have 160+ people. -Freelance work here and there for some cash to help pay the bills. -Found some security vulnerabilities that could have impacted comcast's network which I helped fix. Did the same with Northwestern, but they didn't fix it. -Lots and lots of learning of random things.
  - wonder_er 10y ago
    Please expand on some of what you're working on! I've been thinking about just this sort of "work" to start dipping my toes into, don't quite know where to start.
nevster 10y ago
I'm thinking I'll code till the day I die. So much cool tech is always coming out - so much to play with and invent! I also have very time consuming hobbies - reading, playing video games, pen and paper role playing games, board games.
- ams6110 10y ago
  I don't know if everyone is this way, but at 50 I am losing a little of the starry-eyed excitement. I've seen a lot of the same ideas come around again and again as a new great thing. And yet the pace of change is so fast, if you try to stay current you feel like you never really become an expert in anything. You get jaded. If and when I "retire" I would not see myself not working, but I do think I might do somthing completely different and new. I could see walking away from computer tech entirely. In fact that idea is pretty attractive, honestly. I'm old enough to clearly remember the days before the internet, before mobile phones, before being constantly connected to everything 24x7. When you would leave the house or office, nobody would be able to get in touch with you and you could do what you wanted to do without interruption or distraction. It was nice.
  - tintor 10y ago
    > When you would leave the house or office, nobody would be able to get in touch with you and you could do what you wanted to do without interruption or distraction. It was nice. It was nice? You can still leave your phone at home.
    - conceit 10y ago
      apparently, for some, many even, this puts them under some stress and pressure, socially and organisatoric.
      - 50CNT 10y ago
        In which case you need to delineate your channels of access more clearly. Move your main communication to something more asynchronous (email, text, wechat/whatsapp, slack), set a time where things will be checked, and perhaps offer an emergency line over real-time messaging (phone calls fit the bill best). Most things are not time critical, and a sizable portion of the things that are, are not mission critical.
firebones 10y ago
FWIW, I started this thread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12013621 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12013621 with the hope that we could collect some good examples of how people stay busy after retirement. A great example for me is Don Melton, formerly of Safari and WebKit, who tweets routinely about his work on video transcoding [1]. I follow him on Twitter (@donmelton) and he gives me hope for any future retirement I might be lucky enough to have. [1] https://github.com/donmelton/video_transcoding https://github.com/donmelton/video_transcoding
andyjdavis 10y ago
>“You go from working 50, 60, 70 hours a week to zero,” Moen says. “And it very much affects your identity. Who am I? For men, the answer usually is their job.” I feel like this is a problem our whole life however it is only once we retire that we are forced to confront it. Until then we are able to avoid dealing with a lack of fulfilling activities outside of work, limited social connections and a weak sense of identity outside of work by simply working more. When we retire that coping mechanism goes away and you are left with no hobbies, a weak social network and a weak self image. Personally, I strongly recommend trying cutting your work commitments to something like 20 hours per week. Do this for a year or so. It will give you a chance to realize that many of the things you previously did whenever you got the chance (sleeping in etc) become extremely boring when you can do them all the time. After a while you will likely start to crave some sense of structure and accomplishment and the sooner you start filling the void outside of your work the better. Having a meaningful existence outside of your job will make you happier both now and in retirement.
- chubot 10y ago
  I think this is why it's good to work for an employer who supports open source. You don't want the entire value of your work and your social connections to be abruptly cut off once you leave the company. I saw this happen to both my parents. My dad was forced to retire at 53 and the value of his work was locked up inside that company (he worked there for over 20 years, so your skills develop in a bubble). For the last year and a half, I've been working on open source sponsored by the company. (I've worked on open source since 2009, but this is the first time I've been paid for it.) Even though it's mostly "our" project, there are enough outsiders lurking / paying attention I know that if I were to leave the company, I might have some opportunities or people to reach out to, or even just people to talk to about technical topics. Some of the proprietary software I've worked on has been very interesting, important, and technically sophisticated... but I know that once I leave the company, its value is drastically decreased. Basically you have to build up that value "from scratch" again, whereas open source can be forked, modified, combined, etc.
  - andyjdavis 10y ago
p4wnc6 10y ago
I am only 30 but have been unemployed for about 15 months, due to a significant family health and legal situation. I can definitely say that not working, even if other life needs are met, has had a hugely adverse affect. I definitely need to feel proud of what I am working on to feel whole and well. Ceasing to work and then resuming a new job search is also demoralizing. Most people will not even consider hiring you unless you are already working, even if you can ace the code tests, point to open source or publicly available work samples, and explain your tech skills in extreme detail. Few people seem to earnestly care what you can actually do technically. Ironically, I've found it's the ones who are hyperfocused on things like HackerRank tests who are least likely to care. Sure, you aced our HackerRank test, but after we thought about the fact you're not already employed we just decided no. I've even had recruiters and hiring managers get irrationally angry at me via email feedback or in phone interviews just for being unemployed, like they are personally mad at me that they have to come up with a reason to reject me. Even when I explain it has been an unavoidable and quite severe family problem, they are still mad. In a few cases it was even borderline verbal abuse. One recruiter took a very condescending tone with me and said something like, "it sounds like you don't even want to work" when I told him some of the things I was searching for in my next position. Then he proceeded to pressure me on several jobs that were clearly not at all appropriate for me. It's incredibly demoralizing, and I am even quite good at what I do. Just tonight I am hacking away at some stuff involving integrating the Postgres C API with the NumPy C API so that I can easily call NumPy array functions on Postgres arrays, as a C extension. It involves knowing a lot about CPython, NumPy, the Postgres C API, Postgres arrays, and a mix of other stuff. My plan is to ultimately compare it with MonetDB, which has tight integration with NumPy arrays natively (whereas, for plpythonu functions, Postgres arrays are converted to Python lists, which is horrible). This is not easy stuff, very advanced CPython stuff and I feel it shows I'm a fast learner too (I've only been using Python for a few years). Doesn't matter. I don't have a job, so nobody looking to hire for the positions I'm seeking will even consider it. It makes it very hard and depressing to continue trying (seemingly in vain) to keep my coding skills sharp.
- Kluny 10y ago
  You've got to learn to avoid telling them that you're unemployed. Best way is to work for yourself. Assign yourself a project, pay yourself in equity, and work on it for a few hours each day. Rehearse telling people about it in such a way that it sounds like a legit job. That will be easier if you take it as seriously as a legit job.
d99kris 10y ago
I'm not sure it's related at all, but anecdotally I found myself often falling sick after completing a crunch period at work, or taking a 1-2 week off from work. Nothing serious, but a cold/fever typically. As if being busy forces the body to not allow any sickness.
- withdavidli 10y ago
  Let down effect: http://health.usnews.com/health-news/health-wellness/articles/2016-01-06/the-let-down-effect-why-you-might-feel-bad-after-the-pressure-is-off http://health.usnews.com/health-news/health-wellness/article... In psych class we were given the analogy of people getting sick right after mid-term/finals (after a period of sustained high levels of stress)
ww520 10y ago
Continue to work on your terms is good for your health.
ChuckMcM 10y ago
I'm not sure why "retire" is equated with sitting on the porch doing nothing. Perhaps that is the image that some folks hold but I know lots and lots of people who fund their own existence through passive income (savings, etc) and do all sorts of interesting things. I need a different word for that state, perhaps self employed might be more accurate since at that point you are paying your own "salary".
- Phemist 10y ago
  It seems like leisure in the sense that Thoreau was talking about would be a good fit. Leisure"s contemporary meaning is pretty much doing nothing productive. Thoreau viewed at as doing things for their own sake, which does not preclude being productive. You can work as hard in leisure as you would for err... work to make a livelihood.
- girvo 10y ago
  My Grandfather retired at 45, after becoming the head-banker for a large bank in the north island of New Zealand. Got his gold Rolex and everything. He then proceeded to start, fund and get involved in a number of businesses, owns race-horses, has a massive social circle and is still going strong at 75. He's my idol, for good reason :)
gozur88 10y ago
I wonder if this article isn't putting the cart before the horse. If you're not getting just older but also sicker it gets harder and harder to drag yourself to work each day. Or, to put it another way, maybe you're working at 75 because you're not sick instead of not being sick because you're working.
- cableshaft 10y ago
  I'm in my thirties, and already have some mild chronic health issues that make me not really want to go to work some days. I imagine at 75 it's going to be nearly impossible to get me to go in to work most days. Hopefully everyone lives 24/7 in a VR pod by then.
jeffdavis 10y ago
I view retirement (distant future for me) as a chance to do unappreciated work. Does the world need a new birdhouse? Who cares. When I retire, if I want to spend 100 hours on a birdhouse, then I can, and I don't need to justify it to anyone. I'll even say it's worth $5000 because I spent so much time on it, and put it up for sale on eBay. If nobody buys it, then who cares? But sit around and do whatever the default thing is (watch TV, etc.): No thanks.
ensiferum 10y ago
I despise the use of the word "work" here. Basically any activity that you find rewarding and that keeps your body and mind moving will have the same effect. I.e. getting out of the bed and doing stuff helps you not to become a senile cretin. It doesn't have to be work
- tluyben2 10y ago
  Indeed. But for some reason people connect work with self worth. I have that the same with my hobbies but apparently a lot of people do not; it needs to be work to get that same feeling.
  - digi_owl 10y ago
    The proverbial "protestant work ethic". It may not be codified, but it seems to exist to some degree.
DominikR 10y ago
Continuing to work is probably good for a man's health if he has no (physical) activities he enjoys and no or very few friends. I agree with this. That men end up in such a situation is probably due to the fact that too many of us focus obsessively on a single relationship to one person and then give up in the process their social life, their activities and hobbies. And when the relationship ends for whatever reason you'll have nothing left in your life. That seems dangerous to me. Instead I try hard to keep my social network alive and meet new people just as hard as I try to keep my relationship alive. I believe this is what most women are doing anyways. It's also telling that this article is only about men. It's as if men are following subconsciously some kind of misguided role model that will get them to a point where it is most likely even better to continue working into their 70ties or 80ties than retiring.
jasonkester 10y ago
A better takeaway from this is to make sure that your Job is not the most important thing in your life. If your Job is the thing you do as little of as needed so that you can afford to spend time doing the really important things that give your life meaning, then having your Job go away isn't anywhere near as devastating as this article suggests. It's only because people tend to put so much of their identity into their career that this is an issue at all. I "Retired" from the 9-5 world last year, and my quality of life has seen a noticeable spike ever since. I have always prioritized climbing and other outdoor pursuits, travel and (more recently) raising kids over working, so dropping work down to near zero just let me turn all those other knobs up to where I think they should naturally belong. There's still a "work" knob in the form of the product businesses that bring in my income, and it too is dialed way down to where it belongs. Just enough to keep the mind sharp and diverted with a few hours of geekery each week. So the key, in my mind, is to arrange things so that you honestly don't miss your job once it comes time to give it up. It's cool to work hard and all. But there's a lot more to life than just work. If you wait until you're 65 then are suddenly forced to go find out what those other things are, it's going to be a lot less fun than if you start introducing them at age 25 and have them ticking away ready to take center stage as soon as the opportunity arises.
WalterBright 10y ago
Some years back, 60 Minutes interviewed a research chemist who was over 100, tottering around in his lab. They asked him why he didn't retire, and he replied that research chemistry was fun.
- fuzzfactor 10y ago
  If you're the kind that has breakthroughs with equipment or chemicals, sometimes it takes more than a decade of use for this to occur. Does seem to get exponentially more fun each decade, so many more breakthroughs to be made, so little time.
amelius 10y ago
> Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health This title strikes me as overly sexist.
- pbhjpbhj 10y ago
  In your experience do you find retiring women equally struggling to adjust? In part in the UK it may be that men have to work until later in life but it appears to me that men struggle much more than women with old-age retirement. That's based on observations of my parents and their group of friends, a disproportionate number of whom were teachers.
- assface 10y ago
  Good for you, but maybe you should read the article first.
chadcmulligan 10y ago
most people work hard for many hours a week, give up lots of stuff, so they can retire. The trouble is doing this means you give up having a life, and so when you retire you have nothing else. What's even worse is if you do this, then your health suffers. I don't know how many people i've known who do this and then get really angry that they're retired but don't have the health to do the things they always waited for. Me I work a reasonable number of hours have holidays and breaks, I'm middle aged. I'm not planning to retire, in many ways I sort of am. I do the work I like, have people around me I want to keep. Look after my health, know what my kids are doing. I'm lucky that I can do the work I like, and get paid for it, but I've made choices to avoid the soul sucking super highly paid stuff. I'm pleased with my choices, I'd recommend them to anyone younger. Saying this, there are times I've worked hard, and times I've had in between. Just working then retiring, then dying sucks imho
k__ 10y ago
I think it is sad that so many people grow up without learning what to do with their time besides working.
hordeallergy 10y ago
Developers are mostly anonymous among the millions - they have no identity there. This is the point of stickers on laptops, as with music shirts, a shortcut to identity.
gerbilly 10y ago
I always say that it's best to retire every few years. If I wait till I'm 65 (or 70 now) will I be be able to mountain bike, surf, rock climb and do all the other activities I enjoy? If I wait till I'm 65, I'll be too broken to do any of that.[1] [1] I know that my interests will change by the time I'm 65, but that doesn't mean those interests aren't worth pursuing now, while I do enjoy them.
- CuriouslyC 10y ago
  If you take care of your body there is no reason you can't mountain bike, climb or surf at 65. I'm willing to bet there are people over 65 doing all those things much better than you are currently able to.
  - gerbilly 10y ago
    > I'm willing to bet there are people over 65 doing all those things much better than you are currently able to. Of course this is true, but my chances of being fit enough to engage in those activities at 65 go down with the passage of time, and from many factors outside of my control (accidents, major illnesses, something else...) But there's a more subtle point. By the time I'm 65 I may not want to surf or mountain bike, but I do now. I need to retire the 20 year old me, the 30 year old me, the 40 year old me .... so that I can enjoy some freedom at each stage of my life. By the time I'm 65, I literally won't be the same person anymore.
    - heartsucker 10y ago
      Then decide right now that you want to be fit enough 30 years from now to mountain bike <insert local singletrack here>. What does that take? Probably the ability to pedal a bike with a heart rate of 150 for 3 hours. What does that take? You going out and riding a bike for 3 hours per day 2-3 times per week, every week until then. There ya go. Not saying don't take the time to enjoy life now, but don't sell your future self short. Especially on fitness. I feel like it's "ok" to be unfit after 35 the way it's "ok" to be bad at math. Like somehow society agreed that both of those just don't matter.
JustSomeNobody 10y ago
It's been forever ago, but I recall someone making one of those jokes that are not really. He asked, "What do men do when they retire? They die!"
up_and_up 10y ago
This literally just happened to my Dad. He went from working fulltime to being retired. He has completely lost his sense of purpose in life, mopes around, is becoming depressed. I feel bad but its also kinda pathetic. I mean c'mon dude you have decades of time to do whatever the fuck you want to. To me this is a symptom of men who do not find any other purpose in their life besides working and providing. We need diversification of interests and activities for our long-term wellbeing.
- sosuke 10y ago
  I hope you're trying to do something to light a fire for him. This happened to a relative of mine and I still am trying to get him into more hobbies. He has more free time than he knows what to do with.
  - up_and_up 10y ago
    I have been trying for years but he lives far away so its hard to encourage beyond words and trying to pay for activities etc.
matt_wulfeck 10y ago
I'm reading "Letters From a Self-made Merchant to his Son"[0] and this particular passage stuck out at me (keep in mind the author/merchant was very rich for his time and ran the business): > I hear a good deal about men who won’t take vacations, and who kill themselves by overwork, but it’s usually worry or whiskey. It’s not what a man does during working-hours, but after them, that breaks down his health. A fellow and his business should be bosom friends in the office and sworn enemies out of it. A clear mind is one that is swept clean of business at six o’clock every night and isn’t opened up for it again until after the shutters are taken down next morning. I think this really is something that's lost in our time. I know that 90% of the people reading this comment take their laptops home with them after work. [0] http://www.gutenberg.org/files/21959/21959-h/21959-h.htm http://www.gutenberg.org/files/21959/21959-h/21959-h.htm
ovt 10y ago
This is certainly a big issue. In the comments, I see of course how it's so vital for all of us, and yet our problems and our advice...varies because we're all different and it's hard to express what we are and what we love in two paragraphs. We can't help but talk past each other somewhat with strangers. Maybe what is best to take away from advice is less the specifics and more to take heart that others want to communicate and share and help. For my part, I'll say that "work" as such is not the place to seek meaning unless...unless it's right there for you, isn't hurting anything or anyone, etc.

218 points by _of 10y ago

Studies of health and activity have started to use accelerometers over the past decade. This has shown that even very modest levels of activity - on the order of washing dishes and puttering around the garden - have a meaningful correlation with health. This is causing something of a rethinking of the lower end of the dose-response curve for exercise. So when looking at the correlations between retirement and health, I'm inclined to think that physical activity level has a lot to do with it.

jaggederest 10y ago

As they say in the article, I think many people approach retirement as a cessation. From what I've seen of my own parents, I hope that retirement for me will be more a change of what I'm working on, and how I work, rather than whether or not I work. I'm also trying to make those changes now - working on what I want to work on, at a reasonable pace, at the level and times I'm interested. I'd quite happily keep doing this forever. It's a little frustrating that we reserve "living well and enjoying the fruits of your labor" for aged people - I'd rather enjoy it while I'm still relatively young and healthy, and mix it into my life rather than setting it aside as a separate thing.

pmiller2 10y ago
+1 to this. I plan to retire, or at least semi-retire at some point. To me, that means I'll have more time to do things I want to do that don't necessarily generate income.
brandon272 10y ago
I view retirement mostly as financial freedom. I have every intention of working after retirement as I get personal enjoyment out of doing what I do. I just haven't decided what "work" will look like.
- ergothus 10y ago
  This. I am baffled by friends and family that talk about how they couldn't retire because what would they do? My response is to list the many, many things I want to do that I can't because I 'have to work': read more, learn new languages (spoken & computer), take up the piano/guitar, try new games (board, tabletoprpg, computer), write, program, etc. The only reason I ever get bored is because I don't have the time, resources, and/or other people to do what I want. The thought of not having to rely on a work schedule to provide necessary resources sounds wonderful, not threatening.
  - maroonblazer 10y ago
    My problem is similar but different. The last couple of vacations I've taken have been staycations. Even though I have many hobbies and interests - several musical instruments, writing music, drawing, dabbling in code, reading - not having the structure of a job and expectations of others weighing on me to 'be productive' I procrastinated quite a lot. I frequently felt anxious and unfulfilled. I took this experience as a glimpse into what retirement might be like. In retirement I think I'll need to create a schedule for myself that includes having others depending on me to 'show up'. E.g. doing volunteer teaching, etc.
    - TeMPOraL 10y ago
      I've recently started scheduling stuff I'm doing in advance and trying to stick to it, and I found it incredibly empowering. I too ended up wasting a lot of free time despite having a growing bucket list of things to create - scheduling free time helps to overcome that and generally makes me happier. I hope to use the same technique if/when I retire.
    - elbows 10y ago
      I've found that when I've been stressed out or overly busy, it can take a while to adjust to a more relaxed rhythm. At first I just want to slack off completely. After a couple of days, this gets boring, but it takes longer than that for my motivation to come back. Last year I was unemployed for about a month, and it was really only near the end of that time that I started to get some momentum going with side projects and hobbies.
Shivetya 10y ago
Get a hobby, it will save your life and your marriage. Heck even having pets help. the idea is to not have idle time
singold 10y ago
You made me remember this "living life backwards" quote http://seniorplanet.org/living-life-backward/ http://seniorplanet.org/living-life-backward/

xirdstl 10y ago

This is a concern for me as I consider "early" retirement. I'm not sure what I would do with all that time. I took a bit of a sabbatical a few years ago and ran into some of the problems described in the article. After a few months, it did have some pretty negative effects on my mental health.

bpchaps 10y ago
Find a problem to solve in your local community and do what it takes to fix it, no matter how small. You'll learn, do good and get involved with your community more. I recently took six months off to try and solve some local problems. There hasn't been a dull moment. :)
- xirdstl 10y ago
  What kind of problems were you working on?
  - bpchaps 10y ago
    Lots of the work is just me identifying problems that I see and trying to fix them. Most of it is just exploratory and can be stressful at times, but it's overall very rewarding. I just accepted an offer in the infosec field to get out of the stress and to, well, get out of a financial hole. -Heck of a lot of FOIA requests to get the Chicago mayor's office's phone records. -Went to a hackathon a couple months back and made a domestic violence shelter map which has since been taken over by a small team of volunteers. -Got some wrongful parking tickets and started a project to map out Chicago's parking tickets using FOIA data. -Started setting up a LAN party with some friends which we hope will have 160+ people. -Freelance work here and there for some cash to help pay the bills. -Found some security vulnerabilities that could have impacted comcast's network which I helped fix. Did the same with Northwestern, but they didn't fix it. -Lots and lots of learning of random things.
- wonder_er 10y ago
  Please expand on some of what you're working on! I've been thinking about just this sort of "work" to start dipping my toes into, don't quite know where to start.

nevster 10y ago

I'm thinking I'll code till the day I die. So much cool tech is always coming out - so much to play with and invent! I also have very time consuming hobbies - reading, playing video games, pen and paper role playing games, board games.

ams6110 10y ago
I don't know if everyone is this way, but at 50 I am losing a little of the starry-eyed excitement. I've seen a lot of the same ideas come around again and again as a new great thing. And yet the pace of change is so fast, if you try to stay current you feel like you never really become an expert in anything. You get jaded. If and when I "retire" I would not see myself not working, but I do think I might do somthing completely different and new. I could see walking away from computer tech entirely. In fact that idea is pretty attractive, honestly. I'm old enough to clearly remember the days before the internet, before mobile phones, before being constantly connected to everything 24x7. When you would leave the house or office, nobody would be able to get in touch with you and you could do what you wanted to do without interruption or distraction. It was nice.
- tintor 10y ago
  > When you would leave the house or office, nobody would be able to get in touch with you and you could do what you wanted to do without interruption or distraction. It was nice. It was nice? You can still leave your phone at home.
  - conceit 10y ago
    apparently, for some, many even, this puts them under some stress and pressure, socially and organisatoric.
    - 50CNT 10y ago
      In which case you need to delineate your channels of access more clearly. Move your main communication to something more asynchronous (email, text, wechat/whatsapp, slack), set a time where things will be checked, and perhaps offer an emergency line over real-time messaging (phone calls fit the bill best). Most things are not time critical, and a sizable portion of the things that are, are not mission critical.

firebones 10y ago

FWIW, I started this thread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12013621 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12013621 with the hope that we could collect some good examples of how people stay busy after retirement. A great example for me is Don Melton, formerly of Safari and WebKit, who tweets routinely about his work on video transcoding [1]. I follow him on Twitter (@donmelton) and he gives me hope for any future retirement I might be lucky enough to have. [1] https://github.com/donmelton/video_transcoding https://github.com/donmelton/video_transcoding

andyjdavis 10y ago

>“You go from working 50, 60, 70 hours a week to zero,” Moen says. “And it very much affects your identity. Who am I? For men, the answer usually is their job.” I feel like this is a problem our whole life however it is only once we retire that we are forced to confront it. Until then we are able to avoid dealing with a lack of fulfilling activities outside of work, limited social connections and a weak sense of identity outside of work by simply working more. When we retire that coping mechanism goes away and you are left with no hobbies, a weak social network and a weak self image. Personally, I strongly recommend trying cutting your work commitments to something like 20 hours per week. Do this for a year or so. It will give you a chance to realize that many of the things you previously did whenever you got the chance (sleeping in etc) become extremely boring when you can do them all the time. After a while you will likely start to crave some sense of structure and accomplishment and the sooner you start filling the void outside of your work the better. Having a meaningful existence outside of your job will make you happier both now and in retirement.

chubot 10y ago
I think this is why it's good to work for an employer who supports open source. You don't want the entire value of your work and your social connections to be abruptly cut off once you leave the company. I saw this happen to both my parents. My dad was forced to retire at 53 and the value of his work was locked up inside that company (he worked there for over 20 years, so your skills develop in a bubble). For the last year and a half, I've been working on open source sponsored by the company. (I've worked on open source since 2009, but this is the first time I've been paid for it.) Even though it's mostly "our" project, there are enough outsiders lurking / paying attention I know that if I were to leave the company, I might have some opportunities or people to reach out to, or even just people to talk to about technical topics. Some of the proprietary software I've worked on has been very interesting, important, and technically sophisticated... but I know that once I leave the company, its value is drastically decreased. Basically you have to build up that value "from scratch" again, whereas open source can be forked, modified, combined, etc.
- andyjdavis 10y ago

p4wnc6 10y ago

I am only 30 but have been unemployed for about 15 months, due to a significant family health and legal situation. I can definitely say that not working, even if other life needs are met, has had a hugely adverse affect. I definitely need to feel proud of what I am working on to feel whole and well. Ceasing to work and then resuming a new job search is also demoralizing. Most people will not even consider hiring you unless you are already working, even if you can ace the code tests, point to open source or publicly available work samples, and explain your tech skills in extreme detail. Few people seem to earnestly care what you can actually do technically. Ironically, I've found it's the ones who are hyperfocused on things like HackerRank tests who are least likely to care. Sure, you aced our HackerRank test, but after we thought about the fact you're not already employed we just decided no. I've even had recruiters and hiring managers get irrationally angry at me via email feedback or in phone interviews just for being unemployed, like they are personally mad at me that they have to come up with a reason to reject me. Even when I explain it has been an unavoidable and quite severe family problem, they are still mad. In a few cases it was even borderline verbal abuse. One recruiter took a very condescending tone with me and said something like, "it sounds like you don't even want to work" when I told him some of the things I was searching for in my next position. Then he proceeded to pressure me on several jobs that were clearly not at all appropriate for me. It's incredibly demoralizing, and I am even quite good at what I do. Just tonight I am hacking away at some stuff involving integrating the Postgres C API with the NumPy C API so that I can easily call NumPy array functions on Postgres arrays, as a C extension. It involves knowing a lot about CPython, NumPy, the Postgres C API, Postgres arrays, and a mix of other stuff. My plan is to ultimately compare it with MonetDB, which has tight integration with NumPy arrays natively (whereas, for plpythonu functions, Postgres arrays are converted to Python lists, which is horrible). This is not easy stuff, very advanced CPython stuff and I feel it shows I'm a fast learner too (I've only been using Python for a few years). Doesn't matter. I don't have a job, so nobody looking to hire for the positions I'm seeking will even consider it. It makes it very hard and depressing to continue trying (seemingly in vain) to keep my coding skills sharp.

Kluny 10y ago
You've got to learn to avoid telling them that you're unemployed. Best way is to work for yourself. Assign yourself a project, pay yourself in equity, and work on it for a few hours each day. Rehearse telling people about it in such a way that it sounds like a legit job. That will be easier if you take it as seriously as a legit job.

d99kris 10y ago

I'm not sure it's related at all, but anecdotally I found myself often falling sick after completing a crunch period at work, or taking a 1-2 week off from work. Nothing serious, but a cold/fever typically. As if being busy forces the body to not allow any sickness.

withdavidli 10y ago
Let down effect: http://health.usnews.com/health-news/health-wellness/articles/2016-01-06/the-let-down-effect-why-you-might-feel-bad-after-the-pressure-is-off http://health.usnews.com/health-news/health-wellness/article... In psych class we were given the analogy of people getting sick right after mid-term/finals (after a period of sustained high levels of stress)

ww520 10y ago

Continue to work on your terms is good for your health.

ChuckMcM 10y ago

I'm not sure why "retire" is equated with sitting on the porch doing nothing. Perhaps that is the image that some folks hold but I know lots and lots of people who fund their own existence through passive income (savings, etc) and do all sorts of interesting things. I need a different word for that state, perhaps self employed might be more accurate since at that point you are paying your own "salary".

Phemist 10y ago
It seems like leisure in the sense that Thoreau was talking about would be a good fit. Leisure"s contemporary meaning is pretty much doing nothing productive. Thoreau viewed at as doing things for their own sake, which does not preclude being productive. You can work as hard in leisure as you would for err... work to make a livelihood.
girvo 10y ago
My Grandfather retired at 45, after becoming the head-banker for a large bank in the north island of New Zealand. Got his gold Rolex and everything. He then proceeded to start, fund and get involved in a number of businesses, owns race-horses, has a massive social circle and is still going strong at 75. He's my idol, for good reason :)

gozur88 10y ago

I wonder if this article isn't putting the cart before the horse. If you're not getting just older but also sicker it gets harder and harder to drag yourself to work each day. Or, to put it another way, maybe you're working at 75 because you're not sick instead of not being sick because you're working.

cableshaft 10y ago
I'm in my thirties, and already have some mild chronic health issues that make me not really want to go to work some days. I imagine at 75 it's going to be nearly impossible to get me to go in to work most days. Hopefully everyone lives 24/7 in a VR pod by then.

jeffdavis 10y ago

I view retirement (distant future for me) as a chance to do unappreciated work. Does the world need a new birdhouse? Who cares. When I retire, if I want to spend 100 hours on a birdhouse, then I can, and I don't need to justify it to anyone. I'll even say it's worth $5000 because I spent so much time on it, and put it up for sale on eBay. If nobody buys it, then who cares? But sit around and do whatever the default thing is (watch TV, etc.): No thanks.

ensiferum 10y ago

I despise the use of the word "work" here. Basically any activity that you find rewarding and that keeps your body and mind moving will have the same effect. I.e. getting out of the bed and doing stuff helps you not to become a senile cretin. It doesn't have to be work

tluyben2 10y ago
Indeed. But for some reason people connect work with self worth. I have that the same with my hobbies but apparently a lot of people do not; it needs to be work to get that same feeling.
- digi_owl 10y ago
  The proverbial "protestant work ethic". It may not be codified, but it seems to exist to some degree.

DominikR 10y ago

Continuing to work is probably good for a man's health if he has no (physical) activities he enjoys and no or very few friends. I agree with this. That men end up in such a situation is probably due to the fact that too many of us focus obsessively on a single relationship to one person and then give up in the process their social life, their activities and hobbies. And when the relationship ends for whatever reason you'll have nothing left in your life. That seems dangerous to me. Instead I try hard to keep my social network alive and meet new people just as hard as I try to keep my relationship alive. I believe this is what most women are doing anyways. It's also telling that this article is only about men. It's as if men are following subconsciously some kind of misguided role model that will get them to a point where it is most likely even better to continue working into their 70ties or 80ties than retiring.

jasonkester 10y ago

A better takeaway from this is to make sure that your Job is not the most important thing in your life. If your Job is the thing you do as little of as needed so that you can afford to spend time doing the really important things that give your life meaning, then having your Job go away isn't anywhere near as devastating as this article suggests. It's only because people tend to put so much of their identity into their career that this is an issue at all. I "Retired" from the 9-5 world last year, and my quality of life has seen a noticeable spike ever since. I have always prioritized climbing and other outdoor pursuits, travel and (more recently) raising kids over working, so dropping work down to near zero just let me turn all those other knobs up to where I think they should naturally belong. There's still a "work" knob in the form of the product businesses that bring in my income, and it too is dialed way down to where it belongs. Just enough to keep the mind sharp and diverted with a few hours of geekery each week. So the key, in my mind, is to arrange things so that you honestly don't miss your job once it comes time to give it up. It's cool to work hard and all. But there's a lot more to life than just work. If you wait until you're 65 then are suddenly forced to go find out what those other things are, it's going to be a lot less fun than if you start introducing them at age 25 and have them ticking away ready to take center stage as soon as the opportunity arises.

WalterBright 10y ago

Some years back, 60 Minutes interviewed a research chemist who was over 100, tottering around in his lab. They asked him why he didn't retire, and he replied that research chemistry was fun.

fuzzfactor 10y ago
If you're the kind that has breakthroughs with equipment or chemicals, sometimes it takes more than a decade of use for this to occur. Does seem to get exponentially more fun each decade, so many more breakthroughs to be made, so little time.

amelius 10y ago

> Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health This title strikes me as overly sexist.

pbhjpbhj 10y ago
In your experience do you find retiring women equally struggling to adjust? In part in the UK it may be that men have to work until later in life but it appears to me that men struggle much more than women with old-age retirement. That's based on observations of my parents and their group of friends, a disproportionate number of whom were teachers.
assface 10y ago
Good for you, but maybe you should read the article first.

chadcmulligan 10y ago

most people work hard for many hours a week, give up lots of stuff, so they can retire. The trouble is doing this means you give up having a life, and so when you retire you have nothing else. What's even worse is if you do this, then your health suffers. I don't know how many people i've known who do this and then get really angry that they're retired but don't have the health to do the things they always waited for. Me I work a reasonable number of hours have holidays and breaks, I'm middle aged. I'm not planning to retire, in many ways I sort of am. I do the work I like, have people around me I want to keep. Look after my health, know what my kids are doing. I'm lucky that I can do the work I like, and get paid for it, but I've made choices to avoid the soul sucking super highly paid stuff. I'm pleased with my choices, I'd recommend them to anyone younger. Saying this, there are times I've worked hard, and times I've had in between. Just working then retiring, then dying sucks imho

k__ 10y ago

I think it is sad that so many people grow up without learning what to do with their time besides working.

hordeallergy 10y ago

Developers are mostly anonymous among the millions - they have no identity there. This is the point of stickers on laptops, as with music shirts, a shortcut to identity.

gerbilly 10y ago

I always say that it's best to retire every few years. If I wait till I'm 65 (or 70 now) will I be be able to mountain bike, surf, rock climb and do all the other activities I enjoy? If I wait till I'm 65, I'll be too broken to do any of that.[1] [1] I know that my interests will change by the time I'm 65, but that doesn't mean those interests aren't worth pursuing now, while I do enjoy them.

CuriouslyC 10y ago
If you take care of your body there is no reason you can't mountain bike, climb or surf at 65. I'm willing to bet there are people over 65 doing all those things much better than you are currently able to.
- gerbilly 10y ago
  > I'm willing to bet there are people over 65 doing all those things much better than you are currently able to. Of course this is true, but my chances of being fit enough to engage in those activities at 65 go down with the passage of time, and from many factors outside of my control (accidents, major illnesses, something else...) But there's a more subtle point. By the time I'm 65 I may not want to surf or mountain bike, but I do now. I need to retire the 20 year old me, the 30 year old me, the 40 year old me .... so that I can enjoy some freedom at each stage of my life. By the time I'm 65, I literally won't be the same person anymore.
  - heartsucker 10y ago
    Then decide right now that you want to be fit enough 30 years from now to mountain bike <insert local singletrack here>. What does that take? Probably the ability to pedal a bike with a heart rate of 150 for 3 hours. What does that take? You going out and riding a bike for 3 hours per day 2-3 times per week, every week until then. There ya go. Not saying don't take the time to enjoy life now, but don't sell your future self short. Especially on fitness. I feel like it's "ok" to be unfit after 35 the way it's "ok" to be bad at math. Like somehow society agreed that both of those just don't matter.

JustSomeNobody 10y ago

It's been forever ago, but I recall someone making one of those jokes that are not really. He asked, "What do men do when they retire? They die!"

up_and_up 10y ago

This literally just happened to my Dad. He went from working fulltime to being retired. He has completely lost his sense of purpose in life, mopes around, is becoming depressed. I feel bad but its also kinda pathetic. I mean c'mon dude you have decades of time to do whatever the fuck you want to. To me this is a symptom of men who do not find any other purpose in their life besides working and providing. We need diversification of interests and activities for our long-term wellbeing.

sosuke 10y ago
I hope you're trying to do something to light a fire for him. This happened to a relative of mine and I still am trying to get him into more hobbies. He has more free time than he knows what to do with.
- up_and_up 10y ago
  I have been trying for years but he lives far away so its hard to encourage beyond words and trying to pay for activities etc.

matt_wulfeck 10y ago

I'm reading "Letters From a Self-made Merchant to his Son"[0] and this particular passage stuck out at me (keep in mind the author/merchant was very rich for his time and ran the business): > I hear a good deal about men who won’t take vacations, and who kill themselves by overwork, but it’s usually worry or whiskey. It’s not what a man does during working-hours, but after them, that breaks down his health. A fellow and his business should be bosom friends in the office and sworn enemies out of it. A clear mind is one that is swept clean of business at six o’clock every night and isn’t opened up for it again until after the shutters are taken down next morning. I think this really is something that's lost in our time. I know that 90% of the people reading this comment take their laptops home with them after work. [0] http://www.gutenberg.org/files/21959/21959-h/21959-h.htm http://www.gutenberg.org/files/21959/21959-h/21959-h.htm

ovt 10y ago

This is certainly a big issue. In the comments, I see of course how it's so vital for all of us, and yet our problems and our advice...varies because we're all different and it's hard to express what we are and what we love in two paragraphs. We can't help but talk past each other somewhat with strangers. Maybe what is best to take away from advice is less the specifics and more to take heart that others want to communicate and share and help. For my part, I'll say that "work" as such is not the place to seek meaning unless...unless it's right there for you, isn't hurting anything or anyone, etc.